[ may it serve you well, jayce. if only it were so fucking simple.
ever since his most recent retreat from having his hooves on the edge of a building's open floor eight stories up, jayce has crashed, and crashed, and crashed— every time from something he couldn't wrap his head around, and when he did, it came with a flurry of emotions that were too untamed to swallow and keep down before the bile rose to his mouth. for one, he is alive. lets start with that: a warm tan to his skin that nearly brings a sunny glow to him. no open wounds, no putrid stenches, no disgusting sound following him. just a small limp, and much more sensitivity to his nerves. they fire off at the smallest of stimuli, where brushes become grabs and temperature either feels too hot or too cold. he actually feels it. he still cannot enter the sunlight's domain, either, so night is when he continues his activities (which didn't really amount to anything other than pacing or hitting things, or.....). but the first time after the occurance that he catches his reflection while washing the stains and peeling away the now dry, anomaly-webbed velvet on his half-rack of antlers, he stares at it a good long while, and what remained of purple smudges under his beard . . . and feels sick. not enough to lose his meal, but enough that he must sit, and keep his head close to a container, just in case.
how he came to be was the worst offender, and something he thinks about for about two days straight, no pauses. minimal contact. frustrated pacing and moments of heated bugling, silent sobbing or just a numb sort of stare at the moon. he should be turning that thing inside and out. studying the history and racing down variables in equations to find a way to replicate what it had done. he can't. he fucking can't concentrate on anything else. because every beat within his chest was a ghost haunting him. every hush of the wind or the rattle of tree branches is a huff, or laugh, when he remembered how it was. every chill was a gaze that cut through him, and the pain within him an insurmountable hole that could never be replaced and ached at the absence just as much as the harm done. it made jayce feel insignificant. it made him feel like a project, like the very dead thing he was— with no way back. no salvation. no fixing. only the key to wind him up again and force him to clatter to his doomsdays being by being forcibly slammed into his back.
jayce would evaluate, flip it around, reevaluate, twist and turn it and wonders if he could've done anything differently to change the outcome. he mulls over his words over and over, overthinking as he does best. whether or not he comes to a reasonable conclusion is out of his grasp; what's done is done. he cannot undo viktor popping his own bloodbag open. he cannot undo his hope to linger rather than fall. he couldn't stop himself from consuming every drop of it like a starving animal. he could not have stopped viktor from stabbing his heart so much its wounds keep bleeding, in the form of distrust. in the form of making two choices for him— the same way jayce had done to viktor. he let him go, sent him off. hurt him in a way jayce never thought he'd hear with his own ears, and then— as if on schedule, he interrupts at jayce's lowest. he waited thirty fucking days to help him, or that's, at least, what jayce had thought it was. until viktor slid blades between his ribs and twisted the hilt.
is fate real, he wonders? did he run himself into a loop he couldn't escape from? is it laughing at them? playing this sick, twisted little game of turning tables and switching roles until either side was battered and bruised beyond proper performance? was this karma? did he deserve all of this? part of jayce comes to the ready denouement that yes, this was all somehow his fault. that yes, he deserved it. he deserved it for not letting viktor go when he had the chance to. he deserved it for making him into a walking anomaly, for taking his choices, for breaking his promises. the world could've been saved, then. they could've avoided everything, even this. so . . . why the fuck can he still not fathom that answer?
jayce knows why, even if his incredulity keeps him from personally seeking viktor out on his first, terrible, horrible, no good very bad day of soaking in the consequences of his love. he's not ready to look into his eyes without fracturing under his beauty, one more time, and running the risk of being ground into dust. so . . . when would he be ready—? on the evening of the second day, jayce sits in his truck, only a little calmer but getting crimped when he was trying to come up with schematics for a cane and couldn't stop thinking about viktor's as a base. because that also came with thinking about viktor.
are they better off apart? jayce thinks about it. the world would be safer. maybe. they wouldn't hurt each other so much. and he wouldn't . . . have this impassible urge to crawl back to him, either. it's fiddling with the radio and getting viktor's softspoken accent out of it that quiets him. what were only a few curious minutes became hours. of a nostalgia he wishes he could hug onto tightly. never let it go. go back to. it's hearing himself when viktor needed him, buring his face in his hands and squeezing his knuckles into his eyes. it's— hearing the mage, one more time, that he realizes something.
and so, without really thinking much of it, fingers twitching— he seeks viktor. ]
[The days disappear for Viktor. More time lost. What was once his most precious and limited asset, now time feels like an enemy to him. Time drags moment to moment, emotional emptiness clashes against spikes of intensity. There is no balance, only swings, nothing to overwhelming and back again in instants. Playing out in his mind in uneven gusts of wind, in storms that cannot be predicted. No pendulum, no carried momentum between moments, just chaotic highs and lows.
The first thing to bring him peace in those days after drugging Jayce is... Jayce. It's always Jayce, of course it is. Viktor was keeping his distance, whether that was out of respect or disrespect didn't matter. It was what he was doing. Then, trying to move his truck to a new spot to recharge the battery, it came on the radio.
Jayce's voice, youthful and enthused. Naive. Ecstatic. Viktor's in turn, arguing through hypothesis, interpreting data sets. They sound like different people, but they were. The them of the past playing out in sound waves and crackling interference would not recognize the them of the present moment. They are far too metamorphosized, changed, and twisted. They would be seen as devils to the men on the radio.
Yet, it is a strange comfort to remember being those men. Once, they were hungry merely with ambition. Viktor can disassociate himself back to that time. Can wear those clothes no longer quite his size. He can pretend and he can dream of their dream again.
His truck is quiet, but the radio is playing loud. Chattering. Yapping away. It doesn't matter what is being said, it's like rain pattering on windows, comforting noise. Viktor has the back of the greenhouse trunk wide open so the plants can get fresher air from the night beyond the windows. Viktor is laid out flat in the bed of the dirt, surrounded on all sides by the bits of nature he could sustain. It smells nice, like wet soil and cold greenery. A small oasis. He cannot sleep, but it is as mellow as he has been since his re-arrival. Listening to Jayce talk to him in another time, another place, another version of themselves... it's escapism. He just wants to escape.
He will cant his head when he notices an approach, but even for the Jayce of now, he only slumps back into place. Laid out on his back, looking upward at the night sky through a misty pane of glass. He speaks, quiet and trying to take on the character of his voice before he became so distorted. Viktor nearly succeeds,]
Jayce? Do you need a place to lay down? [there is room besides him, if Jayce isn't going to fuss about the chill or dampness of the soil. Viktor needs it, his body too warm as it overclocks itself trying to heal from so much sacrificed blood,]
[ at first, jayce doesn't say a word. first thought: fuck you. gods, fuck you. he should go off but his nose twitches from a frown. his shadow from the moon's near blue glow only hands in front of the open back seat, his own bleak hesitation being put on brazen display. it was too dangerous and far too soon to take him up on that offer. every part of jayce's intellect bellows at him to stay standing, at the very least take the edge of the vehicle to rest his hooves (there is no longer a particularly "bad leg", but two bad legs with one overcompensating for the worse one). he doesn't need to remain distant, but there does need to be a limit. a line drawn. after everything, the voice makes his ears flip low—
and his heart skip.
the crackling white noise of their past drifting in and out of frequency stirs another beat in him that squeezes his chest so tightly he doesn't know if he's seconds from prancing or screaming— that viktor had been doing the same thing he was was a daunting revelation to seal the doubt boiling as much as make the base of his own recent musings solidify under any more of it: they're both hurting. and he doesn't want this wedge between them.
another thing worth noting is jayce's inability to stay rationally mad at viktor on sight. he made the mistake of staring, perhaps too long at the curve of his cheekbones and the bob of his neck as he spoke in an almost familiar way. the pang of guilt when jayce could not see the beautiful gold he himself had taken away from such a sharp, striking gaze. with both mind and body at war, jayce forces discipline. firmness. he will stay where he is.
his brain is on high alert; it tallies his wounds. it replays betrayal, it replicates how it felt perfectly, to the point that the whispers ring true: this was a bad idea.
and yet, the body has been directly and seductively spoken to. it speaks to the yearning, the starvation he suffers not in blood but in familiarity and warmth. it targets the animal, the stag that begins to twitch at the waft of scents, of the half man's musk and the bed of soil, lush crispness of fresh greens. it's too heavy in the air. he can even feel his vision turn sharper as his pupils swell, as viktor's words keep repeating and bypass every warning signal jayce had put up, destroying every planned action he's meticulously routed on his way over. something deep and purring chuckles in his chest and up his throat with no humor attached. it's not a man-made sound.
jayce's body begins to move before he can even command himself to stop. his gut clenches and releases all at once— and he lays in the cool earthy bed next to his former partner, in surrender and self-destruction, all in one silent breath. it doesn't feel like a triumph, that, he can say with certainty. ]
[The greenhouse is crowded with the stunted plants capable of growing under such conditions. Water pipes are engineered masterfully to fit efficiently in the space, winding and creating a sprinkler system above and a filtration system below for water conservation. The electric engine doesn't make much for noise, but the water system babbles within the ducts and trickles from the ceiling, a simulacrum of brooks and gentle rain fall.
