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Chapter Text

There is a man knocking on the door to Viktor's house.

Viktor stares at him from behind, the results of his shopping in one hand, his other hand stuffed into his trouser pocket where he'd been about to pull out his house key, and his Claw unfortunately deactivated, detached, and stored in his lab. Presumably if the man's waiting outside his door like this the stranger's looking for the scary mad scientist Machine Herald, Ungrateful Terror of Piltover's Academy, or whatever topside newspapers and his former colleagues have taken to calling Viktor. The prospect of walking up to this man with his shopping in one hand and his third hand nowhere in sight leaves Viktor feeling a tad under-dressed.

He feels his lips curl down slightly in annoyance. This would not be a problem if the Claw was not so heavy or his own health not so precarious. Or, if this stranger hadn't decided to knock on his door like visiting Zaun's most infamous mad scientist was a normal social call. At least pushy chem-baron goons and Enforcers had the respect to try break-ins and and threatening notes.

Aiming to startle, Viktor advances silently then clears his throat loudly, "Did you need something?"

The man doesn't startle, but he turns around so quickly that a less observant person might have thought he had, "Viktor!" He says, with a smiling handsome face, curious observant eyes that wrinkle at the corners in time with his wide grin, Viktor's name in his mouth like it's a delight. 

It's a lot.

It's enough that Viktor almost misses the man's next words, as his mind tries to reboot enough to catalogue and process the person saying them. "Good to see, you. It's me, Jayce - kind of anyway. I'm sure this is a bit surprising, but at least I can promise the explanation's going to be interesting?"

The man, Jayce apparently, smiles again though this time smaller and almost bemused. He's a classically masculine sort of beautiful with broad shoulders and a strong jaw that plays strangely with his soft bright eyes and the way he seems to wear his emotions so openly on his face.

The practical but crude leg-brace and the scruffy cut of his hair and beard versus the obviously high quality material and clean edges with 'tasteful' accents that make up his clothing make him visually hard to place, but his crisp, over-clear pronunciation betrays him as clearly coming from Piltover. Both cities had large immigrant populations, but Piltover made sure to sand away any accents or loan words form its sons and daughters as soon as they could speak. So likely from the city above, but part of its working class. Plebians who lied to themselves about being closer to the golden towers above rather than the chasm below.

Taking all he's seen and heard into account, Viktor returns still to his initial conclusion. He has no idea who this man is.

The smart thing to do would be to ignore Jayce, or at the very least interrogate him with the threat of the stun-gun Viktor had grabbed instead of his keys when he'd seen a stranger knocking on his house's door (which in fairness to his detractors, does also contain his very illegal lab and could therefore accurately be called a lair or hideout.)

This is not what Viktor does. Instead, from an incredulous, almost third person perspective he watches himself shoulder past Jayce, unlock his door, then gesture his apparent guest in with a stiff nod.  From there at a loss for what else to do after Jayce follows him inside, Viktor heads to his lab as he had originally planned, Jayce trailing behind with a soft, uneven gait.

Upon entering his lab, Viktor sets down the bag with his shopping (a tin of screws, a case of small electro-magnets, ink, chalk, and several illegal and very volatile chemicals from a chem-baron that owed him a favor) and turns around to face his guest.  His hands itch to squeeze a cane he no longer carries or to reattach his Claw. Viktor had the odd thought that if he were a different sort of person, he'd be puttering about making tea tea to offer - like an old Academy professor leaning on manners to give themselves minute of grace as they prepared to face an unexpected guest.

Viktor's not sure he even owns a kettle, last time he'd made himself something hot to drink he'd just used one of the lab burners. 

Jayce meanwhile is looking around his lab with obvious curiosity. His eyes catch on Blitzcrank resting in his corner, the Claw charging on his workbench, equations scribbled out on a chalkboard half-finished. Despite the multitude of things in the room that seem to draw his attention, every few seconds his soft eyes seem to jump back to Viktor himself.

Maybe I should buy a kettle, Viktor thinks.

Annoyed at the unbidden nonsensical thought, Viktor forces himself to speak to beat his guest at breaking the silence. "You promised an explanation, I would prefer if that started with a more thorough introduction and why exactly you sought me out." 

Jayce smiles again, it must be something he does often; it suits his face, "Well, firstly I'm not here to give you trouble or arrest you or anything like that, so you can put down whatever you're holding in your right hand, V."

He sounds amused as his eyes trail down to the stun-gun Viktor's been discreetly palming. Viktor clutches it tighter for a second, reminded momentarily of the uncomfortably intimacy of X-rays that so easily showed his lungs so heavy with growths and disease they blocked out the rest of his chest, then drops the stun-gun on his desk with a raised eyebrow. It's fine, he's got plenty of ways to defend himself in his own lab, not to mention Blitzcrank in the corner. It still feels odd.

"Thanks. As for why I'm here, it's related to the introduction." Jayce shifts his feet, centering his weight on his unbraced leg. "As you probably guessed, I'm not from here, and I need your help to get back to where I am supposed to be." His hands are spread but it feels more like he's being earnest than a subtle beg. Jayce spoke like he expects it will take convincing, but Viktor's help will - in one form or another - be the guaranteed outcome. What a maddening, enviable sort of confidence to have in another.

Viktor licks the inside of his teeth, controlling his expression, "If you want my help, I'll require a better explanation that that. I'm not entirely sure what your 'here' is as you are obviously from Piltover and should have little trouble crossing the bridge. Why should I be able to guess at some other meaning? I've never met you before despite the familiarity you display towards me."

Jayce's eyes widen, for the first time looking uncertain in his shock, "You don't know a Jayce Talis, or a Jayce Giopara? Besides me, just now I mean. Not even in passing?"

Giopara is familiar from his time in Piltover as one of the more ambitious -and that was saying something- noble Houses, and Talis vaguely rings a bell as the brand responsible for some of his nicer hammers and wrenches, but in association with the name Jayce or with his guest's memorably handsome face nothing comes to mind.

"No. You are a stranger to me and both of your names unfamiliar."

