Chapter Text
The first thing Jayce felt was an overwhelming cold.
It burrowed into his bones and chilled him from the inside out. The freeze was worse than anything he ever felt before. In the back of his mind, he could remember a time when he was just as icy, trudging through snow with his mother, thinking that his life was going to end, that all his dreams were going to die with him.
The next sensation was burning – so bright and powerful he thought he was dipped into a forge. Invisible flames licked up his sides and left transparent burns. It felt like dying all over again; his body torn to shreds, becoming nothing but particles in the vast expanse of space he inhabited, and tied back together with stardust and the magic of the arcane.
Jayce didn’t know where he existed: he knew moments before he had been staring into Viktor’s eyes, peering into the soul of someone he wished he had listened to. If only he destroyed the Hexcore, if only he followed Viktor’s lead, everything would be different. The war between Piltover and Zaun may not have happened; their friends and family would still be alive; the world would not be such a desolate place.
Viktor would have died as himself.
“You think about him alot.” A light voice curled around his ears, coming from a million different directions.
Jayce, growing used to the emptiness – it was rather similar to being in the arcane, tried to turn and face it. “Who are you? Where am I?”
“I wonder if your mortal mind could comprehend it.” The voice was soft, feminine, and closer than before. “Though, you’re smarter than other mortals I’ve met.”
“Answer the question.” Jayce wasn’t in the mood for playing games. He assumed he would be dead; he didn’t want to learn everything he sacrificed was for naught.
“It was a brilliant sacrifice.” A glimmering form appeared before him, a mix of blues and yellows, hues that seemed impossible and yet were in front of him. A face morphed from the light. “Though I’m sure it's not how you originally intended to go.”
Jayce’s shoulders fell. “So I really am dead.”
“Not quite.” The woman stepped forward. She illuminated the world around her. “Think of this as a bridge. You’re neither alive nor dead, just here.”
“Who are you?” He pressed again.
The woman leaned back, squaring her shoulders. The moment she did so authority wafted off of her in brighter waves then the glowing embers. “I am Janna, the goddess of the sea, the spirit of wisdom and harmony, the blue bird of the sea, the protector of Zaun’s dispossessed.”
Jayce’s mouth fell agape. “You’re a goddess.”
“A bit slow on the uptake, but that’s alright.”
He ignored the twist in his gut and the flush of embarrassment.
“Jayce Talis,” Janna’s voice grew stern and rather dark, “Your actions and inactions have caused the pain of hundreds, especially to my people. You wished to ease the suffering of those in need, but in crucial moments you failed to do so.” Janna loomed over him. Her eyes were dark as onyx. “But I admire your passion. There is goodness in your heart that should not be overlooked.” The goddess stalked around him.
Jayce could make out a large scepter in her hand. He was sure it could destroy him just as his hammer had done to Salo. “What are you trying to say?”
“What I’m saying is I want you to have another chance, and perhaps this time you won’t fail so miserably.”
His heart clenched and the sensation of tears filled his eyes. Jayce nearly crumbled on the spot. “Another chance?”
Janna smirked. “How many times must I repeat myself?”
Jayce ducked his head. “I’m sorry, Ma’a- Mada- Gode-”
“Janna is fine.” Her form grew smaller until they were at equal height. Janna still appeared imposing; Jayce could feel heat radiate off her.
“Right. Thank you, Janna.”
“I don’t do this often.” She raised a hand. “The last man I tried to help…” She closed her eyes, a wave of sadness washed over both of them. “He did not understand; he was too consumed with numbers and calculations to understand the more human aspects of the task.”
An image of a man with a similar weakness flashed through Jayce’s mind. “What is it you want me to do?”
The hand came closer, ghosting over the top of his head. “I want you to solve the issues you initially set out to fix. I want you to help the people of Zaun and find a way to demonstrate to Piltover that the Undercity is not to be feared.” Janna’s hand touched him and the heat of lava dripped down his temples. “Most of all, I want you to find the happiness you lacked on your first go around. Find it and it will bring you further than you could have ever imagined.” Jayce clenched his teeth at the searing pain. “I won’t fail you.”
“That’s what they all say.” Bright white seeped into the darkness around them. “You have one year to complete this or else your original reality will return. All those you’ve let down will agonize. Good luck.”
The pain grew worse, spiking through every atom in his body until Jayce felt like he had truly died. That would be easier than suffering through the pain any longer.