Voices chatter through the radio crackle, louder than all of it. Still, the peaceful atmosphere fills the gaps between words, speaks within the thoughtful pauses of the past.
Viktor's eyes alone follow Jayce, as he crawls his way into the space to join him. It had been quite a while, both back home and in this place alike, that they laid side-by-side. The roving greenhouse feels more like a glass coffin than ever, the two laid to rest as a pair. Something in Viktor aches at that idea, with yearning melancholy and loathsome desire. Why can't he be more rational than this-? Jayce had once inspired that part in him, only to now destroy it with his mere presence.
He breathes in despite not needing to, the instinct simply there. Jayce no longer reeks of rot. Not that the insectoid Viktor minded that one bit beyond how concerning for Jayce he found it. His shoulders were tense when the man first approached, but they slack at his sides, Viktor remains flat on his back and looks directly upward, through the glass ceiling, rather than to his partner at his side,]
... nice weather we're having.
[He might be molded into a being not fully machine, nor bug, nor man... but even that won't take Viktor's dry sense of humor from him. Some parts of him even death cannot steal away.]
[ oh, viktor. fuck you, too. twice over. thrice over. that pains jayce in a way that an almost surprised huff swiftly hushes past the spaces of his teeth. he doesn't think to speak his heart back, his hands folding awkwardly over his chest where his heart beats to remind him, of the bittersweet past that now weaves both nostalgic yearning and bitter harm that is slipping from jayce's death grip with each blaring trickle of water working through the pipes.
he couldn't let him go, he couldn't even bring himself to stay away, and now the warmth from jayce's body that felt like a radiating furnace against the cool earth embracing his back reaches out through his stiffness, a silent invitation he wants to take back in his hands and rip to shreds. hopefully, the air doesn't get heavy. it's too bad that it was already loaded with aura, tension and humiliating need. jayce can smell so much more than the plants. ]
Yeah. [ the cervid ear between them flips in viktor's direction, his voice curling dry, but also . . . wrapped in something else. ] You were always good at picking the scenery.
[ the compliment, if you could call it that, sat just like a bruise: soft along the edges yet exposed and tender, painful in the way jayce ears fold back quickly and the tail between his legs tucks in. he tries to shift his legs, one into a bend to hide the fact, hide his involuntary body language that speaks faster just as much as louder. a shadow of humor lays there, but the way his eyes slide to viktor’s profile ruins the joke.
the words hang, warm and wounded all at once, and he hates how much he means them. ]
Edited (im sorry i just woke up) Date: 2025-08-13 11:38 am (UTC)
[Viktor's eyes first shift to see Jayce tilt himself, to look back at him rather than the sky above. He thinks to not engage, to not indulge, but fails his own resolve. With a slow swivel and then a slack thud into the soil, Viktor looks fully sidelong to Jayce. His pearlescent eyes are dull in night time, the moon's glow filtered through foggy glass and the shade of leaves. Jayce might believe they're playing tricks on him, that color and illumination is conspiring to make them appear more honey toned than they are.
As Jayce understands it, as a bruise, Viktor's voice asks with tenderness,]
What do you mean by that?
[it sounds like Viktor, like the old days. The radio practically sounds like it's speaking through him, with less hiss around the edges. Perhaps so much listening to his old self could let Viktor mimic it, to act out a role he used to play well. A retired mask, the Assistant to the Dean of the Academy. It hadn't been enough for him, he had bigger aspirations, he could not be content as he was.
The tone is gentle, not accusatory, not harsh. Just curious. Prying. Hopeful towards the promise of knowledge, of understanding better how Jayce's mind works, of what he's thinking.
Viktor used to have a sense of wonder, after all. In this moment, it's not gone from him.]
[ jayce tries another time not to react as much as he does, but his entire rewired biology keeps him from doing such a thing. cervids are reactive by nature. his ears flip, both direct themselves forward in viktor's direction, the fur lining it quivering with his gaze caught in headlights before he could have the fighting chance at prying them away. it matters not how viktor's eyes were, whether they were reminders of the missed past or the bittersweet present— they would always enrapture him.
jayce breathes in, words catch on his tongue like they're not sure which way they want to cut, and losing the presumed edge they'd have by the minute. jayce breathes them out anyway, low and refined with a ghost of warmth that refuses to die. a briefly darting gaze sliding down and back up. something feels . . . bitter, on his tongue. he stares at viktor now with diminished distance, enticed like a moth to a flame— and knowing he's been caught in the pyre. or, perhaps, what he's always wanted: he just wants viktor back. his partner. his desire does not change. he wished he could be the same man viktor needed— but could he?
jayce was always a terrible liar. honesty, it is. ]
Means you can make anywhere feel like somewhere I'd want to stay. [ it sounds, for a heartbeat, like something tender. Like he's talking about those nights when the two of them made the most unremarkable corners of piltover into places worth remembering. a workshop floor littered with tools and half-finished dreams. but the weight in his voice says the rest: ] Even when I know better.
[ he's talking about now, too, about the places viktor's pulled him back into against his better judgment. things that he could not fathom pretending they didn't happen. it would hurt him all the more. his ears fold flat in the next breath, the tail's twitch betraying the fact he wishes he could swallow the words whole.
but if viktor is receptive to speaking with him, then . . . should they not try to speak? it's not as if jayce wanted this interference. it was more of an . . . inevitability, given their circumstances and choices. hadn't he, after all— done the same to viktor? ]
[Viktor's eyes follow after Jayce's, the rest of him unmoving, only watching and mirroring his partner's gaze. Viktor's arms are folded just beneath his ribs, just beneath hole still blown through his chest and out his back. The heart within doesn't beep with the sad overload or safety mode indicator. At peace, for the time being, at equilibrium of energy. It doesn't beat so much as hum with nearly silent battery operation,
The heart in Jayce's chest is louder, an organic reminder of the humanity they once shared,]
You can stay here a while, Jayce... as you like.
[Viktor had welcomed him, after all. A time and place to just lay down. A respite, an oasis in the desolate landscape around them. Perhaps more fitting, a terrarium for their cruel experimentation. It doesn't matter how one sees it, not really.
Metaphors fail to distract Viktor from the wrongness of his joy. To lay beside Jayce is ill deserved. Another thing he knows full well and yet does not care to uphold the righteousness of.]
We have much knowledge that our better senses ignore, don't we?
[ It is more a reminder of Viktor to Jayce, every single waking minute that drives him into an obsessing madness. His heart was Viktor's heart, pattering against his ribs and the most palpable against the spot where he lacked a sternum. it would take him back to that day his former pump was ripped from his chest. To the few days ago, when he'd rather die than give up on something . . . so hopeless. It wouldn't be the first time, that'd be certain. The thought cuts deep, feels cruel. ]
Yeah. I'm still here listening, for one.
[ And— Craving, to the point that he curls his fingers into fists and stiffles some sort of grunt. His damn tail flicks, and the most he could do is ignore it. Alas (or not?), he's not exactly known for giving up on questionable endeavors. But plenty of things feel cruel to him, as of late. But Viktor is not pushing him away. Jayce leans into it, trailing his eyes lower to the cups of Viktor's nimble hands. The air between them is not the same and Jayce fears it never would be again. Still— Jayce nods wordlessly, shifting his body sideways to adjust where his antlers catch, in dirt and a stray, leafy vine. To face Viktor meant that his broken antler was too short to scrape the bedding. It meant that he could challenge eye contact, even though his voice and gaze are nowhere near as severe as they could be. ]
[Jayce moves to look more sidelong at him. Viktor thinks he should remain as he is. Back to the truck, eyes easily up and away, distant and uneffective.