Jayce still seems shocked, a sadness creeping into his expressive eyes. "That's . . . going to make the explanation more difficult." There's a pause in the sentence, like he was going to say something else, something disappointed or melancholy. To his own surprise, Viktor is unsure if he's glad that Jayce held back and swallowed the sticky sentiment. 

"I'm not from this world." Jayce holds out his wrist, like it's proof of that frankly unbelievable sentence as he begins to ramble.

"The last several times this was easier, because we'd met or the other me was with you when I showed up so obviously that in and of itself is an excellent starting point in the body of evidence for multiversal existence and travel."

 There is a blue crystal etched with an unfamiliar symbol literally embedded in Jayce's wrist. The appearance is uncanny. Viktor knows better than possibly any the way inorganic material can be grafted to organic, and it should not look like that, like his flesh was lightning struck metal warped to cradle what was previously separate.

"A bit harder this time around, which is especially frustrating because this should be the last jump. Which does make it weird this world's apparently so far diverged from mine that we never even met, but you did warn me that space-time does not map easily onto the typical vectors that humans experience."

Thinking back to the familiarity Viktor had been greeted with, the way Jayce had glanced around his lab. Fond at Blitzcrank, confused at the Claw, curious and understanding at the trailing equations Viktor had scribbled on his chalkboard. If there was anyone in Piltover with the brilliance to grasp Viktor's work after just a look, it was improbable to the point of nearing impossible that Viktor would have never heard of them. Piltover had never met a resource it wouldn't exploit, and he kept a close eye on the Academy besides. 

"I mean obviously not you-you or my-you told me, the old version did. Though I guess that's how my-you and possibly even this you end up because he did also imply there was some sort of universal convergence happening, which is the sort of over the top, perfectionist thing any-you would do, come to think of it-"

"Jayce, stop." To Viktor's surprise, the simple command is enough and Jayce's mouth closes with a click though there remains a certain wildness to his eyes that indicates the rambling would start back up if he was allowed to unlock his jaw.

"We can address the issue of evidence later, for now simply explain your journey here and how you expect me to help you get home."

Like a foregone conclusion, like the protagonist of a tragedy offered at every performance a choice but by virtue of self only ever able to pick the most damning one, Viktor wryly realizes he's already decided to believe Jayce and offer any help that he is able.

Jayce's story is unbelievable in the sense that Viktor truly does not know enough of magic or the technology Jayce was describing that utilizes it to evaluate the theory behind it. Despite not being familiar with him like Viktor apparently is in every other universe, Jayce himself and the obviously magical and grotesquely distorted hammer-cannon weapon he'd sheepishly retrieved from its hiding spot outside remained the best proof of his story. 

The person in question is currently asleep on Viktor's seldom used couch downstairs where Viktor had banished him in the late afternoon after several hours of explanations that were becoming increasingly marked with yawns. Jayce had followed the command easily enough, though Viktor could not ascertain whether that was due to exhaustion, a naturally biddable personality, or a pliability in Jayce born of a projected send of trust. It is clear that Jayce feels deeply for his own universe's Viktor in a way that seems to echo with near equal strength to other iterations. 

Regardless, Jayce is now curled up and breathing softly in the way of deep sleep, one hand still loosely gripping his Arcane polluted hammer in a way that resembles a lonely child clutching a blanket far more than it does weary warrior. Watching him sleep had given Viktor a disconcerting pang in his chest of something sweetly to the left of pity and he'd given up on the activity quickly.

Back in his lab, and away from Jayce it is easier to to think rationally. Viktor mulls his own behavior and thought patterns over as he goes to wake up Blitzcrank from his charging station with a gentle pat on the head and sets the silent golem to work.

While Viktor finds the suffering of and injustices done to any sapient creature unconscionable to the point of being rage inducing, he doesn't typically 'like' people on an individual basis. When he did seek individuals out it was typically purposeful: academics for advice outside his fields of specialty, those injured by the cruelty of the world who needed his help as the Machine Herald, or conversely, those resourceful enough to be of assistance to him, sometimes -more often when he was younger, healthier, and a tad bit less misanthropic- sex when there was mutual attraction. Even with added benefits and the uncommon case of a non-grating personality, it was rare such socialization went beyond tolerable to enjoyable.

Viktor shrugs off his shirt and jacket as Blitzcrank comes over with his Claw, now fully charged. He jumps a little at the nerve reconnection as the Claw is screwed back into its stabilizing plate on his rewired metal spine. Damn but that's always unpleasant - the cold, sharp, thousand-needle burn of neuropathic agony that reminds him horribly of when his bad leg was still flesh. Though at least with the Claw it quickly fades as the electrical connection stabilizes.  

His own personality firmly in mind, the way Viktor had reacted to Jayce was rather uncharacteristic.

He takes the new shirt and jacket Blitzcrank offers next, these like most of his wardrobe these days modified to be worn with his third hand, with a grateful nod and quiet thanks. Viktor shrugs into them carefully, wary of over-balancing in his first few minutes with a new center of gravity born of the extra mass on his back before heading over to the lab's largest blackboard covered in Jayce's neatly written equations and pretty diagrams explaining the science of harnessing the Arcane.

Perhaps it is a sense of borrowed familiarity? Jayce had mentioned in his world he'd worked with the Viktor as his partner for years. It's not surprising his tone, mannerisms, and responses had clicked so easily with Viktor's own, like a gear slotting perfectly into place with its replacement part. 

Perhaps it is the mystery he offers? Viktor cannot lie to himself that there isn't an element of bored frustration to his life since being chased back to Zaun where he's resigned himself to angrily patching up the symptoms of an unjust system he'd once thought he could change from the inside in Piltover.

Perhaps it is that Jayce is very, very pretty, both to the conventional sense and to Viktor's own taste?

Viktor can only say for sure that some of it is definitely the impossible theorems drawn up as neatly as a textbook on his blackboard. At first glance, they look like the rambles of a mad man, the sort of blitzed nonsense an Academy student might draw up with their brain stewing on every Undercity drug a scion of Piltover's elite could afford, but staring at them and going through the equations they make sense.

It is like reading through gibberish and watching as it slowly shifts into a legible tongue, it's like watching someone off-handedly declare the theory of gravity false then prove it be sending him flying into the air. A giddy, shivering joy lifts the corners of Viktor's mouth into an unthinking smile, as he realizes that his guest sleeping downstairs is the sort of genius the likes of which Viktor's never seen.