As quickly as it grew, it recessed, leaving nothing but a dull ache in its place. He blinked a few times to get his bearings.
The first thing he noticed was the weight in his arms, the second the fact that he was standing. Jayce’s body slumped back and he nearly fell at the sudden reappearance of gravity. Something dropped in front of him and clanging metal filled his ears.
“Jayce!” Two small hands reached out for him, catching him before he slammed into the wall beside him. “Are you alright?”
Jayce shut his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. When he opened them he was met with clear blue eyes. “Cait?”
The girl retracted her hands. Her expression pinched together. “Uh, yes. You were just walking with me back to your room.” She put a hand on his shoulder. “Jayce, are you okay?”
He took in the environment around him. Blue walls, golden trim: in an instant he realized where he was and what was about to happen. “Oh shit.” Jayce nearly tripped over the fallen box as he raced down the hallway.
He wasn’t sent back to the time he thought he’d be, no, in fact, he was several years too early for that. This was the day everything sparked into motion. The day his independent research was discovered; the day his room was blown to bits because there was a break in. Jayce rushed down the hallway at lightning speed. He needed to stop the intruders from getting their hands on the crystals.
Whatever happened next…he’d have to figure it out then.
Jayce ripped his keys from his pocket and unlocked the door as quickly as he could. He stumbled for a moment, nearly dropping his keys in the process, but finally he slammed the door open. “Stop!”
The room became silent.
Three kids stood in the main room: a pink haired girl that Jayce knew in an instant was Vi, a larger boy with goggles he’d never seen, and a scrawny boy with spiky hair he didn’t recognize either. That left one unaccounted for. “Where’s the other one?”
The kids erupted into frantic movements, grabbing everything they could before hauling it towards the window. “Wait, stop! I’ll give you whatever you want, just stop for one second!” The spiky haired boy was the first to stop in his tracks.
“Move it, Mylo!” Jayced internally sighed. Vi was just as angry as a teenager.
“He said whatever we want, do you know a single other Piltie that would do that?”
Vi pushed the boy, Mylo, forward. “We have enough.”
Jayce took another step forward. “Please. There’s something here that I can’t let get into anyone else’s hands.”
Vi glared at him. “And what would that be?”
At least she wasn’t rushing out anymore. “Crystals.” He saw the other boy’s eyes light up at the word. “Not expensive crystals. They…” He struggled to find an explanation. “They’re highly explosive and if anything happens to them they could turn this whole building to rubble.”
Quiet set over the scene once more.
Vi inched forward. She was far younger than when Jayce knew her, but she still had an air of false bravado about her that he knew she’d only build up more and more in her future. “Claggor, Mylo, check the bags.”
“Vi-”
“Check the bags.” She met Jayce’s eye for a moment before she spun on her heel and rushed through the hallway. “Powder! We’re leaving!”
Jayce watched as the boys looked through the bags but found nothing. Mylo looked at him with interest though. “So, everything else is up for grabs?”
Jayce’s shoulders slumped. It was for the greater good. “You can take anything else.” The boys immediately jumped to their feet and went through Jayce’s various shelves and drawers. He tried not to let it upset him. Everything else was replaceable. Janna was giving him one chance and he couldn’t screw it up just because some kids wanted supplies to tinker with.
With a final look at them, Jayce followed Vi’s path. It led to a smaller room down the hall that he used as a personal office: it was where he kept the crystals.
“He’s letting us take anything, Powpow.”
Jayce awkwardly shuffled into the room. “Well, anything but the crystals.”
Jin-Powder looked at him for a moment. Then, she extended her hand towards Jayce. She looked nothing like the girl Jayce knew, one that had the eyes of a tiger and the appetite to match. Several crystals were dropped into Jayce’s hand. “Oh gods.” He cradled them as best as he could. He didn’t realize just how many Powder had taken. No wonder she had become such a threat later in life. He held them close to his chest and looked the girl in the eye. A relieved smile formed across his face. “Thank you.”
Vi nudged her sister’s shoulder.
Powder looked between Jayce and the forgotten sandwiches on his blueprints.
He chuckled. “You can have them.”
She snatched them away and brushed past Jayce. Vi was quick to follow. “You really just left those sitting out?”
“I was in a rush this morning.”
Vi shook her head as she left the room. Jayce could make out the sounds of books being taken and reshelved, metal clinging, and the balcony door opening and shutting. As the noises died down he slumped against the wall. Then, a laugh erupted from him and then another. A few tears dripped down his cheeks as he lost himself in the insanity of the situation. It had been that simple.
