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Jess considered herself to be a smart person.
She was one, objectively speaking: the golden girl of Pilltover, a genius inventor, the first person in generations to join the Senate without having a privilege of an established great house behind her back.
But for all her intellect, she often found herself at a loss when it came to her lab partner. Vik was smarter than her in every way, her mind as bright as the stars. Whenever Jess found herself stuck over a formula, whenever one machine or another stopped doing what it was, by all rights, supposed to do, Vik was there, gently guiding Jess to the solution, her fragile but surprisingly strong fingers putting the tiny elaborate mechanisms back together. It never felt patronizing, moreso inspiring. Having someone smarter than her around gave Jess an opportunity to learn and an example of someone she wanted to follow.
She proved herself to be a quick learner as well, and wore it as a badge of honour. She could no longer count the times when it was Vik who was confused by one equation or another and Jess was the one to offer a solution - and every time it happened, Vik’s honey-golden eyes would light up and something in Jess’s chest fluttered.
But it wasn’t their studies that most often made Jess confused about Vik’s behavior, it was their downtime. Those were the rare hours when they would leave the lab to run one errand or another, the times when they celebrated major breakthroughs in a nice pub not far from the Academy, and especially the times when Vik invited her to stay over at her place for the night, when they would spend from dusk till dawn talking, reading, listening to music, the times when they would often fall asleep on Vik’s couch, Vik’s head nestled on the crook of Jess’s neck. Those were the times when Vik would smile and laugh the most, when she would hug Jess’s shoulders, when her fingers would absentmindedly brush Jess’s knees. When that happened, Jess would feel her mind short circuit. It felt like Vik knew something she wasn’t telling her, and Jess would just feel a little bit dumb.
Jess also considered herself to be an attractive person.
She never ran out of suitors, and some of her ex girlfriends were literal goddesses walking the Earth, if Mel was anything to judge by. Jess knew the signs of someone being attracted to her. Getting a date was fun and she was good at it - a smile, a flick of hair, a timely ordered drink, an appropriately addressed compliment, and here she was making out with some nice girl.
If only it was that easy with Vik.
Vik was perfect in every conceivable way - smart, kind, funny, beautiful, - and she was also Jess’s best friend and lab partner. No matter how much Jess wanted to tread in the direction of romance with her, two questions stopped her: would it be professionally appropriate? And, perhaps more important, would it ruin their friendship?
Jess, alone in their lab, a piece of chalk in her hand.
A hypothesis.
She asks Vik out.
Possible outcomes:
Vik goes out with her:
They fall in love;
They get married (?);
They have a child(ren??);
They live together till the day they die and nothing is ever bad in the world ever (???)
Probability: highly unlikely.
Vik doesn’t see her that way and all her signs of attention were just usual friendly behaviour:
Vik (politely, of course) refutes her advances;
They go on being “just friends”;
They still grow apart and the conflict is never resolved;
The tension starts affecting their work;
They make a fatal mistake during an experiment;
The end of the world (?)
Probabili…
The word trembled to a squiggly chalk line on the blackboard as Jess heard a familiar sound from the corridor leading to the lab - shuffle, shuffle, knock, shuffle, shuffle, knock. Shit.
She managed to erase most of the hypothesis when a soft voice spoke up from behind her back.
“A fatal mistake during an experiment leading to the end of the world? Anything you’d like to tell me, Jess? I hope you haven’t gotten up to any world-ending business in the, ugh… half an hour I was away?”
Jess couldn’t help but chuckle as she erased the rest of the words.
“I’d never dream of leaving you out of the world-ending. Wouldn’t be fun to do it all on my own. No, it’s just a mental experiment to occupy my brain while you weren’t here. What did you get?”
“They opened a new pastry shop on our floor, I got us some brownies. Powder offered some that she made, but I do not quite trust her in terms of food, especially not since the last time.”
Jess pulled out a chair and sat next to Vik at their paper-covered table. Vik took the brownies out of the paper bag and offered one to Jess, who tried her hardest to hide the blush she felt spreading on her face as their fingers briefly touched by stuffing the entire pastry in her mouth at once.
“Tathth rheally ghood,” - she swallowed, - “Certainly no sprinkles and gunpowder in the stuffing.”
“I’m delighted to hear that,” - Vik replied, elegantly eating her own brownie in small bites. Jess tried to ignore the fact that this woman managed to look ethereal even licking chocolate off her fingers.