Which is not to say that Viktor does not know himself to be a genius - false modesty is for the pathetically timid and those desperately fishing for compliments -, but his mind works in a completely different way. Viktor has pushed his specialties of robotics and biomechanical engineering to previously unimaginable heights with a deeper understanding and more audacious experimentation that any of his colleagues were ever able to achieve. The changes he's desperately wrought on his failing body, or more pleasantly, the intricate robotics that granted Blitzcrank sapience might be things other scientists could only imagine but that in all of Piltover or Zaun only Viktor could achieve, even -he suspects- including his guest downstairs.

But to create an entirely new branch of science would take an intoxicating mix of wild egotism and childish naivety to even consider, and to have the genius to actually pull it off would justify both to their greatest extremes! 

Jayce had mentioned with a dose of self-deprecation that he'd needed that other's world Viktor to make his Hextech actually work as intended for the first time, and that in some universes it wasn't even them who'd discovered his Hextech, that they'd merely perfected it. Perhaps it is selfish but both caveats matter little to Viktor. Jayce had proven himself able to actualize a miracle. In light of that, what did it matter that he required help to bring it to its fully realized form?

Viktor can't help but trace a notation regarding the stabilization of the crystal power source in its high energy state that Jayce had sweetly underlined as 'his' with a reverent finger. 

That sort of evolution of an idea to its best form was Viktor's specialty anyway. 

Chapter Text

Despite Viktor's excitement their first night together the next several days pass slowly, albeit enjoyably. To activate the spell embedded in the rune on his wrist by the mage he'd met, Jayce needs to be near a large source of Arcane energy. From his descriptions, in the other universes he'd visited on his way home he'd sought Viktor or his alternative self out for access to what he call their 'Hexgates' or the Hexcore, though even these grand inventions only powered the rune enough for a partial journey before requiring a recharge.

Per Jayce, that might have been a feature rather than a bug of the spell. Apparently several short trips between realities was a far safer method of travel than one long trip. Judging by the description Viktor had extracted from Jayce regarding his initial, accidental journey to a ruined, lifeless time-line (which apparently involved staying fully conscious through a sort of squash-and-stretch distortion of shape), Viktor was inclined to believe that theory. Though he did still wonder if the 'old-him' in that universe did not have some additional ulterior motives, even through the filter of Jayce's starry-eyed explanations the mage seemed a suspicious figure. 

Regardless, it means that to send Jayce back home they must build a similar device, and to do that they must gather parts and materials that Viktor does not keep in his lab. While he had metal, wires, solder, and other such tools for engineering, Viktor had not previously made it a habit to keep around 'magical' artifacts and strange crystal structures.

Fortunately given how far afield Hextech is from anything that exists as science in this reality, none of the items they need are currently expensive or restricted by Piltover as dangerous. To the unknowing observer, their slowly assembling pile of materials more clearly resembled a collection of mundane rods and wires mixed with esoteric junk. The only items that took more than a rummage through Viktor's storage closet and some of Zaun's shady pawn shops were the parts that were going to have to be custom made and the power source. 

The latter was an issue of scarcity. The fragile, inert dull blue crystals that could be found on land long owned by House Ferros were widely thought useless - too dull and fragile for jewelry and industry. The crystal was hard to find in Piltover and Zaun simply because no one thought them worthwhile enough to justify the mining and shipping. Luckily the supplier that Jayce first utilized in his own universe, a tradesman with family in the area, is also around in this one. Though it will take several days for the man's family in the area to send some of the crystals over.

The custom parts they need, mostly small plates of tempered alloys engraved with long forgotten runes - a bizarre mix of old magic and modern metals -, can be produced while they wait for their delivery in a forge Viktor borrows from a blacksmith he'd once gifted a prosthetic hand. Jayce, as it turns out, is a craftsman as well as a visionary.

The most efficient course of action would probably be for Viktor to work on the soldering and wiring of their project while Jayce is in the forge during the day, but he can rarely bring himself to do so. Instead the wiring and soldering gets done by the both of them in the late afternoon and night, while during the day Viktor often finds himself stopping by to sit just outside the sweltering forge to read Jayce's notes left lying around the lab or study the quick dictionary of runes he'd drawn up that acts as a method for directing the Arcane. Although, with a slightly embarrassing frequency, these studies gets interrupted by the distraction of Jayce himself in the forge, the strong muscles of his arms and back flexing as he used his human strength to pound metals into a useful configuration. 

When Jayce needs a break from the physical demands of his work or the heat of the furnace or when his poorly healed leg needs a rest from bearing his weight, he'll come outside and to sit with Viktor to chat. It apparently does not matter if they've already spoken early in the day or that Jayce is always guaranteed to see him later in the evening given that he's staying at Viktor's house, without fail whenever Jayce finds Viktor available to him during his breaks he lights up. His eyes brighten, his lips unconsciously curls upwards, his spine straightens - the effect is something like the enthusiasm of a dog joyously spotting its master though Viktor had been the one sitting at heel.

It is endearing as much as it is an ego trip.

On this particular instance, possibly their last day of assembling and acquiring parts before they actually start building their Hexcore - Viktor decides not to ask questions regarding the activation of the crystals their supplier has finally delivered, nor for more details regarding how other versions of himself have augmented the frustrating universal constant of his failing body , though both subjects remain of great interest to him. Instead he broaches a new curiosity that has been growing rapidly the more he considers the details Jayce has told him regarding his guest's original universe.

"I have new question for you today, Jayce. As I learn more of the Arcane and your past experiences I can not help but wonder, does it truly not bother you to leave such dangerous knowledge solely in another's hands?"

What they are building is not the Hexcore that Jayce had described as partially sapient and the power source that had fueled that other's Viktor's resurrection and corrupted spiral into power madness, but it is similar. They have designed a device that by description is something of a mix between that dangerous artifact and the weapon yet another version of Viktor wielded like a mage's staff. A dangerous thing in its own right, yes, but by including Viktor in the building and theory behind it, Jayce had also given him the keys to unlock the most apocalyptic of the Hexcore's iterations and other such terrors of the Arcane. Viktor knows that Jayce is too intelligent not to know this.

