Chapter Text
“Soldier one, Soldier one, on point!” Vi spoke with urgency into the mic attached to her headset. Soldier: 76 was the last remaining enemy on the first point of King’s Row, killing him meant they could finally get the Payload moving.
Not even one second later, Vi sees the death pop up in the top right of her screen, Widowmaker has killed the enemy Soldier 76.
“Soldier dead” Caitlyn responded in their team voice chat.
“Nice shot, Cupcake.” Vi made her way onto the Payload, holding right click on her mouse to raise Reinhardt’s shield. She took a sip out of her water while she could.
Vi heard the ‘Thank you’ in game from Caitlyn’s Widowmaker, laughing to herself at the lack of response, she looked over at chat.
“I’m new here, why do you call Killamman ‘Cupcake’? ” Vi read aloud the message from her rapidly passing chat.
“Do you want to tell them, Cupcake? Or shall I?” Vi asked in party chat this time, a space reserved for only Vi and Caitlyn.
“Must you tell this story to everyone who asks, Violet?” Caitlyn sounded annoyed, but Vi could hear the amusement in her voice.
“Yes, I must.” Vi cleared her throat, preparing to tell the story while the Payload moved slowly through the streets of King’s Row. “The first stream I watched of Caitlyn was her infamous baking stream, you know the one where she burnt the cupcakes and tried to salvage them with blue icing.”
Vi fake wiped a tear away from her eye.
“One of you guys suggested I raid her at the end of my stream, great decision by the way, and I just so happened to do it at the exact mo-” Vi interrupted her story to signal “ Junk on the left, watch out Ana ” to her teammate. “At the exact moment Caitlyn took the cupcakes out of the oven, completely black and stuck to the tray.”
Vi turned her focus back to the game, the enemy team positioned in front of the checkpoint, ready to fight. Glancing at the minimap, Vi could see where Caitlyn had positioned herself, just out of sight from the enemy team, ready to reveal herself and kill off any stragglers. She already knew Vi’s strategy, having played hundreds of hours together.
“Hold, hold, hold. Ana get ready to nade them, D.va, bomb on my ult. Ready? Okay go, go go!” Vi called into her mic.
Luckily the enemy team didn’t have a shield to protect themselves, running D.va, Hog instead. On Ana’s nade, Vi pressed Q, the booming “ Hammer DOWN” signalling to D.va to use her ult to wipe out the enemy team.
The announcement of “ Quintuple Kill” echoed to all players.
One left, Vi thought. There was no enemy on point, their Payload continuing to move through the streets at a rapid pace, her other four teammates sticking by her side once again. Just as they were about to hit the checkpoint, the enemy Mercy flew out from the side, starting to revive the enemy Hog.
Before Vi could even think about stopping the revive, the sound of Widow’s shot sounded through her headset, followed by the ‘A la vie, a la mort’ of a confirmed kill.
As they reached the checkpoint, Caitlyn grappled closer to the walkway above, headshotting any enemies who made their way out of spawn, allowing the Payload to continue the final stretch to Victory.
With her GGs in chat, Vi backed them out of the game and continued her story.
“Anyway, I joined at the perfect time to see Caitlyn’s disaster cupcakes. She looked close to tears so I stuck around to try and cheer her up, I’m a Saint like that. It didn’t much effort when she noticed the raid and the massive jump in viewers. Always knew you played with me for my fame and fortune, Cupcake” Vi’s tangent brought a giggle out of Caitlyn.
“You know that’s not true.”
“Yeah, yeah, Cupcake” Vi continued, “When Cait noticed who raided her, her face lit up, couldn’t stop singing my praises for the rest of the stream. Vi you’re such an inspiration, Vi you’re so sexy, I wish I was an amazing Tank like you Vi. ” She tried her best to copy Caitlyn’s accent, but they both knew it was awful.
“That’s not what happened,” Caitlyn interrupted.
“She was really sweet, like a Cupcake herself,” Vi ignored Caitlyn's complaints “So the nickname fit perfectly. Haven’t stopped calling her that since.”
“Not even when I beg you to stop,” Caitlyn joked along.
“Couldn’t stop even if I wanted to!” The fondness obvious in Vi’s voice.
Vi caught a couple messages in chat, Are they dating? and a few They’re so cute together , which were quickly timed out and hidden from view.
(Moderator)(2-Year Subscriber)ClaggorSwagger: No shipping guys, you know the rules!
(Moderator)(2-Year Subscriber)Mylooo: 4weird shippers get timed out
(Moderator)(First Subscriber)GetJinxed: forget timing out, banning the next freak i see shipping these two
“Thanks guys. Listen to the mods chat, you’ve been warned,” Vi directed at her chat.
Caitlyn’s muffled yawn alerted Vi to the time, 02:18 staring back at her on her monitor.
“Shit Cupcake, you should go to sleep, don’t you have class in the morning?”
A soft, affirmative grunt was all she got in return.
“You’re right, I should end stream and get to bed. Thanks for the games Vi, goodnight.” The tiredness in Caitlyn’s voice was more obvious now they weren’t in game, fuelled by the adrenaline.
“Night, Killamman.” Was all Vi could get out before Caitlyn left the call. “I guess I should end stream now, it’s getting late and you shits should be asleep too.”
(1-Year Subscriber)sherbetlands: goodnight vi
MrViforViolent: no dont end yet i just got here
(9-Month Subscriber)sternumoth: its 10am in europe KEKW
Vi said her goodnight s to the chat, raided a smaller streamer also playing Overwatch and ended her stream.
She leaned back in her chair and sighed. The only light in her room came from her mouse, the custom keyboard she’d built on stream with Powder and her computer, dual monitors lighting up her face.