Fuck it. Jess at least had to try, or she wouldn’t be able to live with herself knowing she might have missed such an opportunity. A deep breath, a sprint, a jump right into the cold water -
“Vik, I…” - Jess’s voice broke, making the “I” sound more like a cry of a dying bird than an actual word. She choked, whether on the crumbles of the brownie or her own words, she wasn’t sure.
Vik turned her head to one side and looked at Jess like a confused puppy. Jess couldn’t be happier at that moment that her partner’s mouth was still full, because she definitely would have received either a witty remark or an expression of genuine concern for her well-being otherwise, and she wasn’t sure which would have been worse.
Alright, so the jumping-into-the-water strategy didn’t work. Slowly dipping her toes instead it is.
“I mean,” - she cleared her throat - “are you doing anything later tonight?”
Jess felt herself turning red. Thankfully, once Vik finished chewing, she opted not to comment on it.
“Powder’s exams are right around the corner, she wants me to help her study. Honestly, she truly needs none of my help, but she likes being smart in front of an audience, I suppose. Would be rude to deprive her of that. You are free to join us, if you’d like to spend some time with me. I’m sure Powder wouldn’t mind.”
If you’d like to spend some time with me.
Jess wondered if Vik was aware of what she was doing to her. On second thought, she definitely wasn’t - otherwise she wouldn’t have suggested “spending some time with her” in front of a wise-cracking eighteen-year-old whose humor mostly consisted of jokes about explosions and lesbians, and Jess thought that exploding was preferable to being called out on her crush on Vik by someone like Powder.
No, this course of action would lead to no progress at all. Mentioning Powder, though, gave Jess another idea.
“Nah, you can enjoy that by yourself, if you don’t mind. I’ll probably go hang out with Cait and Vi tonight.”
“Alright, tell them I said hi.”
The rest of the day went on as usual: solving equations, discussing theories, Jess even managed to spend some time in the smithy correcting the angles on their working model while Vik explained her her vision. Having Vik in the smithee was a bit distracting - she was definitely not used to the heat, even if she claimed to be fine. She was sweating and panting, her vest forgotten somewhere near the entrance and the first three buttons on her shirt undone, and yet she insisted on being as close to the working Jess as it was safely possible to “observe the work in progress”. At one moment Jess became so concerned with her partner’s well-being that she had to put the hammer down, grab Vik by the shoulders, sit her down at a chair that was as far as it could get from the furnace and present her with a bottle of water and a wet towel. It seemed to be good timing, too: as soon as Jess touched her, Vik turned as red as a cooked lobster and by the time they got to the chair she looked like she was about to pass out.
The model and Vik’s health weren’t the only things on Jess’s mind, though. She could not believe she hadn’t thought about consulting Cait and Vi earlier. After all, they were her closest friends - after Vik, of course, - and a pretty strong couple. If anyone could help her figure things out with Vik, it would be them, and even if their advice were to be “don’t even think about it”, they would never tell on her to Vik. So, as soon as the work in the Academy was done for the day, Jess went straight to the Kiramman estate.
***
Meanwhile Vik stayed in the Academy.
She did have to do some walking, unfortunately - Academy was not the smallest building in the world and, alas, not the newest, so not every floor had an elevator. Thankfully, the person she was heading to did not care about whether she was late or not.
Entree exams to the Academy were an excruciating affair - Vik shuddered when she remembered her own - and took several stages. The lucky few who got to the final hurdle had to take the final tests in person, so they were generously provided with living quarters on the Academy grounds in the building that students and some younger professors dubbed “The Swarm Dorm”.
Vik was getting out of breath as she struggled to the second floor of the dorm - the hot air (and the hot Jess) in the smithee earlier didn’t help her dizziness much. Thankfully, someone was courteous enough to help the lady out.
“Need a hand?” - a familiar voice asked.
“Thank you, Ekko,” - Vik replied, putting some of her weight on the boy’s shoulder. - “I swear, they add more steps to this stair whenever I come over.”
“Yeah, I see what you mean. First project I’ll offer once I enroll will be installing elevators here. There are some laundry chutes that haven’t been used in ages that can easily be widened, I can’t believe no one had thought about it yet.”
“I would gladly invest. You seem awfully sure you will enroll, though,” - Vik smiled.
“Isn’t that a done deal?”
“Well, there is competition at every turn of the tournament, and being from Zaun isn’t much of an advantage either. They don’t usually accept more than one student from there per year.”