He rolls onto his side, the gesture a mirror to Jayce leaning in towards him. No helping it, it just happens to him. Viktor lays looking to Jayce fully, arching his elbows and laying both his hands close by his own face. One, knuckles down and fingers curled loosely. The other, fingertips sunk down into the soil, as if kneading it for comfort. He gives Jayce a look, a well trod one, a familiar one,
Flippant, his tone is that of "of course not",]
You don't listen to me.
[That same tone says "and you shouldn't", knowing his troublesome and reckless ways back in the lab, he was always the one insisting on the less reserved course of action. Jayce was the more hesitant one, wasn't he? The more measured one, in his own ways, if no less driven by scientific obsession than Viktor...]
[ jayce doesn't know if it's the retort that freezes him in place, or the way viktor lays before him. the pearly iridescence of his gaze, or the reminder of the promise he'd broken. both sink into his bones with devastating efficiency, until he was stripped bare, his lips barely holding together and his ears immediately pulling back. jayce was already expressive, but having ears and a tail just about dooms his chances of hiding what he feels. with his lungs witholding his breath, jayce's stare hangs between them— partially hurt from the truth that bore, and partially objective. ]
That's not fair, [ his voice wavers. rough. salt burns in his wounds. ] I did listen. When you explained things to me, when you gave me the chance— I did—
[ he listened when he was going to end himself the first time. he . . . didn't listen when the council started working in. when he was supposed to destroy the hexcore. when he wasn't supposed to weaponize hextech—
he listened when viktor, old and grey at the edge of the earth with only his jayce's statue still corpse to remind him of all his failures, rotting in an endless loop of time— he listened when the same viktor warned him of the arcane's seduction.
and now, jayce just finds himself in the same, messy ditch. in the same turbulence. his ears keep slanted back, folded as the background noise of their conversations fill the void in his chest. talk about naming their creations. hex here, hex there—
there's a pattern, in all of this. ]
I always made my worst decisions when we were apart.
We are well past fairness. We both made our choices, Jayce.
[for worst or for better or for somewhere in between, they've done what they've done. No erasing that, not without leaving the hurt for others to bare in their stead. Viktor turned away the chance to do that, would lay with the burden weighing on him. A phantom pain ever present within his empty chest.
Hex here, hex there... their voices of the past laugh through better and worse names for their inventions. Viktor's insisting on simplicity, four letter words where they can. Hex gate, Hex claw, Hex core... Jayce makes fun of him for being so basic. Atlas Gauntlets has so much more flare! ...]
I've been- trying to understand your decisions. I've always understood the fear of helpless inaction. We both prefer to regret what we did, over what we did not do.
[he thinks he knows you, Jayce. Is still grasping onto that knowledge, however hesitantly. Maybe he's lost sight of what he once knew. Maybe Jayce is also not the person that he thought he was...]
Better to try and fail than not try... and yet, we didn't consider the agony that success could bring.
[ it's all true; jayce has nothing to add to it other than silence. the distraction of hearing himself speak is foolish. was it foolish, to miss foolishness? ignorance is bliss, or something like that. jayce chews on his lower lip, fingers flexing in and out soil as his ears stay pinned back, making his doe eyes like prey pleading in a bear trap. he tries to keep that sorry gaze away from viktor's, for now. they might get a little too shiny for his own good. if he cannot hide it all, then perhaps, with a slant of his brows, he'll do a little of it. ]
It's not just about inaction, Viktor . . . [ calling it that felt too clinical, a rationalization of the acts themselves. jayce's voice raises, only a touch, before his words even into a low grunt. his eyes are back on him, and this time, they plead to be seen.
he is raw again, nerves exposed— he can feel it in the way he aches without even being touched. jayce looks for words, his lips soundlessly parting and pursing, before the harsh press and slanted brows express his frustrations long before he can put it into coherency.
interference comes through the radio: something of a ghost. jayce's brittle, worn, helpless voice: why did you ever give me this? why? the drop in his gut when the silence stretches brings him to his wrist, the acceleration rune still there, scarred and forcibly making its home in his veins. would it kill him again—? would viktor have to go through all that one more time—? he could only sigh, tipping his head forward and rubbing the pad of his thumb into the crystal's uneven surfaces. ]
The hexcore, that shot . . . Was all I had left. To keep you here. Even if it hurt, and if you'd hate me for it. [ and in what felt like an instant, jayce goes back to the edge of the building, when all he could smell and taste was viktor's blood and the painful, jagged edge of betrayal that had made him shed tears in a way he had only when he was rushing viktor's corpse into the lab. ] . . . Is that what you felt? When you saw me up there?
[ a voice in his head asks, with anguish: did you think i would just endure it? did you fail to expect that i'd rather die than live like this?
I'm losing track of what it even is, anymore. We are fractured into countless broken topics...
[It is difficult to focus on any one thing with clarity of vision. One pain leads to another, bounces to a betrayal, reflects off a love felt so deeply, on and on... Viktor feels like he's chasing after his own nerves, biting towards an itch he cannot reach. Emotions he cannot sort into place and cope with without outburst or numbness,
He can at least answer a direct question, that's something of a focus to latch onto,]
I felt pity... and guilt. The usual. [what's another dark joke about now? He hates to see Jayce looking at him like that, so at his wits end. Still so vulnerable and scarcely guarded. Surely not as guarded as he should be, with Viktor. This only invited more hurt, yet Viktor has welcomed him to lay besides him and is looking back, with his own weak willed yearning on display,]
To save me, rather than destroy the Hexcore... that I understand. I understood once we returned here and I fully remembered doing much the same to you. Taking away and then forcing the life back into you. Making you live like this... I didn't stop to ask myself if you would want to return.
[Rather, he might have thought it, but it didn't stop him. He made the choice for Jayce and wouldn't let him go even now. For that, he's violated a similar pact between them that Jayce had, reviving Viktor with the hexcore. It didn't need to be spoken, it should have been understood. In that, they're surely "even"... well past fairness or not.]
What I don't understand is... shooting me down. I felt I had- finally been doing good work. The work we always wanted to do. Which is why I welcomed you. Then, you turned your weapon upon me, I fail to grasp why. I fail-... to understand you, Jayce.
[he still doesn't understand the mission Jayce was on. He doesn't understand his future self, confronted each and every moment of infinity with the devastation he wrought. It remains a dead end to him, a missing piece he cannot deduce from surrounding information. Rage and betrayed hurt towards Jayce is all he can see as the greater picture, what should one lost part matter?]
[ pity. he felt pity. the usual. guilt, jayce could understand. but pity? it felt like a slap in the face, and the stunned, deer-in-headlights look remains until jayce finds it better to roll onto his back again. his ears may as well be pinned for life against his skull, but what accompanies is a harsh slant of his brows instead of vulnerable doe eyes. jayce's silence to recompose says enough, and he wonders, briefly, if it was said to wound him on purpose. some freak test to confirm or deny his true feelings, to push him away, or to see just how long he'd bear the pain of his love. it makes him fill his lungs and breathe harder, albiet slowly— they almost sounded like snorts, as one single ear directs itself to viktor.
what's worse is that an outburst isn't the first thing on jayce's mind. it's the lips his gaze wandered to with occasion. it's his neck. overthrown by his scent. it's the angry, wild thought of crushing into him. to taste something, to feel something that will override this ache. something that will prove himself. that would take this all away and make them forget, for a while, that there was a divide to begin with.
that's awful, and he knows it. but he can't help missing him and everything about him. his antlers drag into the dirt as if they could feel the weight, too. he's going to try, one more time.
he was doing good. it was only the magic that would twist his work. jayce swallows, jaw tight, fingers twitching against his leg as if the instinct to reach for viktor is a live wire disguised as a flower bed. ]
Every timeline where I don't take the shot . . . Fails early. Every single one. I die, and you're at the edge of the world forced to shoulder that burden alone. [ jayce ears go from perked up with agitation to flattened again. no matter how fucking frustrated or angry he was, his heart breaks when he remember the clarity of those sad, prismatic eyes. the eyes of a man who has seen his beloved die so many times he's gone numb and would not, could not, let it happen one more time. ] You, from the future . . . Told me this was the only way for us to make it, for us to survive together. Only you could convince me to do something like this to you.
[ jayce's body quivers, every muscle taut, ears flicking, antlers brushing against the space between them, and heat rising beneath his exhaustion. ]
I know it looks like betrayal. I know it hurts. But please . . . Understand. I'm not asking for forgiveness— I just— did it for you. For us. [ his breath catches, hangs with tiny croaks at the back of his throat. even his voice raises a pitch, cracks— ] And the fucked up thing about it is that I would do it again.