"Are you not worried what I will do with your Hextech when you are gone?"

"It's 'our' not 'my', first of all. My Viktor and I created it together, so it belongs to any version of you as much as it does to any version of me." That answer is quick and automatic, a rote counter-argument morphed into a quick-draw, steel-tempered insistence. A younger, furious and hurt at credit-stealing professors and at having his existence be swept under the Academy's rug as Zaunite dirt Viktor might have swooned at that a bit, or more likely latched on so hard he'd have dragged Jayce off to the magistrate for a marriage license failing lungs and bad leg be damned.

Older and far less caring about the fickle respect of others, current Viktor is mostly able to keep his composure even if the sentiment is still horrifically sweet.

Jayce continues, "And second, it is not like I'm under the impression you aren't going to continue using and developing Hextech after I've left."

He reaches behind thier backs to poke affectionately at Viktor's Claw which has been to his not fully conscious intent hovering avariciously over Jayce's shoulder like it wanted to to pluck at the thin, sweat-soaked undershirt he'd stripped down to for working in the forge, "For example, I'm guessing you're planning on using Hextech to power this guy so you can keep it on full time, yeah?" The Claw retracts closer to Viktor after the poke, control more conscious than unconscious once he pays attention to it, "That's what you usually do with it, though I can't imagine how hard it would make it to sleep comfortably."

It is with a near inhuman amount of restraint that Viktor keeps himself from spouting a very horrendous pick-up line about coming to bed with him to find out.

"More practical and mundane uses aside," Viktor says, forcing his attention back to the curiosity at hand, "after what you have witnessed in that far future and your own world, are you not worried I will go too far with this technology? I have never been accused of an overabundance of prudence or a refusal to push an idea to its limits."

Jayce bites his lip, his shoulders pulling in to make himself smaller as his voice quiets, "No, no I trust you, both yourself and every possible version of you, more than I trust myself. I've seen universes where you wield a less powerful version of the Hexcore for years as a weapon without succumbing to the Arcane. In mine, it's my refusal to let my Viktor -" his voice cracks a bit, and apparently even now he is unable to spit out the harsh reality of the word 'die', "- to let him go that led to his corruption with the Arcane."

He turns away slightly with a sigh, his eyes now focused on the fires of the forge, far-away and distant, "Honestly, seeing this you I wonder if you're better off having nev- Ow!"

Viktor makes sure Jayce is looking into his eyes with his grip on the chin he'd grabbed and twisted towards himself before he begins to speak, "That is the over-emotional, self-pitying logic of a sulky child, Jayce Talis or perhaps Giopara."

"Definitely Talis." Jayce mutters, still endearingly sulky despite his wide-eyed shock.

"If you say this invention is always ours, then so is its fate. In those other universes that you told me of, whether you are its creator or not, you do not chose to personally wield the Hexcore's most godly and destructive powers - always content with that ridiculous hammer of yours, no? You might have forced such a power on that other Viktor, but it is his own god-complex and arrogance that led him to ruin with it." Viktor shakes the jaw in his hand slightly, fingers gripping tight enough that they might bruise, "Do not disrespect my role in our fate. Understand?"

He releases his grip slowly, not letting Jayce break eye contact even as Viktor's hand retreats. Jayce runs a nervous tongue over his teeth, his head slightly ducked and his shoulders hunched to make himself lower, like he wants to be a Viktor's feet.

"My Mercury Hammer's not ridiculous." He eventually grumbles, eyes darting to the side. Viktor could strangle him, he really, truly in that moment could.

Instead he gathers his patience and sighs as deeply as his lungs allow, "That hammer's not the only thing that's ridiculous. Jayce, how old are?"

A curious twist, eyes more willing in meeting Viktor's, "I'm 32, well possibly turned 33 depending on how you incorporate time-and-dimension travel into counting a person's age."

"And how old do you think I am?"

Jayce's expression melts to something strangely in the neighborhood of adoring as his eyes dart between the crow's feet at the corners of Viktor's eyes, the grey streaks in his hair, the weathering of his skin, "Don't look a day over 25, my dear." He answers in the obnoxious, put-on cadence of a professional Piltover high-society social climber. It does not quite disguise the rumble of real delight in his voice.

Viktor shifts his Claw threateningly, "Be serious, or face consequences"

Jayce breaks character with a snort and returns to his regular voice, though he's still smiling slightly, "I don't know exactly, V. Maybe, about 45? When you're that age in other universes I've been to you're much more metal and usually masked. You look about a decade older than my Viktor, but he was so sick near the end it's hard to say."

The mention of that other him had dulled Jayce's mood, and Viktor wastes no time in destroying it completely. "We are about the same age, Jayce. I'm 34."

"But you look -"

Viktor does not let him speak, "Like you mentioned, illness unnaturally ages. I can replace my leg and spine so that my pain is not so constant and my movement not quite so limited, but no chemical I've devised or experimental surgery I've attempted has ever been able to do much for my poisoned blood and ruined lungs. Though the physiologic stress of the attempts have made me look past it, it is unlikely I will make it the age of 40."

Or rather it had been, now in the background Viktor's mind churns with the possibilities of metal unfailing lungs and an undying steel heart powered by a miracle made reality. It is still not a sure thing, but Viktor has the audacity and ruthless drive to perfectionism in him to try it.

"Let this universe serve as an example that my life is not magically safe and the price for my continued existence not steep just because you happen not to be in it."

Viktor reaches out to touch Jayce's cheek, hand gentle this time, "In fact I rather suspect in all the universes we meet, you push me by competitiveness or inspiration to my greatest achievements, my longest lives, and my most lasting legacies." 

Jayce's ridiculously thick eyelashes flutter closed as he inhales looking struck, "I-it's only fair if that's true." One of his hands comes up to gently cradle the one Viktor has against his cheek, "Without you I wouldn't, can't even, exist at all."

For several long, or possibly tortuously short, seconds neither of them moves or speaks. What they've both said is too true, weaknesses both too exposed to continue. Eventually however Jayce pulls away to return to his work, and Viktor, however reluctant, lets him.