“Well, they will have to accept two this time, whether they like it or not. We will get progress even if we have to bite and claw our way to it, and there’s no way that one of us is going to get here without the other. Speaking of the devil…”
Ekko opened the door to the dorm room he shared with his girlfriend.
If Vik hadn’t known where to look, she wouldn’t have noticed Powder. Thankfully, she did, so she wasn’t startled when the girl jumped down from one of the wardrobes right in front of her and pulled her into a bone-crushing hug.
“Hey, Cookie!” - she screamed, letting her go after a moment and giving her a proper look-over. - “Damn, you look even worse than in the morning. Get over here,” - she pulled her through the room and sat her down in an armchair, before jumping over to a cupboard in the small kitchen area. - “I told you those brownies were no good. Nothing better than a good old home-cooked meal.” - she finally found a bowl full of pastries in the cupboard and dropped it on Vik’s lap. - “Get on with it!”
The brownies were any other color but brown and, upon further inspection, any other flavor but chocolate.
“How do you survive with her?” - Vik smiled at Ekko, anxiously taking a small bite of the nicest looking pink pastry. Ah, strawberry with cream and hot pepper flakes, of course.
“She compensates by mixing killer drinks,” - Ekko smiled back.
“Eh, save your gratitude, I know you two love everything I do,” - Powder threw back, stealing the scariest looking of her creations from the bowl. - “Now, Cookie, what the hell?”
“As in?”
“Where’s Jess? I was hoping for a double date!”
“Ah. She went to visit Cait and your sister. And in any case, no one said anything about a double date, this was supposed to be a study session, if you remember.”
“Yeah, bla-bla-bla, I know everything already, you said so yourself. Anyways, Vi and Cait, you said? Let’s get over to them too! Thoughts on a triple date?”
“I doubt that would be appropriate.”
“Killjoy.”
“In any case, Jess looked like she needed to have a bit of a break today.”
“A break? From you? Trouble in paradise?”
“You are awfully invested in our relationship, Powder.”
“I just like to keep up with the gossip. I was just telling Ekko what colour scheme we should go for for the wedding and here you are, telling me that the lucky girl would rather hang out with my sister.”
“I… I think it's a bit too early to talk about a wedding. Now, if you could tell me, which metals are used in the…”
“Bridge support system? Aluminium and copper originally, steel beams were added two decades later. That's the easiest question, Cooks. What's wrong with Jess?”
“What's… What's wrong with her?”
“Why is she avoiding you?”
“She's not…”
“You've been dating for how long? Forever?”
“We…”
“And no PDA, she won't even ask you to move in with her, you're not going out anywhere as a couple. That's fucked of her, if you ask me.”
Vik went quiet. Her relationship with Jess has been, in fact, quite weird. They were together - of course they were together! - they spent almost every waking moment in each other’s presence, Jess would blush in the most adorable way every time she touched her, they took care of each other, supported each other, that's what partners do, isn't it? And yet, they never did more than cuddle and hold hands, never discussed moving in together, never even defined their relationship in concrete terms - probably because Jess was so in love with her that she was too shy to ask for more and Vik felt too bad to push it from fear of being too forward and losing her.
So… did Jess even know they were dating?
That wasn’t something Vik even ever considered. They met seven years ago and ever since then were the most important people in each other’s lives, they saved each other’s lives, damnit! That’s a bit more than you usually ask of your friends, isn’t it?
Vik wasn’t blameless. She knew Jess well, she knew just how insecure and gentle the heart in that perfect body was, she should have known that that girl needed everything spelled out for her, everything that was so perfectly clear for Vik, or she would spend her entire life questioning every touch, every word, every smile.
It must have been torture. Vik has been torturing her for years.
“Are you okay?” - the ever-considerate Ekko pulled her out of the spiral.
“I… I apologise, I must have gotten distracted. I seem to have forgotten to tell Jess something, ugh, very… important. Are you two sure you need no further help with your studies?”
“We got it, Cookie.”
“Then, wouldn’t it be too much to ask of you to help me get to the Kiramman estate?”
“You’ve got it, Vik,” - Ekko said. - “Think you can hold onto me on the hoverboard?”
***
“Do you think Vik likes me?” - Jess asked, flopping down on the couch.
By the sound of it Cait just choked on her tea.
“Well, I don’t know,” - Vi said, - “What do you think?”
“You’re not helping,” - Jess mumbled into a cushion.
“I was under the impression you were rather close,” - Cait dragged on, - “I suppose she wouldn’t work with you this closely if she didn’t feel some fondness for you, would she?”
“I think Jess here wasn’t asking about working conditions, Cupcake.”