[ if it meant he'd save him, and they'd die together rather than alone— he'd break himself and viktor, over and over again. ]
[Jayce rolls away, just to his back, but it says everything to distance them. The impulse to chase is there, spinning up in Viktor like his lured in prey might escape a well crafted web.
He hates that instinct. Resents the inhumanity deeply. Jayce has never been prey to him, nor the other way around. They were so long equals, partners, even when one could have tried to usurp their project they never did. Such respect feels like a long lost memory, but Viktor bites back against himself for such an intrusive thought.
There is no chase. He remains where he's at, slumped to his side, watching Jayce as he speaks. Watching his lips in turn, the flash of his teeth in the mist of the terrarium, lit by only the moon's light filtered through layers of foggy glass.]
Different timelines... that is what the anomaly showed you?
[If they were not literally, right here and now, thrown into a different world then... well, Viktor might dismiss that as a mere delusion. Madness spun up to comfort Jayce when he fell into the pit to starve, alone and forgotten. Self serving fantasies where he got to be the hero, where every issue is a nail and he's the one holding the hammer-
But then, why take such ownership-? Wouldn't a deluded mind wish for absolution, for forgiveness and affirmation of righteousness? Viktor doesn't know. His mind spins in other directions aside from raw instinct now. Calculating different outcomes, interpretations, motivations...
Silent a while in thought, he finally speaks again,]
I would do all I have done to you again. We are the same... Jayce. Inextricably bound by our choices.
[These shared hearts of theirs are guilty, not remorseful]
[ jayce nods; he'd seen it, with his own eyes. the mage would remind him over and over of the outcome if he were to bend to viktor as easily as he does. as much as it is a burning brand on them both, it is truth that jayce cannot fight, cannot hate and certainly cannot feel unforgiving toward. viktor's gaze on him feels like lasers, seers holes into him to the point that he could feel beads of sweat forming at his temples. the boney branch of his tallest antler almost feels like its quivering, pulsing to the beating of his heart that feels harder by the time jayce is lured to turn his head and gaze back, eyes an intense gold and nostrils flared, words pushed through his tooth gap like a harrowing climb forced to divulge. jayce cannot help the slight loom forward, the angle of his antlers catching in rays of moonlight to make himself seen. ]
Am I something to be pitied to you?
[ it is not angry, not accusatory, but more searching, probing, hoping it is not true. low and said almost like a growled whisper, interluded with a guttural snort that seems to call to viktor. his mouth twitches as it pulls down, and unconsciously flexes his arms where his fingers grasp for his own wrist, to rub at the tingling a touch harder. ]
[Viktor's lips press together at the question, at the return of Jayce's gaze onto him. Twitch in conflict with what expression to make. That question should be accusatory, should hold more rage than it does. Viktor already hurled the insult his partner's way, to twist the knife would be easy enough.
Perhaps that is what it will feel like to receive an honest answer. Viktor isn't going to demean him further by playing pretend, masking the feeling he had seeing Jayce ready to do what he wanted to do,]
Only when you're standing on a ledge.
[when Jayce is choosing to forge onward, to fight in ways that don't require a weapon, then Viktor no longer feels such lowly pity for him.]
Wasn't it the same for you-? To find your long ailing partner near to stepping over the aqueduct, as you did...
[ it's immediate, almost defensive, almost another whisper, but it still lands guttural and solid. another chance that jayce has to face him again, sideways, prepared to challenge his view. take the damn knife and sink himself into it. what else would he do when it was viktor who held it? ]
I'd never . . . Look at you like that. Not pity. Not ever.
[ jayce hesitates, searching for the shape of something harder to name, something that had been easier to mutter before, but felt too strong for something so brittle and dangerously edged the way it was (they were) now. his throat works around it before the words finally fall, laced with . . . more. ]
If anything, I— [ jayce stops, breath hitching, and starts again softer, steadier. ] I was upset you'd came to that conclusion. But it wasn't . . . Lesser. Never lesser.
[ the realization of what this means comes in layers. he's hurt by the difference. he's ashamed, humiliated. it could've been anyone, but viktor— gods. his downcast gaze wants to hide in the hole he once fell down. was he too small, up there? unworthy of his partnership?
viktor doesn't always know how to best express himself.
was that jayce's wishful understanding, or the truth, though? his hand curls at his side, like it wants to reach out but doesn't dare. still, there's something unspoken lingering in the air— an ache, a tether, waiting for viktor to give him reason to react to the pooling, fizzing heat under his skin that could blow at the most subtle triggers. jayce drops his hand between them now, palm up and runestone exposed, knuckles sinking into dirt. ]
If it were you in my place the other day, I would've been terrified, too. Even if I were angry.
[ he's . . . starting to understand.
because they are a mirror. because they are two sides of the same coin. because they are each other's favorite regret. ]
Viktor's expression slips, anger washes out like a poorly built structure meant to hold too much back. The mask always slips with Jayce. There is no maintaining composure when faced with his mirror and the well meaning nature his partner upholds even in his darkest hours. They remain a sun and a moon held in too distant an orbit. Viktor wanted to shine with his own light, but was content to do so with what he was given. A humbling metaphor, perhaps, perspective that Viktor cannot function as the center of his own universe. To impose that upon all that is around him is to simply collapse into an all consuming black hole.]
I misjudged, then... I'm sorry.
[Jayce's hand turns to the sky and Viktor slowly reaches out for it. He'll stop if the man flinches away or gives any other indication not to touch him. If not for that, he lays his palm to Jayce's, resting fingers to lace between, intertwine, and lay his hand and wrist to rest upon his partner's. There would be a slight wince to feel his arcane energy spark against that stone, but he'll not pull away from that. It will settle like so much static electricity,]
[ jayce only meets viktor's gaze for a moment before dropping it, his brows worrying a kink, but his hand does not move. he stays at a standstill, his fingers only twitching in response. part of his coherency rings an alarm, but his body, instinct, flips a different switch. his heart skips and trips on its own beat, and what he says next is low, heavy. there is weight on it like an anchor. it doesn't come clean, nor easy, but it does because jayce needs this to begin on a path going forward and not backward. ]
I forgive you.
[ quiet. almost forced through his teeth. it is genuine forgiveness, but it does not come lightly. for one, jayce is increasingly frustrated with himself, crumbling like paper to the static brush of fingers that sets his whole frame on fire and alert. he shouldn't want this. not now— but even his own wants and needs betray him. both on edge and undone, he takes viktor's hand in a tight, coarse grip, every patch of fur on him standing, and his pupils engorging enough to nearly eclipse the honey hazel within them.
his breathing has picked up from the way the rythmic blows of air pull in and out with the rise and fall of his chest. the way his presence fills the back of the car, the way bruised, purple-black battered knuckles protrude and sting with his squeeze. this was animalistic, and jayce is at a crossroads of incertainty, to whether this is his own desire or his new biology— and which one made it worse? does it matter? ]
. . . I—
[ he catches himself. it's the very last of his restraint. ]
[Viktor interjects, knowing the limits of such forgiveness and wishing them stated. He'd held and begged Jayce to never forgive him his many trespasses, despite being sorry. The burden of his choices is something he needs to carry, they cannot merely be shrugged off with pretty words and sentiment.
He feels this way largely because he cannot forgive Jayce what he's done. For all his talk of being past fairness, Viktor still has that balance in mind. He cannot forgive and so there need be limits to his own absolution.