A bit more time and everything would have gone wrong once again. A minute more and Jayce’s second chance was over before it had ever really started.
“Jayce, what in the world is wrong with you today?” Caitlyn stood in the doorframe, eyes wide and arms crossed. Her face was flush and Jayce could tell she ran as well. Her eyes drifted down to the glowing crystals in his hands. “What are those?”
“Nothing important.”
“What are you going to do with them?”
He looked over the crystals. They were such small things, looking even tinier in his hands. How did such small things cause such pain and destruction? How did these things help develop the Hexgates? How did they form the Hexcore? How did they lead to Viktor becoming something so unlike himself?
His mind was made in an instant. “I’m getting rid of them. They’re too dangerous to work with. I thought-” He swallowed hard, his eyes squeezing shut. “I thought I could do something with them, but I was wrong.”
Caitlyn nodded but her expression was a mask of confusion. “Okay? Well, I left your things in the front room, which is really a mess.” She took a step back. “I guess I’ll see you later?”
Jayce nodded as well. “I’ll see you later, sprout.” The word nearly brought him to his knees. How long had it been since he had seen Caitlyn like this? Young, full of joy, the anger and grief wiped from her face. She was at peace once again.
He was left in his office, staring down at the crystals. They had to go, but the question was to where. Most attempts to destroy them would just cause even more destruction. Just one of them created an explosion so large it decimated his apartment. Half of the block was left in rubble.
Jayce couldn’t allow something like that to happen again.
He placed them back into the box they had come from. At least now he knew how much they could withstand before they caused any sort of destruction. It had been a freak accident the first time after being handled by people that had absolutely no idea what they were doing. Jayce sifted through a few ideas, though none of them seemed like the best option. There needed to be some sort of way he could get rid of them without anyone else finding them. That was the only way that they could be truly safe, the only way to save the world from the destruction that they could cause.
Second chance. The last chance. Jayce couldn’t screw it up this time around.
Destroying them wasn’t an option; they were too powerful for that. They would end up completely ruining wherever Jayce decided to do it. He couldn’t really leave them anywhere in Piltover, nor in Zaun. Any other region was out of the question as well; Jayce was sure if he sent it somewhere then they would just find a way to weaponize it. Noxus, Bilgewater, Ionia – all of it was out of the question. The one thing he was sure of was that it needed to be secure.
A thought bubbled up in the back of his mind. He’d seen the crystals survive great heat before, though there were certainly levels that could cause just as much destruction as the crystals shattering. It was worth the shot though.
Jayce gathered his things together. He glanced at the blueprints scattered around his desk. Once upon a time, they had been his most prized possessions – just like his notes he had signed them in sprawling script. He sighed as he set the box of crystals down. With a quick look around, he secured a box of matches and his trash can.
“Goodbye Hextech.” Jayce sucked in a final breath as he dropped the papers in the can and lit a match to drop as well. They didn’t immediately go up in flames, it wasn’t dramatic or anything; the flame slowly grew across the paper until finally the blue was consumed by gray ash.
Jayce expected himself to be more upset, to feel a loss inside of him that he was sure nothing else could fill but his dreams of Hextech. But, there was none of that. If anything, he felt apathetic to seeing his past life’s work go up in flames. It wasn’t the most important thing anymore – Jayce could see that; Janna had helped him see that. Heimerdinger was right, they needed more time – even if back then it hadn’t exactly been possible. Hextech wasn’t the wonderful thing he had dreamt up, and now, he wouldn’t let it haunt his nightmares any longer.
This was all about new beginnings, Jayce just had to keep telling himself that.
He waited for the flames to die down and the ashes to settle before he took his bag and tucked the box of crystals into it.
Jayce strode out of his apartment and then down to the street. He marched on past the various citizens of Piltover. He was sure he didn’t send the same grins and smirks paired with bright eyes he would have before. It was difficult to pretend he didn’t have years more of lived experience: not just with Hextech and becoming Piltover’s golden boy, but with everything else that came with warfare and then seeing another world in which everything had gone even worse than his.
He pushed open the doors of the Talis factory. Usually, he went to the factory when he needed to clear his head – the physical labor really did it for him – now however, Jayce was a man on a mission. There were a few employees milling about who he tried his best to nod and smile at. It was what past him would have done and Jayce decided on the trip to the factory that it was in his best interest to act as similar to his old self as possible.
