Chapter Text
The thing about raising the dead, is that there's a reason why it's nigh impossible.
Cells stop generating, electrodes stop firing. Past a certain point— a certain amount of wear and tear— the body can no longer maintain it's processes. Including a restart.
At least, naturally.
But Viktor had heard tales of others who had achieved resurrection after a significant amount of time. And he had always been good at working under pressure. After all, maintaining life for himself and others through any means possible had been a long term goal for a while now.
Working with dead limbs and organs wasn't new. Working with week-old ones, a little bit. But that was no issue, it wasn't hard to go out harvest fresher ones, from fresher bodies. Bodies that still lived, breathed. At least, they had been when he went to retrieve what he needed from them.
It was taking out two birds with one stone, as Viktor saw it. He harvested from those whom had troubled him, squashed his beloved Defender. A section of intestine from this elite, a set of vertebrae from that one. He was still choosy, if he was going to bring his partner back he only wanted the best for him. But the added tinge of revenge certainly made the whole ordeal sweeter.
News spread like a gush from an arterial vein when Piltover realized that someone was targeting their precious high class. Rumors flew of how it had started shortly after it was discovered that the Defender of Tomorrow's crypt had been broken into, his body found missing.
It took at least another month before he got Jayce— his Jayce. Ever since Viktor had seen his resting place carved next to him Jayce was his— back the first time. Some semblance of him, at least. It happened right after Viktor had surged Jayce's brain with electricity once he had finished finely tuning the nerves and replacing synapses.
Jayce's eyes fluttered open, their blue faded and cloudy. Simply a result of systems connecting. At least, that's what Viktor had thought at first. But Jayce then looked at him! His eyes moved to where Viktor was standing and looked!
And there had been the barest flicker of emotion, he had been sure of it, before those eyes went dark again and Viktor lost connection.
What had it been? Surprise, maybe. Or pain?
After that Viktor lost Jayce's left eye. It decayed rapidly compared to the rest of him, it had to be removed. Even though he was working on the whole of the man, losing even simply a part of him left Viktor wrecked.
His heart wrenched at the thought of just tossing it out, the damned fleshed thing. So he held a sort of funeral for the organ, and buried with it a scrap of the hope he had been clinging to like a security blanket.
The second attempt was more purposeful. More directed.
The Machine Herald made certain to wait until every little connection was made and tested before put to the whole of Jayce's system. Mechanics were used more liberally than he had initially planned to. His friend hadn't wanted— well, it couldn't be helped.
Jayce may not have wanted augments. Viktor didn't want to be alone. They had to find a compromise somewhere.
After stitching the scalp back into place with long, steady pulls of stiff thread that tugged at the softening skin Viktor's augmented third arm snipped at the knot as he returned to his machines. As he removed long gloves covered in congealed gore he looked over the readings once more. Just a final check before he pulled the final lever.
This time Jayce's body twitched more. His eyes moved under their lids, like he was dreaming. The skin around his nose and mouth flinched and fluttered. His fingers jerked and curled, similar to how Viktor's claw did when he recalibrated it's connections.
Then the lungs he had transplanted gave a huge, shuddering gasp in. Gasp out. First the augmented eye opened. A hand- the one that Viktor had had to use more metal and mechanics than flesh and nerves on- lashed out to grip onto Viktor's wrist in a vice grip.
Jayce's colorless lips parted and he let out a long, loud groan that lasted ages. It rang in Viktor's ears. Monotone and unchanging, even as it sounded painful and helpless at the same time.
The red orb he had used to replace his friend's eye fixated onto his face and Viktor held a breath of his own.
The groaning intensified. Up-pitched. Until suddenly the body was out of air once more. It took in a deep inhale all at once.
"Jayce?" Viktor called as he hurried the few inches closer, bent over the visage of his dearest love to scan for any signal there was something wrong. "Jayce, my darling, do you-"
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!"
This time the groan the body, his lover's body, quickly shifted into a scream right into Viktor's face. The air that left it was rank and rotten and Viktor couldn't help but flinch back.
The hand on his wrist tightened.
Viktor scrambled to kill the connection, to flip the switch back and cut the power. Immediately the body stopped. The hold on his arm went lax. The augmented eye went blank. The scream fell instantly into a soft, hollow gurgle that petered to a halt.
Sobs wracked the Machine Herald's body even without the tears present. His vents overheated into overdrive as they tried to catch up with the sudden onslaught of emotion. He collapsed onto the surgery table, over the body he had labored so hard over, and pressed into the cold skin of it's shoulder. The meat there smelled like freezer burn from how long he had kept it in such a cold room, and how shortly his love had returned to it.
If only Viktor could convince himself that Jayce were really there, really holding him. Instead of just a slab of flesh held together by the fine stitches of Viktor's own careful hand.
Those same hands trembled as he finally pulled himself from the safe crook of shoulder to caress the slack-jawed, pale face. How he wished the warmth would return so he could learn it. How he wished he had realized when Jayce had first been alive…
Viktor's thin lips shook as he pressed them to the dry, spongy dead ones of his nemesis' body and made a promise. The same promise that had been circling his mind since he first broke into Jayce's mausoleum. The same promise that echoed with each cut and slice he slashed for the parts to make him whole again.
The third try was nearly six months later.
Viktor was haggard, but he was done. It was perfect this time, this handcrafted vessel. He could feel it down where his wires met bone.
That didn't stop his jaw from clenching, or the headache that pounded behind his right eye as Viktor applied the monitor adhesives to each planned point. Evvery touch was firm but sweet, tinged in anticipation for when he could feel over where he placed them and meet warmth instead.
Then he pressed one more kiss to that still, porcelain mouth for luck and stepped back behind the safety barrier.
There was a flash as the Machine Herald made the final move.
A sizzle of electricity meeting skin, then coursing through it.
Jayce's whole body trembled like a live wire. Then twitched. And twitched and twitched and twitched…
Sensors in Viktor's vision went off to warn him he was holding his breath far too long.
After two minutes both of the body's eyes opened, and Viktor could see how those pretty lashes jumped as their owner relearned the sensation of vision. The head turned slow like it was on an old hinge until red and blue could fall on him, still hunkered behind the safety window.
The fingers of the hand that reached out to him were still convulsing as feeling returned to resurrected nerves.
And finally, a voice whispered. So soft and cracking from so long without use. Viktor should have lubricated his vocal chords.
But it was still the voice he had missed most since going into his seclusion.
"Viktor…?" the renewed Defender hissed, tongue thick. "Viktor, what… what did you do…?"