Perhaps out of fear that he'd buckle beneath the strength of Jayce's persistence,]
Jayce, [he'll interject when Jayce catches himself, speaking that name firmly. The look in Jayce's blow out eyes is clear as day, even in the night. Viktor's expression sweetens towards him, slipping out from his own resolution in turn. Oh, that looks says so much... Viktor puts it much too simply,]
[ jayce fixes his jaws tight, feels them grind under the buffer of his molars. it is clear and true, that jayce's forgiveness did not come with a free pass. it did not make things good and well again, especially not by his own sentiment of betrayal and wounded self. it meant that he wanted to try. he wanted to work through it, no matter how long it took for his scars to heal.
he wanted viktor.
and how that rings so very prominent now, of all times. denial would be another sentence. hungry, he was. not enough to feel the stuttering madness that makes his body contort and beg, fall apart, but it is hunger all the same. a start. a fuse, wishing to be lit. a dryness at the back of his throat and an emptiness at the pit of his stomach, isolation in his heart. it is a heat set to boil even lower at the hips, knowing what was to come of it, making his ears pin forward and his tail flag embarassingly behind him once the wires cross. if he tastes, he will lose all sense of discipline. he'll crumble.
and it will make this all so much worse. so much more complicated and like treading across a minefield. but can he resist it? resist him? his lips move without pulling apart, a scowl in the making, brows arched low, and an unconscious presentation of his broken rack, bone white and pearly, cleaned— still formidable. still worth something. still strong.
he can't even think clearly enough to answer what mattered most— their lines in the sand to be respected, until they are ready to shorten the distance, and already— something too primal in jayce wants to breach it. and it will.
he's ruining everything before they truly get started, and viktor isn't doing much to help in how his observation dips honey sweet. jayce hesitates for as long as he can, but he continues as carefully as he could before the stag throws caution to the wind.
he breathes his words out as if they could shatter him. like he hates that he wants. and gods, help him. this wasn't what they needed and yet, his whisper scrapes the very floors: ]
[There's doubt in what that means, but only in the details. The tumultuous this-and-that of their unsorted emotions will bite back at them. It will crowd and possibly consume them. Viktor understands the danger in such chaos, but there is also thrill to such danger. He feels alive, hearing it. He knows what it means in the broader sense, in the bigger picture of them. Jayce wants him; heart, body, soul. He wants to feed on Viktor and fuck him and feel the love in their connection. To get lost in the overwhelming carnality of what they share.
Viktor lifts his hand from Jayce's grasp on it. He reaches forward to cradle his jaw, to push his metallic thumb through his beard and along his cheek with tenderness.
Shepherding him forward, to roll his way over top of Viktor, if only Jayce will be guided along. Submitted and yet still in control, still holding firm to anchor Jayce despite how often that idea sank him,]
[ jayce had been doomed from the start, but now? he was a dead man touch broke free from his grasp to remind him of how weak he was to him. jayce's ears shiver to the contact of his fingertips, great, perked satellites. before he realized just what he was doing to restrain himself, jayce was already pushing the curve of his face into viktor's palm to generate a claiming, scenting rub. whatever words, speeches or banter that crackled through the radio was no more to jayce's focus. everything from sound to smell to taste in the very air he now breathed harsh and flared, could only target viktor.
all there was needed was new intention, an opening, for jayce to spring himself with the guidance as if set loose to buck around in an arena. his legs and hooves struggle to bend and sit, especially where his knee does not comply (something about a living body being more painful than dulled where rusted), but he hurries his angles and bears his weight upon the herald, his hands already a mess of loose soil and long locks of platinum and chestnut. they should close this thing if its still open for the convoy to bear witness. jayce will regret it later, but not now. it's of no concern to him, now.
he is vivid, his heart wild, stuck in this enticing wallop like a trap. like a meal. like his ultimate desire. he hangs so pressed into viktor after his single, tallest antler threatens to scrape the heights of the cybertruck, every curve and bulge clasps against viktor's with urgency— and still a damn perfect fit. the snarl that becomes of him is befitting for a stag in rut, digging fingers into metalic flesh and bone not to hurt, but to absorb, to smell, to press his nose, to meld with— become one with. it's hardly words until the syllables slip into addition, low and like a prayer to war. he has been thinking about him and thinking, and thinking, and imagining, until he went mad with it in his solitude— ]
That's a lie.
[ jayce cannot physically live without him. viktor cannot resist him. the same can be said of one another when the coin's sides are flipped. ]
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timeasmymeasure
a few days into august, eventual nsfw im SORRY for how long this is
Date: 2025-08-05 04:19 pm (UTC)ever since his most recent retreat from having his hooves on the edge of a building's open floor eight stories up, jayce has crashed, and crashed, and crashed— every time from something he couldn't wrap his head around, and when he did, it came with a flurry of emotions that were too untamed to swallow and keep down before the bile rose to his mouth. for one, he is alive. lets start with that: a warm tan to his skin that nearly brings a sunny glow to him. no open wounds, no putrid stenches, no disgusting sound following him. just a small limp, and much more sensitivity to his nerves. they fire off at the smallest of stimuli, where brushes become grabs and temperature either feels too hot or too cold. he actually feels it. he still cannot enter the sunlight's domain, either, so night is when he continues his activities (which didn't really amount to anything other than pacing or hitting things, or.....). but the first time after the occurance that he catches his reflection while washing the stains and peeling away the now dry, anomaly-webbed velvet on his half-rack of antlers, he stares at it a good long while, and what remained of purple smudges under his beard . . . and feels sick. not enough to lose his meal, but enough that he must sit, and keep his head close to a container, just in case.
how he came to be was the worst offender, and something he thinks about for about two days straight, no pauses. minimal contact. frustrated pacing and moments of heated bugling, silent sobbing or just a numb sort of stare at the moon. he should be turning that thing inside and out. studying the history and racing down variables in equations to find a way to replicate what it had done. he can't. he fucking can't concentrate on anything else. because every beat within his chest was a ghost haunting him. every hush of the wind or the rattle of tree branches is a huff, or laugh, when he remembered how it was. every chill was a gaze that cut through him, and the pain within him an insurmountable hole that could never be replaced and ached at the absence just as much as the harm done. it made jayce feel insignificant. it made him feel like a project, like the very dead thing he was— with no way back. no salvation. no fixing. only the key to wind him up again and force him to clatter to his doomsdays being by being forcibly slammed into his back.
jayce would evaluate, flip it around, reevaluate, twist and turn it and wonders if he could've done anything differently to change the outcome. he mulls over his words over and over, overthinking as he does best. whether or not he comes to a reasonable conclusion is out of his grasp; what's done is done. he cannot undo viktor popping his own bloodbag open. he cannot undo his hope to linger rather than fall. he couldn't stop himself from consuming every drop of it like a starving animal. he could not have stopped viktor from stabbing his heart so much its wounds keep bleeding, in the form of distrust. in the form of making two choices for him— the same way jayce had done to viktor. he let him go, sent him off. hurt him in a way jayce never thought he'd hear with his own ears, and then— as if on schedule, he interrupts at jayce's lowest. he waited thirty fucking days to help him, or that's, at least, what jayce had thought it was. until viktor slid blades between his ribs and twisted the hilt.
is fate real, he wonders? did he run himself into a loop he couldn't escape from? is it laughing at them? playing this sick, twisted little game of turning tables and switching roles until either side was battered and bruised beyond proper performance? was this karma? did he deserve all of this? part of jayce comes to the ready denouement that yes, this was all somehow his fault. that yes, he deserved it. he deserved it for not letting viktor go when he had the chance to. he deserved it for making him into a walking anomaly, for taking his choices, for breaking his promises. the world could've been saved, then. they could've avoided everything, even this. so . . . why the fuck can he still not fathom that answer?
jayce knows why, even if his incredulity keeps him from personally seeking viktor out on his first, terrible, horrible, no good very bad day of soaking in the consequences of his love. he's not ready to look into his eyes without fracturing under his beauty, one more time, and running the risk of being ground into dust. so . . . when would he be ready—? on the evening of the second day, jayce sits in his truck, only a little calmer but getting crimped when he was trying to come up with schematics for a cane and couldn't stop thinking about viktor's as a base. because that also came with thinking about viktor.
are they better off apart? jayce thinks about it. the world would be safer. maybe. they wouldn't hurt each other so much. and he wouldn't . . . have this impassible urge to crawl back to him, either. it's fiddling with the radio and getting viktor's softspoken accent out of it that quiets him. what were only a few curious minutes became hours. of a nostalgia he wishes he could hug onto tightly. never let it go. go back to. it's hearing himself when viktor needed him, buring his face in his hands and squeezing his knuckles into his eyes. it's— hearing the mage, one more time, that he realizes something.
and so, without really thinking much of it, fingers twitching— he seeks viktor. ]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-05 04:51 pm (UTC)The first thing to bring him peace in those days after drugging Jayce is... Jayce. It's always Jayce, of course it is. Viktor was keeping his distance, whether that was out of respect or disrespect didn't matter. It was what he was doing. Then, trying to move his truck to a new spot to recharge the battery, it came on the radio.
Jayce's voice, youthful and enthused. Naive. Ecstatic. Viktor's in turn, arguing through hypothesis, interpreting data sets. They sound like different people, but they were. The them of the past playing out in sound waves and crackling interference would not recognize the them of the present moment. They are far too metamorphosized, changed, and twisted. They would be seen as devils to the men on the radio.
Yet, it is a strange comfort to remember being those men. Once, they were hungry merely with ambition. Viktor can disassociate himself back to that time. Can wear those clothes no longer quite his size. He can pretend and he can dream of their dream again.