Removing her headset and running a hand through her hair, a text alert sounded in the empty room. Leaning forward, Vi picked up her phone.
Pow-Pow 02:34
try to tone down the pining on stream, i know youre madly in love with her but its getting obvious. theres only so many people i can time out.
Pow-Pow 02:34
night sis, sleep tight dont let the cupcakes bite
Vi groaned to herself, the last thing she needed was for Caitlyn to know about her little crush. She didn’t want to make things uncomfortable or awkward between them.
Vi 02:35
night pow. dont stay up all night
Vi: 02:36
and im not in love with her
A Discord alert brought Vi’s attention back to her monitors.
Caitlyn Goodnight Vi. Thanks for playing tonight. I promised chat I’d play more BOTW tomorrow, but I have a sponsored Genshin stream on Thursday, thought you might want to join? I know you like playing Genshin, I thought we could do some artifact runs together. I’m pulling for Yae Miko and will need something with good Crit stats. Completely fine if you’re not available, I can ask someone else, Mel might want to join. Anyway let me know, goodnight.
Caitlyn was rambling, she did that when she got nervous. Vi couldn’t help the smile that came to her face.
Vi Fuck yeah, count me in
Vi Night Cait, sleep well
What Caitlyn didn’t know was that Vi only played Genshin Impact because Caitlyn spoke so fondly of the game, she wasn’t usually one to play gacha games, but she had to admit the story was interesting and the characters were hot. The things she’d do for Caitlyn scared her a little.
She was lying to herself, Vi was in love with this girl.
Vi started streaming three years ago, and has been partnered for two and a half. She finished high school with no plans to go to college so she started working full time, spending her money on things Powder needed and saving the rest for a gaming PC setup.
She wasn’t planning on streaming, but Powder, Mylo and Claggor weren’t gamers so she often spent nights playing alone.
It was Powder’s idea for her to start streaming, said she was good enough that people would enjoy the gameplay, but her wit and charisma would make people want to stick around.
Powder was right, she always was. After a couple months, Vi had grown a steady viewer base, making enough money from bits, donations, subscriptions to quit her job and start streaming full time.
Three years down the line, Vi was making enough from sponsored streams alone to move into her own apartment and put Powder through college. Even though Powder didn’t stream, she was still well known in the community, apart from being a moderator and making frequent appearances on Vi’s stream, she also took commissions for custom emotes and artwork for other streamers.
Caitlyn on the other hand was a lot newer to streaming, the aforementioned cupcake disaster stream happened only a month into Caitlyn’s streaming career. Vi’s raid managed to almost quadruple her regular viewerbase, growing even more as the two started playing together regularly.
Caitlyn was only part time right now, she’d love nothing more than to stream full time, but that wasn’t possible at the minute, she needed to graduate college first. Even if she did go full time, Caitlyn didn’t think her mother would be pleased if she didn’t make use of her Business Management degree and played video games for a living.
Not only was Vi the reason for Caitlyn’s success in streaming, she was the reason Caitlyn started streaming to begin with. Although the games Vi played weren’t Caitlyn’s usual genre of choice, she loved to keep her streams open in the background while she studied or went about life in her apartment.
Despite Vi’s growth and success over the years, she was still the same person Caitlyn loved to watch from three years ago. The success hadn’t gone to her head; at the end of every stream, Vi always raided smaller streamers, helping kickstart the careers of some. Caitlyn was lucky to be included in that.
Vi did regular charity streams, donating a large portion of her own money to causes close to her heart. She often did giveaways on stream, partnering with companies to buy computers, keyboards, headsets for her community. Vi was always ready to give advice to other women in the space who wanted to start streaming, tips on how to get started and grow themselves. Vi had a good heart, and Caitlyn would keep saying it until Vi believed her.
Caitlyn was often included in that category, Vi giving her advice on streaming equipment to buy, companies she should partner with, and which ones to avoid.
They kept in contact both on and off stream, regularly dropping by the others’ stream to hang out in chat. They interacted often on both Instagram and Twitter, replying and commenting on the others’ posts. It’s no wonder their communities thought they were together.
One stream where her chat was particularly out of hand, backseating her first playthrough of Hollow Knight, Caitlyn was about to call it quits early, not wanting to deal with people directing her gameplay.
(VIP)(First Subscriber)ViforViolence: cmon guys, chill out and enjoy the greenpath music. cait can figure it out on her own
Vi’s appearance managed to distract chat for a bit while Caitlyn composed herself again, allowing her to find Hornet and defeat her for the time being.
Caitlyn was more than capable of handling herself, but they both knew the impact a chat could have on your mentality on any given day. It wasn’t the first time Vi had managed to control her chat, and it probably wouldn’t be the last.
What Vi didn’t know about that day was that Caitlyn had just survived the roughest finals week to date, using this time to decompose. Playing a game that’d been on her to-play list for months seemed like the perfect way to do so. If Vi hadn’t come along, the stress from finals may have pushed her over the edge, causing tears to fall and ruining what was supposed to be relaxing gaming session.
Caitlyn had messaged Vi privately after her stream had ended, thanking her for controlling her chat and giving hints on gameplay when Caitlyn had asked chat for help.
Vi anytime cupcake, ill be your (hollow) knight in shining armour whenever you need
Caitlyn couldn’t keep the smile off her face at that
Caitlyn youre so dumb, why do i talk to you
Vi my sunny personality? sexy muscles and tattoos? just admit you love me cupcake
Caitlyn swallowed hard, Vi had no idea how right she’d been with that final comment.
Caitlyn in your dreams