Chapter Text
For Viktor, the Hexzone had always felt like freedom. Freedom from the body, freedom from the world. There was something intrinsically wonderful about being able to strip right down to one’s soul. He’d been spending more time there than in the real world lately, but he always stuck to his routine. It was written on one of the last few scraps of paper he had left. It felt comforting.
Normal days:
- Go outside
- Tend to Jayce’s statue and his garden
- Keep the plants off him
- Make sure the weather is good, sunny if possible
- Jayce doesn’t like the cold.
If a Jayce visits:
Bring him here immediatelyTake him around my PiltoverExplain everythingDon’t interact- ?
He was having trouble with the second list.
“There’s another Jayce coming today,” Viktor said. The empty Hexzone answered with silence. Jayce’s body didn’t move in his arms.
“You know, his timeline is exceedingly similar to ours. I… I hope I can help him. For once.”
No response.
At first, Jayce had been able to talk and move in the Hexzone. His Glorious Evolved form was more restricted because Viktor hadn’t fully completed the evolution out of fear. It was oddly poetic that Jayce had been the one to restore his humanity. Viktor would’ve said that Jayce restored his emotions too, but if he thought about it, he’d never truly stopped loving Jayce. It was twisted, perhaps, or maybe more of an obsession, but it had always been love right from the start.
In those times, they would float in the Hexzone undisturbed. The others were nothing more than flecks of light now, spectral and golden. But Jayce was special. He always had been. His hair looked like Viktor’s—kissed by starlight. They’d talk together in a tangle of limbs that Viktor would have never pulled himself out of if he didn’t need to take care of Jayce’s statue. All the others had become dull from neglect or disuse; Viktor couldn’t find it within himself to care for anyone else the same way he preserved Jayce.
Sometimes they wouldn’t even talk. Being with each other and finally having a moment to themselves after so long was enough. Jayce would tuck Viktor firmly under his chin, squeezing him so tightly that it seemed like he was trying to meld them into one being.
One day, Jayce had admitted something innocuous. Viktor should’ve paid more attention. He still remembered it so clearly.
“Viktor?”
“Hm?” Viktor murmured lazily, pressing his nose into Jayce’s neck.
“I’ve been starting to feel… well, tired.”
“Studies show that you may become sleepy around your partner because they make you feel safe and calm,” Viktor replied.
“I don’t know. I wasn’t sleepy at all before. I didn’t need it,” Jayce sighed.
“Well, take a nap then. I’ll be here.”
“Alright,” Jayce whispered. He pressed a kiss to the top of Viktor’s head. “Love you.”
The nap wasn't too long. At first, Viktor had thought it was a sign that Jayce was returning back to his body despite all evidence suggesting otherwise. He’d never been able to reverse a Glorious Evolution, but maybe Jayce was becoming more human.
Then the naps turned into a night’s worth of sleep. Then a day. Then days at a time. Jayce could only ever wake up on his own or with very insistent prodding from Viktor.
The first time it hit one full week, Viktor began to panic.
“Jayce. Jayce, wake up. Jayce, please,” Viktor said urgently, shaking his partner’s shoulders.
“Mmh… Viktor?” Jayce mumbled, shifting in Viktor’s arms. Viktor had been doing more of the holding lately.
“I’m scared,” Viktor admitted. “You slept for a full week this time. I can’t even get your statue to look at me outside.”
“I’m sorry,” Jayce said quietly. “I’m just so tired.”
“I’ve tried everything. I got the Glorious Evolved to bring me more materials. More research. Did you know I’ve become fluent in Solerian?”
“That’s nice,” Jayce said, kissing Viktor’s jaw. “Didn’t take you for a literary scholar.”
“It’s just… if it keeps going like this, you might…”
“Might what?”
Viktor bit his lip, pulling Jayce closer. He didn’t want to say it out loud. It made it feel too real.
“You might fall asleep forever.”
Jayce stayed silent for so long that Viktor thought he’d gone back to sleep. Suddenly, he spoke again. “I’ll still be here, right? In the Hexzone? You’ll still have me.”
“It won’t be the same,” Viktor whispered, his voice cracking with emotion. “I won’t be able to talk to you. I won’t be able to kiss you. You won’t be able to hold me.”
“If I fall asleep forever, you have my permission to kiss me as much as you like. Maybe you’ll wake me like a sleeping princess under a curse. True love and all that,” Jayce laughed, elbowing Viktor in the ribs.