His truck is quiet, but the radio is playing loud. Chattering. Yapping away. It doesn't matter what is being said, it's like rain pattering on windows, comforting noise. Viktor has the back of the greenhouse trunk wide open so the plants can get fresher air from the night beyond the windows. Viktor is laid out flat in the bed of the dirt, surrounded on all sides by the bits of nature he could sustain. It smells nice, like wet soil and cold greenery. A small oasis. He cannot sleep, but it is as mellow as he has been since his re-arrival. Listening to Jayce talk to him in another time, another place, another version of themselves... it's escapism. He just wants to escape.
He will cant his head when he notices an approach, but even for the Jayce of now, he only slumps back into place. Laid out on his back, looking upward at the night sky through a misty pane of glass. He speaks, quiet and trying to take on the character of his voice before he became so distorted. Viktor nearly succeeds,]
Jayce? Do you need a place to lay down? [there is room besides him, if Jayce isn't going to fuss about the chill or dampness of the soil. Viktor needs it, his body too warm as it overclocks itself trying to heal from so much sacrificed blood,]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-09 01:01 am (UTC)and his heart skip.
the crackling white noise of their past drifting in and out of frequency stirs another beat in him that squeezes his chest so tightly he doesn't know if he's seconds from prancing or screaming— that viktor had been doing the same thing he was was a daunting revelation to seal the doubt boiling as much as make the base of his own recent musings solidify under any more of it: they're both hurting. and he doesn't want this wedge between them.
another thing worth noting is jayce's inability to stay rationally mad at viktor on sight. he made the mistake of staring, perhaps too long at the curve of his cheekbones and the bob of his neck as he spoke in an almost familiar way. the pang of guilt when jayce could not see the beautiful gold he himself had taken away from such a sharp, striking gaze. with both mind and body at war, jayce forces discipline. firmness. he will stay where he is.
his brain is on high alert; it tallies his wounds. it replays betrayal, it replicates how it felt perfectly, to the point that the whispers ring true: this was a bad idea.
and yet, the body has been directly and seductively spoken to. it speaks to the yearning, the starvation he suffers not in blood but in familiarity and warmth. it targets the animal, the stag that begins to twitch at the waft of scents, of the half man's musk and the bed of soil, lush crispness of fresh greens. it's too heavy in the air. he can even feel his vision turn sharper as his pupils swell, as viktor's words keep repeating and bypass every warning signal jayce had put up, destroying every planned action he's meticulously routed on his way over. something deep and purring chuckles in his chest and up his throat with no humor attached. it's not a man-made sound.
jayce's body begins to move before he can even command himself to stop. his gut clenches and releases all at once— and he lays in the cool earthy bed next to his former partner, in surrender and self-destruction, all in one silent breath. it doesn't feel like a triumph, that, he can say with certainty. ]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-11 07:15 pm (UTC)Voices chatter through the radio crackle, louder than all of it. Still, the peaceful atmosphere fills the gaps between words, speaks within the thoughtful pauses of the past.
Viktor's eyes alone follow Jayce, as he crawls his way into the space to join him. It had been quite a while, both back home and in this place alike, that they laid side-by-side. The roving greenhouse feels more like a glass coffin than ever, the two laid to rest as a pair. Something in Viktor aches at that idea, with yearning melancholy and loathsome desire. Why can't he be more rational than this-? Jayce had once inspired that part in him, only to now destroy it with his mere presence.
He breathes in despite not needing to, the instinct simply there. Jayce no longer reeks of rot. Not that the insectoid Viktor minded that one bit beyond how concerning for Jayce he found it. His shoulders were tense when the man first approached, but they slack at his sides, Viktor remains flat on his back and looks directly upward, through the glass ceiling, rather than to his partner at his side,]
... nice weather we're having.
[He might be molded into a being not fully machine, nor bug, nor man... but even that won't take Viktor's dry sense of humor from him. Some parts of him even death cannot steal away.]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-13 11:33 am (UTC)he couldn't let him go, he couldn't even bring himself to stay away, and now the warmth from jayce's body that felt like a radiating furnace against the cool earth embracing his back reaches out through his stiffness, a silent invitation he wants to take back in his hands and rip to shreds. hopefully, the air doesn't get heavy. it's too bad that it was already loaded with aura, tension and humiliating need. jayce can smell so much more than the plants. ]
Yeah. [ the cervid ear between them flips in viktor's direction, his voice curling dry, but also . . . wrapped in something else. ] You were always good at picking the scenery.
[ the compliment, if you could call it that, sat just like a bruise: soft along the edges yet exposed and tender, painful in the way jayce ears fold back quickly and the tail between his legs tucks in. he tries to shift his legs, one into a bend to hide the fact, hide his involuntary body language that speaks faster just as much as louder. a shadow of humor lays there, but the way his eyes slide to viktor’s profile ruins the joke.
the words hang, warm and wounded all at once, and he hates how much he means them. ]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-13 03:47 pm (UTC)As Jayce understands it, as a bruise, Viktor's voice asks with tenderness,]
What do you mean by that?
[it sounds like Viktor, like the old days. The radio practically sounds like it's speaking through him, with less hiss around the edges. Perhaps so much listening to his old self could let Viktor mimic it, to act out a role he used to play well. A retired mask, the Assistant to the Dean of the Academy. It hadn't been enough for him, he had bigger aspirations, he could not be content as he was.
The tone is gentle, not accusatory, not harsh. Just curious. Prying. Hopeful towards the promise of knowledge, of understanding better how Jayce's mind works, of what he's thinking.
Viktor used to have a sense of wonder, after all. In this moment, it's not gone from him.]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-15 05:12 pm (UTC)jayce breathes in, words catch on his tongue like they're not sure which way they want to cut, and losing the presumed edge they'd have by the minute. jayce breathes them out anyway, low and refined with a ghost of warmth that refuses to die. a briefly darting gaze sliding down and back up. something feels . . . bitter, on his tongue. he stares at viktor now with diminished distance, enticed like a moth to a flame— and knowing he's been caught in the pyre. or, perhaps, what he's always wanted: he just wants viktor back. his partner. his desire does not change. he wished he could be the same man viktor needed— but could he?
jayce was always a terrible liar. honesty, it is. ]
Means you can make anywhere feel like somewhere I'd want to stay. [ it sounds, for a heartbeat, like something tender. Like he's talking about those nights when the two of them made the most unremarkable corners of piltover into places worth remembering. a workshop floor littered with tools and half-finished dreams. but the weight in his voice says the rest: ] Even when I know better.
[ he's talking about now, too, about the places viktor's pulled him back into against his better judgment. things that he could not fathom pretending they didn't happen. it would hurt him all the more. his ears fold flat in the next breath, the tail's twitch betraying the fact he wishes he could swallow the words whole.
but if viktor is receptive to speaking with him, then . . . should they not try to speak? it's not as if jayce wanted this interference. it was more of an . . . inevitability, given their circumstances and choices. hadn't he, after all— done the same to viktor? ]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-15 05:31 pm (UTC)The heart in Jayce's chest is louder, an organic reminder of the humanity they once shared,]
You can stay here a while, Jayce... as you like.
[Viktor had welcomed him, after all. A time and place to just lay down. A respite, an oasis in the desolate landscape around them. Perhaps more fitting, a terrarium for their cruel experimentation. It doesn't matter how one sees it, not really.
Metaphors fail to distract Viktor from the wrongness of his joy. To lay beside Jayce is ill deserved. Another thing he knows full well and yet does not care to uphold the righteousness of.]
We have much knowledge that our better senses ignore, don't we?
no subject
Date: 2025-08-18 12:00 am (UTC)Yeah. I'm still here listening, for one.
[ And— Craving, to the point that he curls his fingers into fists and stiffles some sort of grunt. His damn tail flicks, and the most he could do is ignore it. Alas (or not?), he's not exactly known for giving up on questionable endeavors. But plenty of things feel cruel to him, as of late. But Viktor is not pushing him away. Jayce leans into it, trailing his eyes lower to the cups of Viktor's nimble hands. The air between them is not the same and Jayce fears it never would be again. Still— Jayce nods wordlessly, shifting his body sideways to adjust where his antlers catch, in dirt and a stray, leafy vine. To face Viktor meant that his broken antler was too short to scrape the bedding. It meant that he could challenge eye contact, even though his voice and gaze are nowhere near as severe as they could be. ]
Why wouldn't you trust that I'd listen to you?
no subject
Date: 2025-08-18 01:07 am (UTC)He rolls onto his side, the gesture a mirror to Jayce leaning in towards him. No helping it, it just happens to him. Viktor lays looking to Jayce fully, arching his elbows and laying both his hands close by his own face. One, knuckles down and fingers curled loosely. The other, fingertips sunk down into the soil, as if kneading it for comfort. He gives Jayce a look, a well trod one, a familiar one,
Flippant, his tone is that of "of course not",]
You don't listen to me.