That was what everyone expected from him after all.
Jayce collected his materials and slipped on his gloves, all the while making sure that he kept his eye on the case to ensure that nobody was going to take it. He knew that they likely wouldn’t given the environment – it wouldn’t exactly pan out well for them if they stole something that belonged to a Talis family member – but he couldn’t stop himself. Until the crystals were far away from where they could do harm, Jayce was in charge of them.
He labored at the forge to craft a box to place the crystals in. Alloys that would be difficult to melt down; metal that water couldn’t corrode. Most of all, ensuring that there weren’t any seams that could be ripped apart. Jayce pounded the metal together for hours; just like all of his experiments it took more tries than he would have really liked. There were several scrapped models laying around – only a couple that he had tripped over.
By the time he concluded the moon was high in the sky and everyone else had left the factory. Jayce’s eyes were drooping and sweat dripped from his body. His shirt lay discarded in a pile of failures and the box of crystals sat safely on a table besides him. Wiping the sweat from his brow, he picked up the box with a sinking feeling in his chest. It was now or never.
He set the box inside the larger one and let out a long breath as it slid in perfectly. Jayce didn’t allow himself to celebrate immediately as there was still the most dangerous part and that was sealing the box up completely. Thankfully, it took far less time.
The crystals were tucked away, safe from anyone’s prying eyes.
Jayce slid his shirt back on and buttoned it with aching fingers. He took the metal box and tucked it under his arm. The streets were nearly barren. Jayce knew it was rather late, but he still expected that there would be some people out and about. It was as though the world knew he needed to be alone and it had gracefully granted his wish. Jayce stalked down the streets of Piltover. His body was past the point of exhaustion, but he knew that he had to keep walking, to move as far away from the inner city as he could. He walked – as to not bring too much attention to himself – as quickly as he possibly could to the docks. There was one place nobody could reach and that was the bottom of the sea. He would have liked to throw the box further out, but it wasn’t really a possibility. All he could hope was that there was a dinghy at the docks that he could use to get a bit further out. At least then it was less likely to be brought back up.
Jayce’s arms ached as he rowed the oars. The water was still as the moonlight shone over it. With each stroke he reminded himself why he was doing what he was doing.
For all of those that were hurt and killed in the war between Piltover and Zaun.
For Mel and the suffering she had endured from her mother.
For Vi and the loss of her sister and father.
For Caitlyn and the death of her mother.
For Sky who he learned had been killed thanks to Hextech.
For Viktor: his partner, his closest friend, a man he had spent the better part of his life with and thinking about. He never wanted their friendship to fall apart, but Hextech forced it to do so. Jayce shook his head. He kept blaming everything on Hextech, but he knew there was more than that which caused the fissures that ruined everything that surrounded him. He went about most things in the wrong way: saying the wrong things, doing the wrong things, everything was always wrong when he got involved.
Not this time. Not again.
When he felt that he was far enough out, Jayce set the oars back into the dinghy and lugged up the box. It was heavy and burned his already strained muscles, but it was necessary. All of this was necessary to ensure that the future ahead was bright then the past he left behind. He hauled it over the side of the boat. It dropped into the water with a satisfying gurgle, ripples fanned out around the spot the box had occupied before settling once more to their eerie stillness.
Jayce watched as it sank down into the dark depths below. With each foot it dropped his chest felt that much lighter, the guilt in his gut dispelling. It never left completely, it still haunted him, but it felt a bit lighter. Easier to deal with.
Jayce laid back in the boat and looked up at the stars. He wondered who else was looking up at them. Did Viktor see the same stars? Was Mel looking out at them? Were Vi and Powder safe within their home with wide eyes?
He ran a hand down his face, trying to wipe away the sleep. He still needed to get back to shore though. There were more tasks to be completed. If his hypothesis was correct and the crystals were the starting point that meant that the future ahead of him was completely different from the one he previously lived.
With a huff, he rose and pulled the oars out once more. His arms screamed bloody murder despite his slow pace, but Jayce could barely find it in himself to care. He had possibly saved his entire world, timeline, universe, whatever one wanted to call it. Never in his life – previous or current – had he been filled with such hope. There was a bright light ahead of him and he couldn’t let it dim.
Jayce returned to shore, docked the dinghy, and made his way back home. Tomorrow was going to be filled with a million new possibilities and choices, but first, he needed a good night’s rest.