Tears welled in Viktor’s eyes. “That’s not funny, Jayce,” he choked, burying his face into Jayce’s hair. Starlight hair. He wished he could turn it back to brown. Something human. Then he could have Jayce for a lifetime instead of the shell of Jayce for an eternity.
Jayce turned around until he could grab Viktor’s face with both hands. His own expression had softened. “We should make the most of this, then,” he said, leaning in for a kiss.
Viktor didn’t deserve him.
They were still floating at first, trading lazy kisses in zero gravity against a backdrop of stars. If Viktor closed his eyes, it felt just like the weightlessness from when they’d cracked Hextech. Viktor imagined what it would’ve been like if he’d kissed Jayce that day: the blue glow of the spinning crystal illuminating Jayce’s grin, the pure ecstasy on both their faces, the excitement of a new discovery and a new partner… it would have been magical. Maybe if they’d gotten it right from the start, none of this would have happened.
“Viktor… Viktor? Are we in Heimerdinger’s lab?”
Viktor opened his eyes and it was like he’d never closed them. Instead of his usual iridescent skin, Jayce looked as youthful and carefree as the day their partnership began, all clean-shaven and wearing a very flattering and form-fitting academy uniform. If he squinted too hard, Viktor could still catch glimpses of an occasional flickering sheen in Jayce’s hair.
“I was just thinking about what it would’ve been like if we’d kissed here,” Viktor admitted as his eyes darted around the room. “I’m not sure how it appeared, though.”
“It’s reasonable to assume that you can influence the Hexzone,” Jayce said, eyeing the suspended hex gem glowing over Viktor’s shoulder. “You created it, after all.”
Viktor answered with a bruising kiss that caught Jayce off-guard. “I already wanted to kiss you here, I think,” he whispered against Jayce’s lips. The edges of some of the furniture floating in the background were fuzzy, as if he couldn’t picture them well enough, but everything about Jayce was perfect. Viktor remembered the little nick in his eyebrow, the strands of hair falling out of place, the way he looped his tie around his neck instead of under the collar, and even the creases in his dress shirt. “I could have kissed you. I should have kissed you. We were so—”
“—happy,” Jayce finished for him, pulling away to get a better look at Viktor’s face. He stroked Viktor’s cheeks with both thumbs on either side. His expression looked almost disgustingly fond. It was unbearable. The tears that finally spilled out of Viktor’s eyes burned like acid.
“I—sorry, I’m sorry,” Viktor said shakily as Jayce wiped them away. He tried to imagine what he looked like: face a little fuller, perhaps, and skin that went rosy in the cold instead of looking pallid. He supposed he’d been quite pretty back then, before he’d lost it to his sickness.
Some of what he was thinking must have shown on his face because Jayce pulled Viktor into his arms properly. “Whatever you’re worrying about, don’t. We’re here together. That’s more than enough.”
“How could you say that?” Viktor said as Jayce tightened his grip. “You’ll fall asleep again. One day, you won’t—” he choked as his breathing sped up, “—won’t wake up, like all the Glorious Evolved that don’t move, and—and it’s not fair, because I didn’t finish evolving you because you would’ve become like all the others, and what if I couldn’t figure out which one you were? And I can’t—I can’t live without you, Jayce!”
Viktor’s shout was muffled by Jayce’s vest. His shoulders heaved with gasping breaths while he clawed desperately at Jayce’s back as if the sting of his nails would jolt Jayce into wakefulness for a little longer. As if it would make him stay here, with Viktor, for longer.
If Viktor ever had to let Jayce go, it would end with claw marks.
“It’s funny,” he chuckled wetly. Perhaps he was going insane. Maybe after so long of not feeling strong emotions as the Herald, his mind had become a raw, exposed nerve prone to going haywire. “This is how you felt when I left you in our lab, isn’t it?”
“Kind of,” Jayce admitted as his fingertips traveled over Viktor’s spine, mapping the body he never got to touch. “Okay, definitely.”
“Then this is my punishment,” Viktor whispered. “If I had known what you meant, if I had known the depth of your affection, maybe I would have stayed. Maybe we could have fixed things before they broke.”
“I think everything was broken long before that,” Jayce sighed. “Believe me, I regret a lot of things. But we have here, and now, and us, and I can’t regret that.”
“We won’t have it for much longer,” Viktor replied, extricating himself from Jayce’s chest. He’d been trying to listen for a heartbeat. It was there, thrumming faintly through his clothing. A reminder that Jayce was alive, for now.