Chapter Text

Even after Jayce has returned to the forge the intensity of their conversation boils beneath Viktor's skin. There is an underlying embarrassment in the vulnerability he'd shown but no real regret. He is not a man who wastes much time on such things - nor is he unsatisfied with the conversation's outcome. What he had given up of himself had been returned in equal or greater measure to an extent that the vulnerability exchanged felt gifted rather transactional. 

Still there is a restless adrenaline born from the conversation that has Viktor moving from his self-interested vigil of Jayce's work and onto finding distraction with his own projects. Giving himself a steam vent lest he boil alive in his own skin through the over-activation of his previously neglected limbic system.

Viktor has not completely abandoned his own work these past few days, though it has definitely been put on a backburner. Still there have often been points in the Hexcore project where he and Jayce have had no choice but to wait for a certain part to be delivered or finished at the forge - their assembly of wiring and soldering hitting a rate-limiting step. 

Normally that sort of interruption in such a fascinating project would be immensely frustrating but Jayce's presence made it less so. He was perfectly happy to help with or offer commentary on Viktor's previous experiments or in-process creations; or to just fiddle around with scraps of metal and wire as he spoke about this theory or that, the changes between universes versus their baffling constants, or even something as mundane as what Jayce thought they should do for lunch. Though his lab had previously been silent Viktor did not mind the change and even found himself making idle talk back: arguing that obviously a mechanical version of saltatory conduction was preferable to breakable fiber optics; wryly joking that is was unsurprising Heimmdinger's pompous little mustache was as much of universal constant as the yordle's self-important passivity; and that anything was fine for lunch as long as it could be eaten while they continued working.

It was enough that Viktor truly considered giving Blitzcrank a voice-box so he could join in. It had seemed an unnecessary, perhaps even cruel, feature to add when Viktor had first been working on his creation. No one came into his lab, and Viktor himself had never been in the habit of talking to himself or voicing his ideas aloud as he thought them out. Who would Blitzcrank have spoken with, a creator fighting the urge to demand silence? Still these past few days had shown that from the right source Viktor could enjoy and even contribute to chatter while he worked, and he would never want his creation to feel limited by his body.

Walking back into his lab Viktor spies Blitzcrank working quietly on maintaining some of the labs more delicate tools, and he smiles slightly to himself imaging his assistant's determined helpful nature accompanied by a tinny but enthusiastic voice. He decides he'll ask Blitzcrank if he desires such an upgrade after he finishes this project with Jayce. 

Speaking of Jayce and of multiversal constants though, there is a certain -maybe not project- but perhaps another curiosity that Viktor has been working on. This one without Jayce's input or even awareness.

While Jayce himself doesn't seem to pay it much mind, Viktor himself cannot help by wonder: if their fates are so intertwined, fused into a shining if occasionally tragic alloy in every other world, where is the Jayce Talis or Giopara of this universe?

Is he still languishing and suffocating under the dusty ivory towers of the Academy? Has he left that stuffy place to pursue his intellectual pursuits in obscurity? If that oversensitive man has in any way given up on his dreams then Viktor feels it it is a moral imperative to kick-start the gears of that brilliant mind back into motion. Jayce does not get to give up and waste himself when he has such potential - even if Viktor is sure the version he knows would disagree.

Well while his current guest may not be aware of this endeavor, he had contributed greatly to it. Jayce had given him a first name, two possible House names, and a record of attendance at the Academy.  Viktor helps himself to his former alma mater's resources and technology all the time, and their records department is far less guarded than their labs. Acquiring old student records only took an hour or so while Jayce had been occupied making them dinner that particular evening.

Viktor has already gone through the last ten years of nepotism-appointed incompetents and exploited adoptees, sorry, he means students attending the Academy under the surname Giopara last night after Jayce had collapsed onto a spare mattress that Viktor had dug from storage somewhere out of pity for a man that size trying to fit curled up on his couch. There is no sub-section in the records specifically dedicated to the name 'Talis', which means paging through the section containing less noteworthy surnames starting with 'T'. 

It is a dull next half-hour or so of mindless flipping, a task he could have given to Blitzcrank if Viktor was a tad more patient and didn't feel an odd compulsion to find Jayce himself, personally drag him to light.

Eventually however his patience is rewarded, and Viktor triumphantly pulls out a surprisingly thick file labeled, 'Talis, Jayce' with a feeling of triumph. He wastes no time in opening it.

Viktor cannot help the immediate chuckle as he sees the black and white student photo on the inside - younger and without the beard, Jayce is so clean-cut. He looks like he'd be mugged the second he crossed the bridge to Zaun and the obviously practiced smile on his face doesn't fully hide his nerves though it does show off dimples. Viktor feels an enlightening moment of understanding with both little boys that push their crushes into mud puddles and older women that describe younger paramours as good enough to eat.

Viktor puts the photo aside after several more seconds to actually begin reading the Academy file as he had planned. It's immediately obvious why he hasn't met this universe Jayce yet. While in his guest's universe they are 4 years apart in age - just enough for Jayce to be getting tired of being a student and Viktor fed-up with his powerlessness as an assistant -, in this universe the difference is 8 years. Jayce would have only enrolled at the Academy a couple of years after Viktor had already left.

How ridiculously simple yet deeply aggravating, Viktor's universal constant buzzing just outside his orbit for something as simple as a 4 years change in age when so many other parts of their lives could be different without stopping the two of them from colliding. 

The rest of the file is broadly in line to descriptions of his guest's universe. Sponsored by the Kirammans, though given that this world's Jayce would be about the same age as the Sheriff likely this world's 'Cait' isn't seen as a plucky, well-meaning young sister, with uninspiring official grades and projects as signs Jayce's attention was elsewhere, till a robbery triggered an explosion revealing his secret project to harness the power of magic with technology. The Academy's universal constant seems to be that it favors stodgy traditionalism as much as it fears true progress, as this world's Jayce was also put on trial and expelled. A decision that without Viktor there to spur him into a last minute breakthrough and proof of concept was carried out in this universe.

