Work Text:
Jayce woke with a start, water dripping onto his face. With bleary eyes, he spotted the stalactite responsible for the offense; one that was closer to the opening he had fallen into. It must be raining.
As if on cue, pain throbbed in his leg and he sat up with a groan. Clothes stuck to his chest and with a sharp pang of hopelessness, Jayce realized his clothes were wet.
Of course.
From sweat or the rainwater dripping down the cave, he didn’t know. But it didn’t stop the ache in his eyes as tears welled up in the corners.
He gave himself a harsh flick to his cheek to stop himself from bursting into tears. Again.
Stay strong. Wet clothes aren’t the end of the world.
His hands fumbled for the pile of cloth he’d torn off of his outfit weeks earlier and threw a few scraps into the fire pit he was using, wincing at the discomfort of sticky clothes dragging along his arms.
As Jayce scraped together his usual rocks to create a spark, he argued with himself internally. Would he be more cold if he took his wet clothes off and bared his skin to the stale air of the cave? Or would he just as likely freeze to death?
The lake in his cave was not warm, and he had nothing to contain the water with to boil and make a bath.
A burst of heat against his face took Jayce out of his thoughts and he allotted himself a small sigh of relief at the sight of fire rising up. He leaned down to blow air onto the flames, ignoring when some embers settled on his face and left tiny pinprick burns.
Running a hand through his hair, Jayce moved to lean against the cave wall and stare into the fire. Wet clothes and injuries were forgotten for just a moment as he let the small heat wash over whatever exposed skin he had.
His moment of reprieve ended though when he glanced over to the pile of bones and dried guts sitting next to the fire. He mentally counted the days it had been since he had last eaten and felt his stomach sink at the realization that it had been way too long.
It was always like this, almost a daily routine.
Jayce would wake up with his bones aching from the hard ground and cold air, his leg throbbing from where the hammer had barrelled into it, his stomach gasping for food. He’d stop himself from crying just long enough to get a fire going. Then he’d remember he needed to eat or move or drink, and it would all crumble around him again.
The only things he could find down here to eat were definitely infected with something . He didn’t know if the infection came from the organic Hextech that had consumed Piltover or from any dangerous substances and gases that were still leftover in whatever remained of Zaun, but it didn’t matter.
Whatever it was, his body could barely choke down the few things he could find down here. More often than not, whatever he ate ended up coming back up anyway. It didn’t matter that his wound had clearly already gotten infected by it.
Wet clothes. Food. Water. Dirty bandages. Trying to climb out again . So much ahead of him that day that he needed to deal with.
He flicked himself once more when he felt his eyes sting again. Pull yourself together , he thought to himself angrily. Start with water .
Jayce dragged himself to the lake, barely able to keep the weight off his leg. He couldn’t keep from cursing at the world, at the gods, at his hammer, at Hextech, at everything, at himself, whenever his leg would hit a rock.
Viktor’s voice drifted into his head, a mockery of what he would have sounded like had he been watching Jayce. “All this over a temporary leg injury? You would have never survived my life. ”
“Shut up,” Jayce growled into the empty air as he continued crawling. This was another part of his new daily routine that he couldn't stand and he absolutely didn’t need to be reminded yet again of the reality of his solitude.
But his brain wasn’t done.
“One would think after weeks of being in this… predicament, the great Man of Progress would have had the wherewithal to move your camp closer to the water .” This time it was Mel’s voice that taunted him, filling up his ears with sounds that weren’t being made.
“You aren’t real,” he snapped, his words carving out the contradiction he felt in his heart.
“I told you your dreams were dangerous. ” That voice got him to stop. “You never listen to your mother, do you? ”
Jayce felt his breathing get shorter. His brain had never taunted him with his mom’s voice since he’d gotten stuck here. Not until now.
“Please, stop,” he begged. He was almost there , it wasn’t even that long of a crawl–
“If you had just destroyed the Hexcore… ”
“If you had just stopped to think before touching that wild rune… ”
“If you had just listened to me… ”
He sucked in a deep breath as the voices merged into one.
“You wouldn’t be stuck in this pit .”
With a throaty roar, Jayce slammed his fist into the ground so hard he felt skin break. He screamed into the cave with all the strength he had left in him, not stopping even when his voice strained and his lungs ached.
His eardrums were throbbing as his scream was cut off with a choke, a lump forming in his throat. He gasped for air, as if it would stop what he knew was coming, but it was too late.