“Why spend time worrying about what you won’t have in the future when you have it in the present?”
“It’s not that easy,” Viktor said quietly. “I could imagine a place for us to be happier than ever, and I’d still think about what it would feel like when it slips away. My life was like that too, you know. Each day would be the best out of all my remaining days because I knew I would simply get sicker. I used to worry that one wrong move would get me cast out of Piltover. Sometimes, I thought that if I didn’t contribute enough to our dream, you wouldn’t see me as a worthy partner.”
“That’s nonsense,” Jayce said firmly. “Our dream would have died without you, and quite literally too, because you… you know. Barged into my ruined apartment.”
They were both silent for a moment as the implication of Jayce’s words cast another shroud over their mood. Viktor never enjoyed thinking about how close he had been to losing everything that evening without knowing the joy they would experience together. He said as much to Jayce who just nodded.
“We did experience joy. It wasn’t all that bad, was it? Our first day was great, but we had good moments after that too,” Jayce said, looking expectantly at Viktor.
Viktor’s lips twitched into a small smile as memories flashed unbidden in his mind. Meeting in Jayce's apartment. Cracking Hextech. Winning the Distinguished Innovator's competition. Unveiling the Hexgates. Sharing coffee and splitting pastries, always two different kinds so they could both have some of each. Little moments spent laughing in the lab, scattered across time. “We did. Perhaps not every day was worse than the one before.”
Jayce laughed at that, causing strands of his floating hair to wave back and forth. He really looks just like the day I first saw him, Viktor thought as their eyes met.
“A kiss?” Jayce asked, leaning in until their faces were centimeters apart.
“You don’t have to ask, Jayce,” Viktor huffed with a grin and an arch of his eyebrow. “You were kissing me only a few minutes ago.”
Jayce’s cheeks went ever-so slightly pink. “I just like hearing your answer.”
Who was Viktor to deny him after that?
Wrapping a gentle hand around Jayce’s neck, Viktor closed the final gap between them to press their lips together. Their first kiss had been a desperate here-I-am kiss fueled by the embers of a love almost lost. Now, Viktor could pretend like they were back at the start. A new first kiss. A fake second chance.
Viktor poured every fond thought and all his memories of yearning into it. There was no frantic sliding of tongues or urgent clash of teeth. There was just a kiss, and there was love.
He drew back after a few seconds. “Was that enough of an answer for you?”
Jayce looked at him with wide eyes and an even wider smile. “Beautiful,” he breathed. “You’re beautiful.”
“I was, back then,” Viktor said, stroking Jayce’s jaw with one thumb.
“No,” Jayce began fiercely before stopping himself. “No! I mean, yes! I mean, you were always beautiful. Always.”
“If you say so,” Viktor chuckled at Jayce’s verbal misstep as the light shone behind him.
Jayce sighed before pressing a flurry of light kisses to Viktor’s face. He threaded a hand through Viktor’s hair, using it as leverage to expose his neck for attack.
“Jayce! You’re sending us into the wall!” Viktor exclaimed when he noticed that their mid-air twisting had them floating away from the hex crystal. “Maybe we should get down.”
“This is your vision,” Jayce said as he nipped at Viktor’s skin. “Take us there.”
“Unbelievable,” Viktor said as he begrudgingly brought them to the ground. It seemed like he was rewinding the explosion—all of the floating clutter slowly travelled back to its usual arrangement, including the hex crystal, which pulsed innocently in the stabiliser. He looked at the fuzzy warping background and tried, in vain, to will it into stasis.
“What’s wrong?” Jayce asked, following his line of sight to the cabinet that was much too short. Or was it too wide? Viktor wasn’t sure.
“I can’t get it right,” Viktor said, waving his hand around the room. “The lab.”
“To be honest, I remember nothing except you and the way we laughed up there,” Jayce shrugged as he looked at the ceiling. “A few of my memories are like that. Kind of blurry, except for you.”
After that admission, Viktor decided, for the second time, to abandon perfection in favour of Jayce. His cane was still blocking the door, but there were no enforcers trying to barge in and no pressure to absolve themselves from the crime of illegal research. They had the illusion of all the time in the world, and as Viktor unbuttoned Jayce’s vest, he chose to indulge in it.
Jayce placed his hands firmly on either side of Viktor’s waist as Viktor backed him against the table. Viktor got to work on Jayce’s shirt as well until he was able to slip his hands underneath the fabric and slide it off Jayce’s shoulders. Viktor could see his skin starting to pebble in the soft light.