[That same tone says "and you shouldn't", knowing his troublesome and reckless ways back in the lab, he was always the one insisting on the less reserved course of action. Jayce was the more hesitant one, wasn't he? The more measured one, in his own ways, if no less driven by scientific obsession than Viktor...]
no subject
Date: 2025-08-18 11:48 am (UTC)That's not fair, [ his voice wavers. rough. salt burns in his wounds. ] I did listen. When you explained things to me, when you gave me the chance— I did—
[ he listened when he was going to end himself the first time. he . . . didn't listen when the council started working in. when he was supposed to destroy the hexcore. when he wasn't supposed to weaponize hextech—
he listened when viktor, old and grey at the edge of the earth with only his jayce's statue still corpse to remind him of all his failures, rotting in an endless loop of time— he listened when the same viktor warned him of the arcane's seduction.
and now, jayce just finds himself in the same, messy ditch. in the same turbulence. his ears keep slanted back, folded as the background noise of their conversations fill the void in his chest. talk about naming their creations. hex here, hex there—
there's a pattern, in all of this. ]
I always made my worst decisions when we were apart.
no subject
Date: 2025-08-18 04:23 pm (UTC)[for worst or for better or for somewhere in between, they've done what they've done. No erasing that, not without leaving the hurt for others to bare in their stead. Viktor turned away the chance to do that, would lay with the burden weighing on him. A phantom pain ever present within his empty chest.
Hex here, hex there... their voices of the past laugh through better and worse names for their inventions. Viktor's insisting on simplicity, four letter words where they can. Hex gate, Hex claw, Hex core... Jayce makes fun of him for being so basic. Atlas Gauntlets has so much more flare! ...]
I've been- trying to understand your decisions. I've always understood the fear of helpless inaction. We both prefer to regret what we did, over what we did not do.
[he thinks he knows you, Jayce. Is still grasping onto that knowledge, however hesitantly. Maybe he's lost sight of what he once knew. Maybe Jayce is also not the person that he thought he was...]
Better to try and fail than not try... and yet, we didn't consider the agony that success could bring.
no subject
Date: 2025-08-18 10:33 pm (UTC)It's not just about inaction, Viktor . . . [ calling it that felt too clinical, a rationalization of the acts themselves. jayce's voice raises, only a touch, before his words even into a low grunt. his eyes are back on him, and this time, they plead to be seen.
he is raw again, nerves exposed— he can feel it in the way he aches without even being touched. jayce looks for words, his lips soundlessly parting and pursing, before the harsh press and slanted brows express his frustrations long before he can put it into coherency.
interference comes through the radio: something of a ghost. jayce's brittle, worn, helpless voice: why did you ever give me this? why? the drop in his gut when the silence stretches brings him to his wrist, the acceleration rune still there, scarred and forcibly making its home in his veins. would it kill him again—? would viktor have to go through all that one more time—? he could only sigh, tipping his head forward and rubbing the pad of his thumb into the crystal's uneven surfaces. ]
The hexcore, that shot . . . Was all I had left. To keep you here. Even if it hurt, and if you'd hate me for it. [ and in what felt like an instant, jayce goes back to the edge of the building, when all he could smell and taste was viktor's blood and the painful, jagged edge of betrayal that had made him shed tears in a way he had only when he was rushing viktor's corpse into the lab. ] . . . Is that what you felt? When you saw me up there?
[ a voice in his head asks, with anguish: did you think i would just endure it? did you fail to expect that i'd rather die than live like this?
did you think i'd come back to you earlier? ]
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Date: 2025-08-18 11:07 pm (UTC)[It is difficult to focus on any one thing with clarity of vision. One pain leads to another, bounces to a betrayal, reflects off a love felt so deeply, on and on... Viktor feels like he's chasing after his own nerves, biting towards an itch he cannot reach. Emotions he cannot sort into place and cope with without outburst or numbness,
He can at least answer a direct question, that's something of a focus to latch onto,]
I felt pity... and guilt. The usual. [what's another dark joke about now? He hates to see Jayce looking at him like that, so at his wits end. Still so vulnerable and scarcely guarded. Surely not as guarded as he should be, with Viktor. This only invited more hurt, yet Viktor has welcomed him to lay besides him and is looking back, with his own weak willed yearning on display,]
To save me, rather than destroy the Hexcore... that I understand. I understood once we returned here and I fully remembered doing much the same to you. Taking away and then forcing the life back into you. Making you live like this... I didn't stop to ask myself if you would want to return.
[Rather, he might have thought it, but it didn't stop him. He made the choice for Jayce and wouldn't let him go even now. For that, he's violated a similar pact between them that Jayce had, reviving Viktor with the hexcore. It didn't need to be spoken, it should have been understood. In that, they're surely "even"... well past fairness or not.]
What I don't understand is... shooting me down. I felt I had- finally been doing good work. The work we always wanted to do. Which is why I welcomed you. Then, you turned your weapon upon me, I fail to grasp why. I fail-... to understand you, Jayce.
[he still doesn't understand the mission Jayce was on. He doesn't understand his future self, confronted each and every moment of infinity with the devastation he wrought. It remains a dead end to him, a missing piece he cannot deduce from surrounding information. Rage and betrayed hurt towards Jayce is all he can see as the greater picture, what should one lost part matter?]
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Date: 2025-08-19 03:26 pm (UTC)what's worse is that an outburst isn't the first thing on jayce's mind. it's the lips his gaze wandered to with occasion. it's his neck. overthrown by his scent. it's the angry, wild thought of crushing into him. to taste something, to feel something that will override this ache. something that will prove himself. that would take this all away and make them forget, for a while, that there was a divide to begin with.
that's awful, and he knows it. but he can't help missing him and everything about him. his antlers drag into the dirt as if they could feel the weight, too. he's going to try, one more time.
he was doing good. it was only the magic that would twist his work. jayce swallows, jaw tight, fingers twitching against his leg as if the instinct to reach for viktor is a live wire disguised as a flower bed. ]
Every timeline where I don't take the shot . . . Fails early. Every single one. I die, and you're at the edge of the world forced to shoulder that burden alone. [ jayce ears go from perked up with agitation to flattened again. no matter how fucking frustrated or angry he was, his heart breaks when he remember the clarity of those sad, prismatic eyes. the eyes of a man who has seen his beloved die so many times he's gone numb and would not, could not, let it happen one more time. ] You, from the future . . . Told me this was the only way for us to make it, for us to survive together. Only you could convince me to do something like this to you.
[ jayce's body quivers, every muscle taut, ears flicking, antlers brushing against the space between them, and heat rising beneath his exhaustion. ]
I know it looks like betrayal. I know it hurts. But please . . . Understand. I'm not asking for forgiveness— I just— did it for you. For us. [ his breath catches, hangs with tiny croaks at the back of his throat. even his voice raises a pitch, cracks— ] And the fucked up thing about it is that I would do it again.
[ if it meant he'd save him, and they'd die together rather than alone— he'd break himself and viktor, over and over again. ]
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Date: 2025-08-19 03:55 pm (UTC)He hates that instinct. Resents the inhumanity deeply. Jayce has never been prey to him, nor the other way around. They were so long equals, partners, even when one could have tried to usurp their project they never did. Such respect feels like a long lost memory, but Viktor bites back against himself for such an intrusive thought.
There is no chase. He remains where he's at, slumped to his side, watching Jayce as he speaks. Watching his lips in turn, the flash of his teeth in the mist of the terrarium, lit by only the moon's light filtered through layers of foggy glass.]
Different timelines... that is what the anomaly showed you?
[If they were not literally, right here and now, thrown into a different world then... well, Viktor might dismiss that as a mere delusion. Madness spun up to comfort Jayce when he fell into the pit to starve, alone and forgotten. Self serving fantasies where he got to be the hero, where every issue is a nail and he's the one holding the hammer-
But then, why take such ownership-? Wouldn't a deluded mind wish for absolution, for forgiveness and affirmation of righteousness? Viktor doesn't know. His mind spins in other directions aside from raw instinct now. Calculating different outcomes, interpretations, motivations...