Viktor flips back to nervous, naive, brilliant young man pictured in the file's front his thumb lingering at the corner of a flat and printed yet still so expressive mouth. Heimmdinger with his false-mouthed promises of looking out for his students and Cassandra Kirammen whose daughter Jayce spoke of like family had both been on the Council when it made that decision. Betrayal smokes and burns cold in Viktor's bones, his own old anger and hurt at the Academy and people he'd trusted in Piltover flaring up like an empathetic coup-contrecoup.

Viktor forces it down, harshly reminds himself of the stupidity of temper. The Jayce he knows has forgiven these people, and the one he's yet to meet can help Viktor with his previous plans to burn the corrupt systems they stand for to the ground. Or well, even if this world's Jayce also chose to forgive, he can at least take some secret petty pleasure at watching Viktor carry out those old plans regardless. If a system could not be fixed by logic it deserved to be removed and replaced, and this system had failed them both badly.

Viktor flips back to where he'd left off, eager to find where this Jayce had ended up after his expulsion. There is no chance the Academy didn't keep a close eye on someone who could prove to be so dangerous. The next page after the official notice of expulsion is a report - 

("Without you I wouldn't, can't even, exist at all"

Jayce hadn't bothered to look, hadn't bothered to hide any clues that would stop Viktor from looking even as he clearly thought Viktor better off from not knowing him.

A blue crystal shining with magic, crackling the air with energetic potential after they'd finished the chemical process that shifted it to its activated form. "Careful", he'd said, as Viktor had picked it up, "Without the machine oscillating them to keep them in their high energy state they're seriously unstable.")

The autopsy report ruling the death of Jayce Talis as a suicide wrinkles to unreadability in Viktor's clenched fist.

Viktor is cold that night. He shouldn't be, they are assembling the almost finished Hexcore building something that a week and a half a ago he could not even have conceived the idea of. The excitement of discovery alone should have Viktor in a good mood.

Also it's not as if his guest has promised him anything. Jayce has done nothing but give to him despite ostensibly being the one requesting aid. He has gifted to Viktor a powerful new technology that could enable him to extend his own life and give him the power needed to challenge the entrenched corruption of Piltover. He has been nothing but pleasant company, engaging to work with, fun to be around - more than that he made it feel like Viktor could reach out and grab all his old, childish dreams of changing the world and bring them into reality.

It is because of all of this that Viktor cannot help but be cold, drawing back like a slow-motion flinch would make the inevitable hurt less.

Jayce does not seem to take it personally, graciously pulling back to give him space and directing his need to fuss as Blitzcrank. Perhaps he thinks it a delayed reaction to the intensity of their earlier confessions.

 Or perhaps he is used to the Viktor of his world's need for occasional isolation, sweetly and silently accommodating the same way he always makes tea exactly to Viktor's tastes and always leaves just enough space between them when they walk together for a crutch or a cane. Although they are now violently at odds, he's lived more than half a decade with his universe's Viktor and it painfully shows. All this borrowed devotion is actually meant for the doomed man Jayce will leave Viktor for.

It is that bitter thought that comes while drinking perfectly sweetened tea made in a kettle Jayce had somehow found in the back of his cupboards while Viktor is on break from soldering that lights up his synapses into actually considering Jayce's plans and actions beyond his own spite.

"Jayce, I asked before if you were comfortable letting me have sole control of Hextech in this universe, but what about you?" Viktor pauses, waiting for Jayce to put down his own soldering iron and takes off his goggles to look Viktor in the eye, "What are you going to do after you return to your universe and kill me?"

Viktor does not flinch from saying plainly what Jayce plans to do, doesn't couch it in vague terms like 'stop' or righteous ones like 'execute'. He's been aware of this plan since Jayce's long, rambling initial explanation after he'd agreed to help at the start, and he agrees with the decision both in and outside the context of that ruined, future world. Any version of Viktor that started a fucking cult obviously had something influencing or perhaps piloting his decisions, and he loathed beyond measure the idea of being a higher power's puppet.

Jayce's hands start to shake, his eyes drawn to his feet. "I'll make sure that nothing is left of the Hexcore and the Anomaly and that the Hexgates can't hurt anyone."

Viktor sets down his tea with a deliberate click and continues, "And after that?"

Jayce does not respond, though his respiratory rate increases and the rise and fall of his chest becomes deeper.

"I said, and after at?" Viktor repeats coolly, standing up from his seat to stalk closer to Jayce's frozen form.

"I'm . . . not sure." He's a horrid liar, not even able to make eye contacts his pupils shift to the side and pausing like he's had to force the words out of his mouth.

They are the only two versions of themselves in this universe, so Viktor does not have mercy. He manages to control his temper enough that it's his hand on Jayce's collar forcing him to meet Viktor's eyes, not his Claw around Jayce's throat but just barely. "Jayce, what are you going to do after you kill me?"

Oh, he's crying just thinking about it. A subtle clumping of his long eyelashes, his bright expressive eyes glazed with an extra shine - he's an infuriatingly pretty crier. His voice is a small whisper, yet full of deep conviction when he finally answers, "I wouldn't be alive without him, and he wouldn't be dead if it wasn't for me. It's only fair, right?"

Viktor has to release his collar, has to stop touching Jayce before he kills the idiotic piece of shit in a temper himself.

"So your misplaced guilt and stale gratitude means what? That you can just give up? There is no crime you could commit greater than the one you are contemplating, you fool!"

Jayce inhales sharply with the yell, his tears falling with a blink. Though instead of sobbing, he matches Viktor's snarl, "You think I don't know that? I know I deserve to spend the rest of my life cleaning up my mistakes, actually following through on our promises to help people and not just make rich Council members richer! But Viktor," his fists clench, his eyes wild, "I need to stop my partner, need to save him from that awful future more than anything else!"

"And?"

"And the only way I could ever make myself kill you, any version or iteration of you, is if I follow you right after I'm sure you're gone!"

If Viktor stays in this room he's going to do something emotional and ill-thought out. He can barely keep his Claw under control, his fingers from reaching out to dig into flesh. What a hypocrite to say that when he plans to leave Viktor alone here. Coward to be unable to carry out his duty without the sick self-promise of oblivion after. Cruel for letting Viktor come to know him but not keep him.

Viktor turns away from Jayce and walks out of the room, ignoring any apologies given to his back.