Jayce flushed at Viktor’s open admiration. “Not fair, you’re still fully dressed,” he mumbled, giving Viktor’s hip a squeeze.
Viktor grabbed one of Jayce’s hands and pressed it near his throat around the shirt collar. “Undress me, then,” he said simply, watching with delight as Jayce short-circuited before pulling off Viktor’s tie in one smooth motion.
“How do you want me?” Jayce said with a grin as he let Viktor’s shirt fall off his shoulders.
Viktor shook his arms and flung the fabric over the side of the desk. “Here, against this table. Now.”
Jayce shivered. “God, Viktor, I wish you’d been this forthcoming sooner,” he groaned as Viktor toyed with his waistband and dipped a finger inside. Jayce’s skin felt like a furnace.
“It’s only easy now because I know how deeply you cared for me all this time,” Viktor whispered. He gently undid the top button of Jayce’s trousers and thought about how amazing it had felt, even if it was just for a few seconds, to plunge his fingers into Jayce’s skull and be so enveloped in the essence of Jayce that it was all he could see, hear, touch, and taste. The feeling of Jayce, Jayce, Jayce coursing through his veins had been electrifying. Sometimes he wished he could experience it again, if only for a moment.
Jayce pressed a kiss to the corner of Viktor’s jaw. “I don’t even know if I knew I was so in love with you. It was… normal, I guess.”
Viktor knew the feeling. The sky was blue, the sun rose each morning, and he loved Jayce Talis. It was just another simple fact of life.
Jayce leaned away from the table slightly. Viktor could see the strained tent in his boxers and felt his own cock, hard and aching, in his slacks. Once Jayce had finished stepping out of the last of his clothes, Viktor crowded him against the table again to give them both some much needed friction.
“Ah—sorry,” Jayce hissed, Viktor’s trousers still separating them. “I’m getting you all messy.”
Viktor looked down and saw that Jayce’s glistening precome had smeared all over his pants, leaving a damp spot. “Could you come like this?” he wondered out loud, pressing his good knee forward. Jayce’s legs fell open instinctively, allowing them to get closer together. He gasped as Viktor ground against him with more purpose. “Humping me? Dirtying my clothes and ruining yourself while I stay half-dressed?”
“Mhn, probably,” Jayce managed. He let out a harsh breath as Viktor wrapped a hand around him. “Cruel,” he added as Viktor chuckled. He’d always loved teasing Jayce and riling him up. It made the end all the more sweet.
“We’ll have to leave that for another time,” Viktor said noncommittally. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like to bend you over a desk.”
“Fuck,” Jayce groaned. “You wouldn’t happen to have some magically-appearing lube, would you?”
Viktor reached into the nearest drawer and pulled out a small bottle. “Don’t think too hard about the horrifying implications of Heimerdinger having lube in here,” he warned, causing Jayce to let out a shocked laugh.
“Wait,” Jayce wheezed, bringing a hand up to his face. “Heimerdinger.”
“Shut up,” Viktor snickered before flipping Jayce around by the shoulder and slamming him onto the surface of the desk.
“Oh god,” Jayce groaned as Viktor pressed him down by the neck, “please tell me there’s more where that came from.”
“Remind me, since when were you getting choked?” Viktor said playfully as he dragged a finger along the curve of Jayce’s spine and squeezed Jayce’s neck a little tighter. There was already a light sheen of sweat glimmering on the small of Jayce’s back—or perhaps it was remnants of his Hexzone form. Viktor actively pushed it out of his mind.
“Mm, since you grabbed me in the council room,” Jayce murmured. Viktor noted with a pleased thrill that he already looked flushed. “And in the Hexgates.”
“Even when I was the Herald? Or when it was the marionette?” Viktor said, lightening the pressure on Jayce’s neck.
“Didn’t matter what you looked like,” Jayce replied, shifting his hips. “It was you.”
Viktor tried not to go red himself at that admission. “Are you saying you’d let me fuck you as the Herald?” he asked, finally releasing Jayce’s throat to coat two fingers with lube.
“Yes,” Jayce gasped as they pressed against his entrance, slick and insistent. “You were, what, a whole head taller than me? Even your fingers were so—hah— long.”
As Viktor slipped a very human finger inside Jayce, he couldn’t help but imagine using the Herald’s hand instead. He would have pushed Jayce up against the Hexgates and fingered him open in broad daylight, spreading Jayce’s legs with his staff or that ridiculous hammer. Viktor added a second finger and imagined torturing Jayce with the slow drag of the metal that had studded his joints.