Silent a while in thought, he finally speaks again,]
I would do all I have done to you again. We are the same... Jayce. Inextricably bound by our choices.
[These shared hearts of theirs are guilty, not remorseful]
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Date: 2025-08-19 05:36 pm (UTC)Am I something to be pitied to you?
[ it is not angry, not accusatory, but more searching, probing, hoping it is not true. low and said almost like a growled whisper, interluded with a guttural snort that seems to call to viktor. his mouth twitches as it pulls down, and unconsciously flexes his arms where his fingers grasp for his own wrist, to rub at the tingling a touch harder. ]
cw: attempted suicide mentions
Date: 2025-08-19 05:48 pm (UTC)Perhaps that is what it will feel like to receive an honest answer. Viktor isn't going to demean him further by playing pretend, masking the feeling he had seeing Jayce ready to do what he wanted to do,]
Only when you're standing on a ledge.
[when Jayce is choosing to forge onward, to fight in ways that don't require a weapon, then Viktor no longer feels such lowly pity for him.]
Wasn't it the same for you-? To find your long ailing partner near to stepping over the aqueduct, as you did...
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Date: 2025-08-19 06:27 pm (UTC)[ it's immediate, almost defensive, almost another whisper, but it still lands guttural and solid. another chance that jayce has to face him again, sideways, prepared to challenge his view. take the damn knife and sink himself into it. what else would he do when it was viktor who held it? ]
I'd never . . . Look at you like that. Not pity. Not ever.
[ jayce hesitates, searching for the shape of something harder to name, something that had been easier to mutter before, but felt too strong for something so brittle and dangerously edged the way it was (they were) now. his throat works around it before the words finally fall, laced with . . . more. ]
If anything, I— [ jayce stops, breath hitching, and starts again softer, steadier. ] I was upset you'd came to that conclusion. But it wasn't . . . Lesser. Never lesser.
[ the realization of what this means comes in layers. he's hurt by the difference. he's ashamed, humiliated. it could've been anyone, but viktor— gods. his downcast gaze wants to hide in the hole he once fell down. was he too small, up there? unworthy of his partnership?
viktor doesn't always know how to best express himself.
was that jayce's wishful understanding, or the truth, though? his hand curls at his side, like it wants to reach out but doesn't dare. still, there's something unspoken lingering in the air— an ache, a tether, waiting for viktor to give him reason to react to the pooling, fizzing heat under his skin that could blow at the most subtle triggers. jayce drops his hand between them now, palm up and runestone exposed, knuckles sinking into dirt. ]
If it were you in my place the other day, I would've been terrified, too. Even if I were angry.
[ he's . . . starting to understand.
because they are a mirror. because they are two sides of the same coin. because they are each other's favorite regret. ]
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Date: 2025-08-19 06:56 pm (UTC)Damn Jayce's earnestness to all hell.
Viktor's expression slips, anger washes out like a poorly built structure meant to hold too much back. The mask always slips with Jayce. There is no maintaining composure when faced with his mirror and the well meaning nature his partner upholds even in his darkest hours. They remain a sun and a moon held in too distant an orbit. Viktor wanted to shine with his own light, but was content to do so with what he was given. A humbling metaphor, perhaps, perspective that Viktor cannot function as the center of his own universe. To impose that upon all that is around him is to simply collapse into an all consuming black hole.]
I misjudged, then... I'm sorry.
[Jayce's hand turns to the sky and Viktor slowly reaches out for it. He'll stop if the man flinches away or gives any other indication not to touch him. If not for that, he lays his palm to Jayce's, resting fingers to lace between, intertwine, and lay his hand and wrist to rest upon his partner's. There would be a slight wince to feel his arcane energy spark against that stone, but he'll not pull away from that. It will settle like so much static electricity,]
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Date: 2025-08-20 01:38 am (UTC)I forgive you.
[ quiet. almost forced through his teeth. it is genuine forgiveness, but it does not come lightly. for one, jayce is increasingly frustrated with himself, crumbling like paper to the static brush of fingers that sets his whole frame on fire and alert. he shouldn't want this. not now— but even his own wants and needs betray him. both on edge and undone, he takes viktor's hand in a tight, coarse grip, every patch of fur on him standing, and his pupils engorging enough to nearly eclipse the honey hazel within them.
his breathing has picked up from the way the rythmic blows of air pull in and out with the rise and fall of his chest. the way his presence fills the back of the car, the way bruised, purple-black battered knuckles protrude and sting with his squeeze. this was animalistic, and jayce is at a crossroads of incertainty, to whether this is his own desire or his new biology— and which one made it worse? does it matter? ]
. . . I—
[ he catches himself. it's the very last of his restraint. ]
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Date: 2025-08-20 01:44 pm (UTC)[Viktor interjects, knowing the limits of such forgiveness and wishing them stated. He'd held and begged Jayce to never forgive him his many trespasses, despite being sorry. The burden of his choices is something he needs to carry, they cannot merely be shrugged off with pretty words and sentiment.
He feels this way largely because he cannot forgive Jayce what he's done. For all his talk of being past fairness, Viktor still has that balance in mind. He cannot forgive and so there need be limits to his own absolution.
Perhaps out of fear that he'd buckle beneath the strength of Jayce's persistence,]
Jayce, [he'll interject when Jayce catches himself, speaking that name firmly. The look in Jayce's blow out eyes is clear as day, even in the night. Viktor's expression sweetens towards him, slipping out from his own resolution in turn. Oh, that looks says so much... Viktor puts it much too simply,]
You're hungry.
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Date: 2025-08-20 04:49 pm (UTC)he wanted viktor.
and how that rings so very prominent now, of all times. denial would be another sentence. hungry, he was. not enough to feel the stuttering madness that makes his body contort and beg, fall apart, but it is hunger all the same. a start. a fuse, wishing to be lit. a dryness at the back of his throat and an emptiness at the pit of his stomach, isolation in his heart. it is a heat set to boil even lower at the hips, knowing what was to come of it, making his ears pin forward and his tail flag embarassingly behind him once the wires cross. if he tastes, he will lose all sense of discipline. he'll crumble.
and it will make this all so much worse. so much more complicated and like treading across a minefield. but can he resist it? resist him? his lips move without pulling apart, a scowl in the making, brows arched low, and an unconscious presentation of his broken rack, bone white and pearly, cleaned— still formidable. still worth something. still strong.
he can't even think clearly enough to answer what mattered most— their lines in the sand to be respected, until they are ready to shorten the distance, and already— something too primal in jayce wants to breach it. and it will.
he's ruining everything before they truly get started, and viktor isn't doing much to help in how his observation dips honey sweet. jayce hesitates for as long as he can, but he continues as carefully as he could before the stag throws caution to the wind.
he breathes his words out as if they could shatter him. like he hates that he wants. and gods, help him. this wasn't what they needed and yet, his whisper scrapes the very floors: ]
I still want you.
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Date: 2025-08-20 05:15 pm (UTC)Viktor lifts his hand from Jayce's grasp on it. He reaches forward to cradle his jaw, to push his metallic thumb through his beard and along his cheek with tenderness.
Shepherding him forward, to roll his way over top of Viktor, if only Jayce will be guided along. Submitted and yet still in control, still holding firm to anchor Jayce despite how often that idea sank him,]
Have me. Just once more.
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Date: 2025-08-21 12:59 am (UTC)all there was needed was new intention, an opening, for jayce to spring himself with the guidance as if set loose to buck around in an arena. his legs and hooves struggle to bend and sit, especially where his knee does not comply (something about a living body being more painful than dulled where rusted), but he hurries his angles and bears his weight upon the herald, his hands already a mess of loose soil and long locks of platinum and chestnut. they should close this thing if its still open for the convoy to bear witness. jayce will regret it later, but not now. it's of no concern to him, now.
he is vivid, his heart wild, stuck in this enticing wallop like a trap. like a meal. like his ultimate desire. he hangs so pressed into viktor after his single, tallest antler threatens to scrape the heights of the cybertruck, every curve and bulge clasps against viktor's with urgency— and still a damn perfect fit. the snarl that becomes of him is befitting for a stag in rut, digging fingers into metalic flesh and bone not to hurt, but to absorb, to smell, to press his nose, to meld with— become one with. it's hardly words until the syllables slip into addition, low and like a prayer to war. he has been thinking about him and thinking, and thinking, and imagining, until he went mad with it in his solitude— ]
That's a lie.
[ jayce cannot physically live without him. viktor cannot resist him. the same can be said of one another when the coin's sides are flipped. ]
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