Jayce sobbed. He collapsed back onto the ground and pressed his forehead onto the cold stone. Tears dripped down his cheeks and nose as he closed his eyes.
He lost track of how long he stayed there, laying just feet away from the lake. Jayce couldn’t stop the tears and it paralyzed him.
It only made him cry harder.
His wails filled the once-silent cavern, all the desperation and misery and solitude unable to be contained as he weeped.
He weeped for his mother, a woman who had fought to make sure he stayed safe. Now she may never see him again.
He weeped for Mel, someone who had built him up all these years and offered him comfort and a much-needed clear head. Now he was alone, with none of Mel’s cunning and care there to guide his path.
He weeped for Viktor, his tragic partner who had picked him out of the lowest part of his life and gave it a new purpose. Who even knew where he was at that point, if he was even alive. Maybe the Hexcore had consumed him from the inside as it had this version of Piltover.
He weeped for his former self. That bright young innovator who had been so filled with ideas, so filled with images of magic, so dedicated to his life’s research. The scientist who wanted to do good by the world. The star crossed dreamer that ended up dooming Piltover in the end anyway.
Jayce was startled out of his sobs at the sensation of something tickling the back of his neck. On instinct, he swung his arm around to grab whatever it was.
All he got for his effort was a loud smack on skin and a wince at the pain. He hazily sat himself up again, wondering if he was still hallucinating.
Through tear-blurred eyes, he could make out a small fluttering slowly hovering around the water.
Somehow, a butterfly had made its way down into the cavern. Jayce couldn’t take his eyes off it as he felt snot and tears sticking to his face in the cold draft.
It was just a simple beige creature with a skinny yellow body.
But after weeks of dealing with the horrible purples and greens of the creatures down there and the infection slowly rotting through Jayce’s leg… his tears slowly dried as he watched the beautiful, uncorrupted butterfly circling the stalactites over the lake.
Jayce remembered a conversation he’d had with Viktor that felt like a lifetime ago, the morning after he made his speech on Progress Day.
“I didn’t know you had such an interest in butterflies” he had said, smiling as a bright blue one rested on Viktor’s finger.
His partner offered him a raised eyebrow. “Is it so surprising?”
Jayce shrugged in reply. “I guess I’ve never really seen you take an interest in anything outside of, well, technology.”
Viktor let the butterfly go and turned to face Jayce. “Organic bodies were the original technology, Jayce. And a butterfly developed the technology to fly, something we only just figured out in recent centuries. Natural evolution.”
“I guess I never really thought about it that way,” he said, watching as the butterfly flew off into the sky.
“There were a lot of butterflies where I grew up. One of the few but prevalent treasures of the undercity that survived the last civil war.” Viktor gave him a warm smile that made Jayce’s heart skip a beat.
“Maybe what we’re doing here can bring those other natural treasures back,” Jayce said, eyes averting from Viktor’s handsome jaw.
“Wishful thinking. What’s done is done,” Viktor sighed, using his cane to stand up from his seat. Jayce saw his eyes sparkle though when they traced back to the blue insect in the air. “But maybe we can make the people feel just as this butterfly does.”
“Which is?”
“Unconcerned with the constraints we humans give ourselves.” He brought his hand up to shield his eyes from the morning sun illuminating the butterfly.
Jayce chuckled. “Can’t say the freedom a butterfly has wouldn’t be nice.”
Viktor had smiled, and Jayce had felt whole.
Now more than anything, he wished Viktor were here to talk more about butterflies with him.
Jayce watched as the butterfly flew back towards the wall with the opening, landing on a stalagmite behind his fire. The fire warped the image of the butterfly, the yellows and browns mixing in with the reds and oranges.
For a second, he thought he saw faces in the warping air. His mom, Mel, Viktor, all fading in and out of the fire as the butterfly rested. They didn’t hold the expressions he imagined they would hold, though. No angry disconnect, no utter disappointment, no vindicated “I-told-you-so.”
It was just them. Their faces all smiles he recognized.
The butterfly delicately flew up through the cracks and curves leading back up. Jayce strained his head as far he could go just to catch one last glimpse of that flash of yellow amongst the sickly green, purple, and red.
The cave remained silent except for the dripping of water and the quiet crackle of the fire.
Jayce took in a deep breath and turned back towards the lake.
“Start with water.”