“Shit, Viktor, it feels like your fingers just grew inside me,” Jayce whimpered, pressing his forehead into the table like he was trying to sink into it.
Viktor looked down to see that his fingers had started to bleed into purple where they met his palm. He’d forgotten how integral his imagination was to this environment. If his fingers were now in the shape of the Herald’s, he was definitely touching Jayce’s prostate by now. That meant…
“ Fuck! " Jayce shouted as Viktor twisted his fingers before adding a third. “Viktor, please, I might come, slow down,” he panted, though the rock of his hips suggested that his body wanted otherwise.
“Imagine if I was fingering you as the Herald when you first entered the Hexzone,” Viktor breathed, watching his fingers slide in and out of Jayce’s twitching hole. “My pinkie finger would go past your torso. You’d still try to take it, wouldn’t you?”
“Yes,” Jayce groaned breathily, trying to push further onto Viktor’s fingers again.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have bothered figuring out how to manipulate my form. Then we could’ve tried it sooner,” Viktor said, finally pulling his fingers out of Jayce and willing his hand back to normal. His heart thudded as he imagined what a sight Jayce would be sitting in his hand and trying to grind down onto his impossibly large finger. Jayce would have to prepare himself while Viktor watched, all flushed and panting there in his palm.
“Another time,” Jayce exhaled, craning his neck to look back at Viktor. “I’m looking forward to whatever you have planned for me on this desk.”
“Big plans,” Viktor said as he started to work his way out of his trousers. Although his brace wasn’t necessary in the Hexzone, he decided to leave it there for the sake of fucking Jayce as soon as possible.
“Oh, I’m sure they’re big, alright,” Jayce grinned, waggling his eyebrows as he turned away.
“You incorrigible—“ Viktor began, letting a hand fly as his mouth twitched into a smile. It landed on Jayce’s bare ass with a smack that was a little harder than he’d intended. He got the most pleasant shock of his life when Jayce moaned.
Jayce looked at Viktor again, face pink.
“You like that?” Viktor murmured, rubbing gently over the flesh that was starting to turn red. “I suppose that’s no surprise considering your fascination with being manhandled by the Herald.”
“Being manhandled by you,” Jayce said back. Viktor couldn’t quite tell whether he was raising his hips off the desk consciously or subconsciously, so he gave Jayce’s stinging flesh a kiss for good measure.
“So cruel and yet so kind,” Jayce sighed happily, crossing his arms on the desk and resting his head near the crook of his right elbow. “God, I love you.”
Viktor froze. Jayce didn’t know what he’d half-said.
Jayce loved Viktor. A cruel parody of a god. Viktor kept swinging like a pendulum, going back and forth between being so disgustingly in love that he forgot everything except for Jayce and feeling like he could never forgive himself for what he had done.
“I love you a hundred percent, but I’ll love you a hundred and ten percent if you fuck me right now,” Jayce chucked, causing Viktor to snap out of it.
He’d done that too much today. Viktor was wasting precious time.
“Viktor? Is this… do you want me to beg? Because I will,” Jayce said hurriedly, “but I’m feeling a little exposed. You still there?” he asked, pulling his right arm out from under his head and feeling around blindly for Viktor behind him.
“Yes,” Viktor said quietly, clasping a hand around Jayce’s wrist. Jayce used it to pull Viktor’s hand toward him. Viktor followed it down until he was practically lying on top of Jayce’s back, chin on his shoulder. Jayce, still resting his head on his left arm, took in Viktor’s pained expression.
“Hey,” Jayce whispered, “we don’t have to do this. I know I asked, but if you’re not up for it, I’m not.”
“But I am,” Viktor whispered back. “I just can’t stop thinking about what I’ve done to you.”
“I forgave you ages ago,” Jayce said. Viktor risked a glance at Jayce’s eyes. They were full of kindness and understanding that he hadn’t earned. “If you can’t forgive yourself, there’s a distraction right here,” Jayce grinned, shifting underneath Viktor. “Don’t focus on what you think you’ve done to me, but what you could be doing right…” he trailed off, grinding upwards where Viktor’s cock was resting, “... now.”
Viktor hissed at the slight unexpected friction as his blood—did he even have any left?—started to flow south again. “If we had gotten together earlier, we might have never actually finished those gates,” he muttered as he pushed himself off of Jayce and stood up again.