Chapter Text

It is not fair. Viktor has always hated unfairness, hated more the smug follow-up that preached it to be the natural state of existence. Much of his own life has been devoted to struggling to correct that unfairness: the inequality between the cities, the effects of pollution and unsafe industry in Zaun, his own failing body. Each wretched result of human hubris and greed trickling down to fall upon the already unfortunate only fed his fervent need to challenge what others called fate.

His fists clench on his bed sheets, knuckles turning white. All his muscles are tense, even lying down he feels like a live wire ready to snap with the tension of his fury and indignation.

While part of it is an altruistic indignation that someone so intelligent and so capable of realizing miracles into all too often stagnant world would do said world the grave disservice of abandoning it, part of it is also an alloyed mix of self-preservation and selfishness. Viktor has never wanted another person like this before, to the point of irrationality. Wanted every piece of them inseparably down to the smallest molecule, wanted like a need.

It is so very, very unfair of fate to have Jayce stab him in the chest like this, then pull out his presence of a knife. To leave Viktor bleeding out with regret instead of allowing him to spend the rest of his life lovingly twisting it deeper.

He cannot ask Jayce to stay. What he feels for Viktor is in the end just an echo, and in a better universe -a fair universe- what Viktor feels for Jayce would be simply a jumpstart and course correction towards his own world's iteration of the man. It is not his guest's fault for leaving nor this world's Jayce's fault for having already left, simply a cruel twist of fate with Viktor as the punchline.

Viktor rolls over in his bed, studiously ignoring the continued sounds of assembly coming from the lab. Jayce wasn't completely wrong that it is slightly awkward lying down and rolling over with his Claw attached to his spine. Still after years and years of constantly only having one hand free since his other was always occupied holding onto crutch or cane, he enjoyed the convenience of now having an one more hand than everyone else.

It is not in Viktor's nature to settle for the decisions of an unfair universe.

Jayce feels in a word like shit.

No, wait's that's wrong. He feels almost insulting good physically in comparison to the gnawing shaking hunger, the deep steady yet somehow always worsening ache of his shattered leg, and the loneliness that became so extreme it was a visceral burning of his skin that had wracked his body in that pit. Over the last month he's mostly been able to eat three meals a day, had varying medical professionals look at his leg, and been able to talk to real people rather than images in a fire- even better been able to talk with and be around Viktor.

And oh gods, wasn't that something. Seeing different versions of himself was like looking into a less than flattering fun house mirror, even if the reflection might be distorted this way or that it was obvious to him from where each feature and flaw came. A few worlds very similar to his own where he saw himself being  recognizably easily manipulated and eager to please all the wrong people; worlds that were quite different where he saw his anxiety about himself and how others saw him hidden behind a rude tongue and an exaggeration of an already present ego. And of course, no matter the world each version of Jayce always and unsurprisingly not only deeply enamored with Viktor but also devoting his life to orbiting his wondrous gravity and focus - even if it was in opposition.

Seeing different versions of himself was mostly just a little embarrassing for both parties, seeing different versions of Viktor - even when it involved a 7 foot mostly metal Machine Herald shooting to maim - always felt like delightful revelation. Every iteration was a chance to see and talk to Viktor, each one a chance to better understand his own iteration. How much his body must hurt and frustrate him to get to the point of self-operation. How deeply and viciously he must feel to want to be able to turn off his emotions. Even how his thought process worked - straightforward, logical, and brilliantly audacious in how he addressed what he saw as issues in himself and in world. The same soul drawn from a dozen different angles each as breath-taking as the last.

So actually physically Jayce feels pretty good, even after a day of working in a borrowed forge and a night of assembling a watered-down version of his worst creation. He's well fed, his leg doesn't ache too bad, and his skin isn't a hungry burning itch. What he really meant before was, he feels like he is a piece of shit.

His eyes alight of on the Hexcore's shining and malevolent purple glow, and Jayce turns around to walk to other edge of the lab. His gaze lands on the chalkboard still mostly covered in the diagrams and equations he'd re-drawn his first night here to explain Hextech to this world's Viktor, though some parts have been erased to make room for newer and more advanced theorems as their work progressed.

Though he still hasn't been able to bring himself to erase the written copy of the equations regarding crystal oscillation in regards to energy states that is his and his own Viktor's first ever collaboration, the one that sent them flying into the air, held aloft by magic and the sheer high of discovery both their first night together.

Jayce spins around again and is again immediately greeted with the sight of the Hexcore - his and his Viktor's last collaboration in a way. He makes a noise he's not particularly proud of that is very much in the neighborhood of a whimper. He turns back around but keeps his heard down this time.

He's talked a lot about universal constants, unchanging variables across the various realities over this past month - every version of Viktor he'd met had seemed an equal amount entranced and disgusted by the concept. Hated being told what to do or given any limitations especially by anything that could be considered a higher power, but loved the brute-force surety whether it was in metal or the scientific method - that was his partner alright.

Former partner, anyway. Jayce spins around and starts moving towards the Hexcore again. 

Anyway, if there was a universal constant for Jayce it had to be self-destruction. He always needed Viktor, yet in each universe seem destined to let him down. Focused on the wrong things, not listening to his silent pleas for help, not speaking up when he was needed, and then saying the wrong thing when he did find his voice. And here at the very end, only able to help, to actually do as he's told by ki-, by stopping Viktor permanently.

Viktor, his Mage who was and will be his partner, asked it of him, so Jayce will. He can do it. He can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he can, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to,he has to, he has to,he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to, he has to kill Viktor.

Jayce digs his nails into his palms, eyes on the floor as his stomach rolls threateningly. Oh fuck, it's beyond selfish but he hopes he doesn't even survive finishing it, hopes the Hexcore changed Viktor physiology enough that they both explode with the energy cannon. Or maybe he'll take his hammer to the core of the Hexgates and die together with their creation. Or find his old apartment, blow out the wall again and finish what he'd started all those years ago. Or maybe the council room where he'd lost Viktor the first place. Or -

"Sorry to interrupt your pacing, but if you are going to head out better do it sooner rather than later." 