“I understand that,” - Cait replied, taking another sip of the tea, as if she was putting a full stop in the sentence.
“Alright, so, Jess,” - Vi clapped her hands, - “Yes, Vik likes you. You like Vik too. Why haven’t you two fucked yet?”
Jess groaned and turned away from them. Why did she ever think that this was a good idea? For Cait and Vi a relationship was a whirlwind, it swooped them off their feet at the same time and they were a unit in less than a month after meeting each other. Obviously they wouldn’t understand what it was like, to wonder, to steal touches, to remember every compliment given and to store it deep in their heart, to yearn.
For seven long years.
With her face hidden in the cushion and her mind lost in thought, Jess didn’t even realize that the conversation went on.
“…seize the opportunity until it’s lost. What’s the worst that could happen if you just come up to her and ask her for a coffee? You go for coffee together all the time anyway,” - Vi was saying.
“I made a hypothesis,” - Jess said, turning on her back and staring aimlessly at the ceiling.
“And?”
“If I ask her out and she doesn’t accept, the world will literally explode. So I need to be one hundred percent certain that she likes me back before I try anything.”
“Well, Powder is convinced the two of you are dating already,” - Vi shrugged, - “so if the world were to explode it would probably happen if she found out that you weren’t together, not if Vik rejected you.”
“Which she would never do,” - Cait added.
“Yeah, sure. I’m not good enough for her. She’s literally perfect.”
“I’m sure she thinks the same about you,” - Cait tried to console her.
It was sweet, really, even if they were just trying to make her feel better.
At this point Jess decided to spend the rest of the evening brooding and eating biscuits. Still, though…
“Why does Powder think Vik and I are dating, anyway?”
“Well I don’t know,” - Vi sighed. - “Because you two are glued at the hip? You never even talk about anything else.”
“But her and Vik are friends, wouldn’t Vik just tell her that this wasn’t true?”
“You know Powder. Once she gets something in her head it is impossible to convince her otherwise.”
“And in any case,” - Cait said, - “if we didn’t listen to your complaints as often as we do I think we both would have assumed the same. You do look like a couple, maybe a comparatively reserved one, but you are not teenagers anymore, no matter how much you try to act like one. Honestly, what would even change in your relationship if you just made it official?”
That was a good question. Well, they would be more physical, obviously. Kissing Vik was probably very nice. And doing other stuff, too. Jess did have a pretty nice bed, after all.
It would be so wonderful to wake up together in that bed, every single morning. They have woken up together before, but never in the same bed: in a lab after an all-nighter, on Jess’s couch after celebrating a breakthrough. Vik looked amazing in the mornings, much better than Jess; her hair messy, the honey-gold eyes beaming from underneath the heavy eyelids, an absent-minded smile on her tender lips; watching her wake up was like watching a sunrise. She even moved better in the mornings, her legs and back well-rested. Vik was the most beautiful when she was feeling her best, and Jess wanted nothing more than to make sure that she was feeling her best as often as possible.
Sharing a bed would need some practice, though, as Jess was terrified of possibly crashing Vik in her sleep, even if she was much less fragile than she looked at the first glance. Jess would probably have to get used to sleeping on the very edge of the bed. It wouldn’t be something to complain about, though - instead, it would give Jess a chance to wake up earlier than her girlfriend - oh, how she wanted to call Vik her girlfriend, how she wanted to call her her wife! - and to surprise her with breakfast in bed.
Every single morning.
But apart from that, coming back to Cait’s question, what would really change? Vik would still smile whenever she saw her, still say the smartest and the funniest things with her soft beautiful voice, they would still be partners, spending almost every waking moment in the lab, pushing the progress forward, celebrating together whenever they succeed.
So why not risk it?
Jess spent way too much time thinking about what was the worst that could happen to notice that the best that could happen was in her arm’s reach all along.
“I… I think I’d like to talk to her. Now. Just… to get it over with. I’ll just pop to Powder’s, I suppose, and try to get Vik out of there.”
“Don’t want my sweet sister to be the first to know?”
“No, not particularly. Bye, I suppose? Wish me luck.”
“Break a leg!”
She almost did as she rushed down the stairs. For some reason this felt insanely urgent, like if she didn’t get to do it right now she would end up never doing it.
Jess opened the front door and rammed straight into someone very dainty as they immediately started falling down backwards - Jess just barely managed to keep her own balance and catch the other person in a dip a split second before they hit the ground.