“What I’m hearing is that our sex is so mind-blowing it could have saved the world,” Jayce said coyly, wiggling his hips again as Viktor used the last of the lube to coat his cock.
“You were always the talker in this relationship,” Viktor said casually as he began to push inside of Jayce.
Jayce’s eyes, previously relaxed, flew wide open. “Finally,” he breathed, planting one hand on the table to ground himself. “Need all of you, please, Viktor, fuck!”
“Yes, that’s the idea,” Viktor said, marvelling at how well the Herald’s fingers had prepared Jayce.
“Cruel,” Jayce repeated with a whine as Viktor stopped, only half-way inside him. “ Now, Viktor, please.”
“So desperate and yet you still remember your manners,” Viktor chucked, running his fingertips teasingly along Jayce’s lower back.
“I’m not joking,” Jayce pleaded, trying to fuck himself backwards onto Viktor’s cock. Viktor firmly pressed down the hand on Jayce’s back to stop him. “I know I said I’d beg but I need you.”
“If you insist,” Viktor grinned before bottoming out inside of Jayce without warning. Jayce gasped, his hands fisting at invisible sheets. Viktor pulled out of him slowly and took a second to admire the way Jayce’s hole stretched around him before pushing back in. It felt like Jayce's walls, hot and slick, were trying to pull him in deeper.
A litany of yes, Viktor, more fell from Jayce’s lips. Viktor happily obliged and started fucking him harder. “Feels like you were—ah —made for me,” Jayce slurred, voice muffled by the surface of the desk.
Viktor grabbed a fistful of his hair and tugged, lifted Jayce’s forehead off the table. “If you’re going to make noise, let me hear you,” he purred, gently lowering Jayce’s head back down.
Having learned his lesson, Jayce pillowed his head with his arms again but kept it turned to the right. “Do—do you want noise?”
“I like your voice, especially when it’s all for me,” Viktor said, drawing his hand back with a longing look at Jayce’s neck. He wouldn’t be able to bask in the filthy noises Jayce was making if he squeezed it. Maybe later.
“Yes, yes, ah, all for you,” Jayce babbled as Viktor slowed down, letting the head of his cock drag over Jayce’s prostate. “Yours, always yours. Faster, Viktor.”
“Poor thing,” Viktor said wickedly as if he wasn’t struggling to torture Jayce himself when all he wanted to do was fuck him hard and fast, entirely uncaring for finesse, and bite down on Jayce’s bare shoulder.
“Do it then,” Jayce panted. Viktor hadn’t realised he’d said the last part out loud, but now he had to make good on his promise. He leaned over Jayce, still rutting shallowly into him as he kissed the area just beside Jayce’s neck on the left and bit down, feeling the muscle jump between his teeth as he did so. Jayce let out a small whine and Viktor sucked a mark into the skin, inhaling the comforting musk of Jayce’s sweat before soothing the area with a lick and then releasing him.
“F—fuck,” Jayce stuttered, taking a deep breath. “Will it stay?”
“Do you want it to?” Viktor said slowly, moving one hand to thumb at it. He pressed into the darkening flesh and felt his cock twitch as Jayce hissed.
“Yeah,” Jayce responded, embarrassed. “Can you leave another?”
“I have a feeling I know where you’ll want them,” Viktor murmured, pressing a kiss to Jayce’s neck and then sucking lightly on his pulse point. He grasped Jayce’s neck with the hand that had previously been pressing Jayce’s bruise and applied a slight pressure.
“That’s so dangerous,” Jayce breathed. Viktor could feel his voice vibrating with his palm. “You could rupture my carotid artery and I trust you. I can trust you. Only you.”
“Always,” Viktor whispered back after he released Jayce’s neck. He left two more marks—one under Jayce’s right ear and one in the junction between his neck and right shoulder—before Jayce started squirming beneath him and begged him to move again. This time, Viktor abandoned restraint and teasing to fuck Jayce brutally instead. The slick skin-on-skin sounds they were making were downright obscene. Viktor looked at the red mark on Jayce’s ass and made up his mind, drawing his hand back and swinging it forward until it connected in almost exactly the same spot. The answering smack seemed to echo off the high ceilings. If they’d been doing this on the actual night they’d cracked Hextech, there’s no doubt that Heimerdinger and the enforcers would have heard them perfectly through the barricaded doors.
“Your leg,” Jayce gasped suddenly, trying to twist around in Viktor’s grip. “Is it—”
“It’s okay, Jayce,” Viktor assured him, slowing down and carding a hand through Jayce’s sweaty hair. “It became more psychosomatic after the Hexcore.”