Jayce's eyes jump to see Viktor at the doorway, his voice is a cold snap his arms tucked close to his body to match the downward closed-off tilt of his mouth. Jayce's mind momentarily quiets its panic spiral about having to stop his own Viktor to electric prod him with the reminder that he's currently hurting this world's Viktor.

Universal constant, indeed. This world's him is probably dead before they met, and Jayce still managed to mess their relationship up. Given Viktor an intellectual equal then yanked the rug out from under him, thoughtlessly begged help then flaked when it was his turn to offer support. Still just as Jayce can't make himself regret using the Hexcore to revive his Viktor even knowing what he has to do now, he can't regret coming here and hurting this Viktor if the Hextech he brought with him can be used to extend Viktor's life even a little.

As always when he see him, Jayce's eyes trace the elegant streaks of grey in Viktor's silky hair, small wrinkles at the corner of his captivating amber eyes born from long nights squinting cutely in concentration at his work, the tiny scars and spots that use has added to his pale skin. It really was unfair that Viktor only got more beautiful with age, the intensity of him was already enough to leave Jayce wrong-footed and stammering when they'd both been young and fresh-faced. Now he even with the weight of everything he must do wrapped around his throat like a noose, Jayce still sometimes found himself dreaming of how handsome his mage proved Viktor would be as an older man.

Standing the doorway, Vitkor's frown deepens and he sighs, "Jayce, if I thought you would be content to stay here, I would welcome you to." His tense posture melts slightly, closer to defeat. Jayce feels his own body droop in shame on cue, "But I know that you are set on this by some version of me you worship as a savior and by your own idiotic guilt for your part in what choices the Viktor in your world is destined to make, I know that I cannot talk you out of this."

The urge to do as Viktor subtly didn't quite ask is immediate and near overwhelming, the same way kick behind the knee would make him drop to a kneel as his leg goes numb. It tears at him, but Jayce cannot abandon his partner nor forget the fully evolved form of the same lonely devastation he hears from this Viktor in his mage's voice. "You're right, always are, I could never leave him. I have to go back and save him - and, everything that comes after."

Jayce swallows, knows it won't change anything but says it anyway, "I'm sorry."

Viktor's stance harden again, his eyes flashing with determination as they force contact with Jayce's own, "You misunderstand. I can't talk you out of leaving, but I will demand one last thing as the co-creator of the invention that will allow you to go running off to your doom."

He stalks closer till he's near enough that Jayce can smell the well-cared for metal scent of him, see every individual shade of brown and gold that makes up the color of his burning eyes, "You are going to promise me something, Jayce." His right hand reaches out, not grabbing exactly though still demanding as it grips the back of Jayce's neck and pulls his head down.

Jayce freezes as Viktor keeps moving closer, till the dry skin of his lips brushes Jayce's forehead in a gentle kiss. His whole body tingles, he wants the world to stop forever or for time to unspool and run backwards, to relive or stay forever in the dry brush of skin and too-brief warmth of breath. If he wasn't so eternally hungry for the familiar lilt of Viktor's voice Jayce would have missed his next words.

"You are going to live as long as you are able, and I expect at least 90 years out of you. Get rid of any harm your and his Hextech has done, help the people of Zaun like I've always dreamed, destroy the broken power system that rots in Piltover, figure out a way to jump worlds on your own and go back to keep your horrid, power-mad mage company in his lonely hell. There is plenty for you to spend your life on that will have your Viktor's spirit with you in every step - chase him like that instead of into death."

Back in the lifeless ruins of what had once been Piltover and Zaun, broken in body and spirit, angry and bitter Jayce had been prepared to tear the mysterious mage apart with his bare hands and teeth for setting him on his life's path. Then his mage had pulled down his hood and spoken to him with Viktor's voice laden with old grief, looked at him beseechingly with Viktor's eyes grown desperate with despair.

Now, just as back then, Jayce cannot deny Viktor anything when he asks in that voice, "I promise." It will be perhaps the second hardest promise he's ever had to keep. Even knowing that it is still near impossible to focus on anything but how close Viktor is still standing - the hope that his yes will earn Jayce another kiss.

It doesn't. Viktor release him and takes a step back instead, though his lips are curled upwards with a triumphant, determined tilt to his expression which is also a nice reward, "Good, to lose you early would be an aberration in design that bears avoiding."

Despite the long years of practice, Jayce almost doesn't manage to bite back 'I love you' in return.

Although Viktor managed to finish the first of his objectives in extracting a promise from Jayce to do his best to keep living, it was still bitter to say goodbye to someone he had, even amidst the odd circumstances and the minuscule amount of time they had, come to love.

He's never given the thought of anything as ridiculous as soulmates any attention - but he does understand gears, parts designed to click together in perfect harmony. Maybe for him to remain constant enough to be Viktor simply guaranteed the shape of an existence that would unite perfectly with any Jayce constant enough to be Jayce? The sample size is too small to say for sure, he's not the one that just disappeared in a flash of blue light and swirling runes after all.

The lab is quiet.

He really does need to make Blitzcrank a voice box.

The glow had started from the rune on Jayce's wrist as soon as he'd touched it to the Hexcore, the purple glow of the machine transforming into a clear, clean water blue with star-light runes bubbling to surface as it was siphoned towards to the rune stone. It had made a pretty accompaniment to Jayce's bitter-sweet smile and whispered final goodbye.

Viktor turns over to one of his small chalkboards and quickly copies down the runes he'd seen. He recognizes most of them from the dictionary Jayce had made him.

His head has started to tingle with the beginnings of a headache from starting the day without any caffeine or at the very least something to eat. He ignores it not wanting to leave their lab.

The Hexcore -cursed thing- is still here. It floats in place, the runes of its surface occasionally rotating with small clicks. Jayce had made quite sure to warn Viktor of all the ills Hextech had visited on his world and on Viktor in particular. Of the pollution that would spread from a single tree to every building and person in both the cities, of people changed into mindless metal monstrosities in an attempt to heal, of weapons that could so easily destroy and kill.

Of how the Hexcore had revived a dead man and the anomaly at the Hexgates had allowed traveled through time.

Viktor walks over to his largest chalkboard and flips it over to the clean back, ready to focus on the second half of his goal.