“I’m sor-”
The apology died in Jess’s throat as her eyes focused on the most beautiful face in the whole wide world.
“Hello, Jess,” - she would never get tired of hearing this voice - “could you please help me back to my feet?”
“I- Yes, sure, Vik,” - Jess managed to get them both upright, picked up Vik’s cane that fell down in the commotion and gave it back to her. Their fingers touched and Jess felt the all familiar flush running up her neck. Nothing felt real right now.
“Uh, hi, Jess!” - a familiar voice called out from behind Vik’s back. - “I kinda gave Vik a lift and now I’ll probably… Now I’ll probably get out of here.”
“Goodbye, Ekko,” - Vik turned around, - “Good luck to you and Powder at the exams!”
“Hi, Ekko,” - Jess was still incredibly confused, - “And… Bye, Ekko?”
The boy got on his hoverboard and was gone as quickly as he appeared.
“What are you doing here?” - Jess asked.
Vik chuckled in response.
“Could we sit down on the bench here, if you don’t mind? We could go inside, but I really don’t want to intrude on Cait and Vi, especially since I came here to talk to you. Alone.”
A hundred different thoughts rushed through Jess’s mind, the two most prominent ones - “Did she come to see me for the same reason that I wanted to see her?” and “Did she come to see me to break things off?” The first thought seemed like too much of a coincidence and the second was of the same depressing nature that Jess wanted to distance herself from.
While she was thinking, they got to the bench and sat down. Close. So close that Jess could see the peach fuzz on Vik’s slender face.
“What… What did you want to talk about?” - Jess’s head was swimming.
“Something very important. Although, I’m not sure you deserve to hear it after you almost broke every bone in my body. Where were you rushing to, Jess?”
“You.”
“Oh?”
Now or never. Jess couldn’t bear looking into those perfect eyes for the risk of becoming speechless once again so instead she stared on the flowerbed in front of her. The tulips were the exact colour of Vik’s eyes. Blast it. Deep breath, dive into the water.
“I wanted to tell you… That I want you to be my girlfriend. I… I guess it is a bit too early for the L word, isn’t it? But you are the most important person in my life, have been for a very long time. I literally wouldn’t be alive if it wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t achieve anything, ever. You are the smartest person in the world, the kindest person in the world, the most beautiful person in the world. Your voice in my favourite music, the colour of your eyes is my favourite colour, and I’m not even sure I even had anything favourite before I met you. I was so convinced that the day we met would be the worst day of my life, but looking back now… I can’t say that it was the best day of my life, but it was certainly the most important one so far. As for the best day? Every day that I spend with you is better than the last one and I would love to believe that the very best day of our lives is yet to come and that we will spend it together. Now, if that’s not what you want… I will understand. You deserve the best of the best and maybe I’m just not it. I would love to stay friends, if you can even call someone you worship your friend. And I would love to stay partners. We are a perfect team in the lab, aren’t we?”
Jess took another breath and looked up at Vik. She was smiling, and in a moment she broke into laughter. Jess’s heart was still pounding on her eardrums, so she wasn’t sure whether Vik was laughing at her or with her, but she still couldn’t help but smile. There was nothing better in the world than Vik laughing.
“Jess, you silly, silly girl. I’m so sorry I tortured you so for such a long time,” - Vik put her hand into hers and Jess’s poor heart skipped a beat. - “But tell me, did you really think that when I called us ‘partners’ to anyone we met I meant ‘lab partners’?”
“…Huh.”
“We should certainly work on our communication. As a couple. You see, I thought we already were one. I just considered you to be rather… physically reserved, and, to be fair, I was fine with that, as long as I got to date you. Because that is what I really want, Jess.”
“So… we’re dating now?”
“As you wish,” - Vik smiled.
“We’re girlfriends?”
“Girlfriends, partners, whichever you prefer.”
“Girlfriends, definitely. No room for misinterpretation. And, as I understand, you would like me to be less ‘physically reserved’?”
“I would very much prefer it.”
“Right,” - Jess said, before cupping that perfect face in her hands.
Kissing Vik was better than she ever imagined. All those teas she kept drinking made her taste like an orchard, her lips were softer than rose petals but her sharp canines made Jess shudder when she brushed them with her tongue.
When they broke apart Vik looked like a painting and Jess felt like she was dreaming.
“That’s more like it,” - Vik smiled.
“Wanna move in with me?” - Jess blurted out.
“I was afraid you would never ask. Your bed looks too big and too comfortable to sleep in it alone.”
Jess felt like she could fly.