“I’m—’m sorry if I made you think it was disgusting,” Jayce whimpered, voice hitching. “Your new form.”
“I know it bothered you at first,” Viktor said quietly, slowing to a stop. “It can’t be helped, I—”
“No,” Jayce said immediately, squeezing one hand into a fist. Viktor could feel his strong thighs trembling. “It didn’t. Not at first. When you woke up. And it was all I could think about when you left.”
“Explain,” Viktor said after a moment, feeling genuinely confused.
Jayce rubbed his eyes harshly. “I meant when I tried to kill you. It wasn’t because I hated it.”
That hadn’t elucidated the meaning of anything for Viktor at all. “What?”
“You have the arcane inside you. The Hexcore. You’re Hextech,” Jayce said shakily, meeting Viktor’s eyes and no doubt straining his neck to do so. “You’re my dream.”
Viktor felt his throat start to tighten. His eyes burned with unshed tears. “That’s not fair,” he said, voice almost wobbling as he dug his nails into Jayce’s skin. “I wanted you for so long it was painful.”
“I know that now,” Jayce said, blinking at him with wet eyes and tear-stained cheeks. “I’m so sorry, Vik. I love you. And—and I’m never going to get sick of saying it. I have years of being stupid to make up for.”
“You’re not stupid,” Viktor murmured, stretching forward to kiss the salt off Jayce’s cheek. “Dense, perhaps, but not stupid. We were busy.”
“Too busy to see what was right in front of us,” Jayce whispered, trying to lean into Viktor but failing horribly in his awkward position.
“Right now, I see someone in front of me who has more than earned an orgasm,” Viktor said, purposefully letting his hot breath fan out near Jayce’s ear. He kissed the spot behind it, toying with the earlobe between his teeth until he was ready to speak again. “Are you going to be good for me?”
“Always want to be good for you,” Jayce shuddered. Viktor felt Jayce’s walls clench eagerly around his cock.
“Then let go,” Viktor murmured, pushing himself upright and resting one hand on Jayce’s back.
“Only if you do too,” Jayce said, looking back at Viktor again. He rubbed the side of his neck that was probably stretched sore from all the turning he was doing. Viktor watched him for a moment before pulling out completely. Jayce whined at the loss.
“Don’t worry,” Viktor soothed. He took a second to admire Jayce’s fluttering hole and pressed a light kiss to it, pleased by the way he could taste both Jayce’s scent and himself. “Turn around. Onto your back.”
Jayce’s eyes widened, and Viktor couldn’t stop the small laugh that escaped him as Jayce scrambled to roll over, pushing only with his arms given the way his legs were hanging off the table. He hooked both arms under Jayce’s knees and lifted. He reveled in the strength he could possess in the Hexzone as he teased Jayce again by pressing the length of his cock against his ass.
“Thought you said I was good,” Jayce whimpered, trying to push his hips closer. “Please, Viktor.”
“I’m just enjoying myself,” Viktor said, drinking in the way Jayce lay writhing beneath him and at his complete mercy. Jayce lifted his lower legs out of Viktor’s grip and wrapped them around his waist, causing him to almost stumble forward. He chuckled, sliding one hand over Jayce’s hip and using his other to guide his cock towards Jayce’s entrance. “Needy?”
“When it comes to you.”
“Trying to make me blush?” Viktor grinned, moving to pinch the curve of Jayce’s ass while he tried to tame the warmth in his cheeks. “You seem to have a knack for being a walking, talking romance novel.”
“Just saying what comes to mind,” Jayce squeaked as Viktor started to push inside him. “I—you make me want to say—hah —the most—”
“Nonsensical things?” Viktor finished for him as he started thrusting. Jayce’s body was rocking back and forth slightly on the table.
“ Oh—yes,” Jayce moaned, squirming as Viktor wrapped a hand around his neglected cock and started stroking it in time with his thrusts.
Viktor had felt his orgasm building for a while, ready to crest like the wave of a tsunami after they had paused twice now. Judging by Jayce’s blissed out face and heaving chest, he wouldn’t last much longer either. He started fucking Jayce with more purpose, basking in the little noises Jayce made with each thrust once he finally found the perfect angle.
“They—they well up, right there,” Jayce said, splaying a hand on his chest over his heart. Viktor removed his hand from Jayce’s hip and covered it with his own. “Until it—ah —spills over, and I say it,” he panted, tangling his fingers with Viktor’s. “Wait, I—I want it here,” he said, dragging both of their hands towards his neck.
Viktor nodded and wrapped his fingers around Jayce’s throat. He had to use the other, much stickier hand that had been jerking Jayce off to stabilise both of them and stop himself from accidentally slipping out. He squeezed Jayce’s neck lightly, eliciting a breathy moan.
This Jayce, young and pliant and hopeful, could have been all his the entire time.
“I was,” Jayce said as he subconsciously tried to grind upwards into something nonexistent now that Viktor wasn't touching him. “Yours, yours, yours, fuck!”
“I said that?” Viktor mumbled, dazed. His rhythm had started to falter, growing sloppier and more frantic.
“Yes,” Jayce gasped. “Yours.”
It was only when they made eye contact that it clicked for Viktor. Jayce’s lust-filled gaze was only so intense because it was buoyed by a love Viktor had never seen outside of books and stages. Or, perhaps, never noticed. He knew, logically, that Jayce loved him. He told Viktor as much almost every day when he was awake. Now he understood. Now he could truly wrap himself in it like a blanket. Jayce gave me his blanket, his mind registered hazily. Jayce loves me.
Mine.
Viktor tried to wrap his arm around Jayce’s torso and lift him up, but he couldn’t manage it with only one hand. Blessedly, Jayce understood, pushing himself up and looping both arms around Viktor’s neck. Viktor let Jayce do the work of keeping them together as he lifted one of Jayce’s legs higher to adjust to the new position. He squeezed Jayce’s neck tighter, watching Jayce shudder in delight as he ran out of air and then releasing his frip when Jayce's vision started to look hazy.
“Yes,” Jayce slurred, letting his head drop forward. Viktor panicked slightly, pushing him up by the forehead to see if he was alright. As Jayce looked at him, Viktor saw one of the marks he’d left on Jayce's forehead from the attempted evolution break through the academy illusion. His fingers were in the wrong position, approaching Jayce from the front instead of the back, but it was close enough. Before he could think the better of it, Viktor lined his fingers up with the marks and pressed them in.
The effect was instantaneous: Jayce’s eyes glazed over, and then he screamed. He clenched around Viktor hard, pulsing and slick and wet, and then they were both coming.
Viktor could feel everything. He’d felt Jayce’s balls tighten before his release erupted from his cock, untouched and throbbing between them. It splattered over Jayce’s chest and stomach from the force of it. Some got on Viktor, but he was barely lucid enough to notice. He wasn’t lucid at all, actually, because his entire mind and body was stretched full of Jayce. He knew Jayce could feel him too, the way his mouth had fallen open before he came harder than he ever had in his life, painting Jayce from the inside. Their pleasure mingled together along with their souls, becoming indistinguishable and twice as strong. Viktor felt emotions, too: their desperation, their fear, and their love reflecting back at each other. As a second wave of pure, unadulterated bliss threatened to overwhelm them both, he was quite sure that the overstimulation of feeling two bodies at once had them coming again.
The Glorious Evolution had never been perfect.
This was perfection.
When he disconnected his fingers from Jayce’s skull, the change felt instant. Without the sense of being merged with Jayce, or at least intertwined so deeply that you couldn’t separate one from the other, everything only felt half as meaningful.
Jayce started to tip forward. Viktor thought he had passed out until Jayce stopped just shy of Viktor’s forehead.
“That… you…” Jayce said quietly, sounding lost.
Viktor closed the gap and pressed their foreheads together, placing a hand on Jayce’s arm when he raised it to cup the back of Viktor’s head. “I know,” he murmured, letting his breath ghost Jayce’s lips. “It was—”
“Beautiful,” Jayce finished. Viktor could hear him smiling.
He let the illusion melt away, conveniently cleaning them both up in the process. Now floating, they could curl into each other’s arms.
“Could we try that again sometime?” Jayce whispered. His face was buried into Viktor’s shoulder. Viktor could tell by the sound of his voice, as he’d quickly learned to do, that Jayce was becoming sleepy.
“Always,” Viktor replied. He extracted Jayce’s face from his neck so that he could look at him directly. “Jayce?”
“What?” Jayce chuckled. His eyes were already lidded.
Viktor took a deep breath and smiled back, praying that a tear wouldn’t escape from either eye. “I love you.”
Jayce grinned, letting his eyelids droop as he buried his head back into Viktor’s neck. Viktor both heard and felt Jayce’s voice against his skin when he replied.
“I know.”