Perfect Strangers- part two: The Classmate
Viktor x Fem!reader (SFW)
Takes place before Arcane and works its way there, did my best to combine the different versions of lore. (nsfw in later parts)
(you and Viktor meet on your first day at the academy and bond over being habitual, awkward loners. The story revolves around class issues and a sense of belonging mixed with lore and Arcane plot. The story will split at some point and you choose which ending you want to read. Kind of self-indulgent… Based on interactions in platonic and romantic relationships with the men in my life.)
*no warnings for this part*
You hadn’t even considered what you were going to do with yourself once classes had begun and independent research projects started in a few years. It seemed so far ahead, but you were surrounded by classmates excitedly discussing their ideas. For now you could only focus on whatever Viktor was sharing with you everyday. You didn’t even think you’d see him everyday before school began, but there he was at your hotel door the next morning with tea for you and a few books from the library in a bag hanging from his arm.
“You’re late moving in,” he lowered himself into the chair at the dining table with a sigh.
“I only have a couple bags, they’re small anyways. I didn’t bring much,” you assessed your tiny travel bags on the hotel floor while gratefully sipping the tea, not counting your bag you brought everywhere for school and art, “maybe I didn’t bring enough.” You thought about how long you were actually going to be there and your closet full of clothes you’d left at home plus stationery supplies. It wasn’t like you were unable to ask your parents to send them from the other end of the city. It would only take a day for your stuff to get to you if you really cared.
“Then let’s go over so you’re settled. Classes start in a couple days,” he stood and lifted the closest bag which was no more than a large purse, hardly a travel case.
You checked out of the hotel early, refusing the refund for the spare nights. Viktor heard from a few feet behind as you chatted with the attendant; when you only referred to the possible refund as a “tip” he cleared his throat in surprise. He watched you sign off on the receipt without a second thought. Nothing caught your attention from his rigid body language when you turned to leave, letting him know everything was ready to go.
The walk to campus was quiet for a bit as you checked the dorm number over and over making sure you got it right. Viktor thought about how comfortable you were surrounded by the expensive hotel lobby while he had been shuffling his feet behind you.
“How many days did you have left at the hotel?”
“Um, maybe three or four? I wasn’t paying attention when I signed the receipt,” casually waving your hand in a nonchalant manner. It had made you feel nice leaving the rest as a tip as you always did with spare change.
Viktor’s look of surprise went unnoticed by you as you went back to reading the letter detailing where your dorm was. Inside the elevator he cranked the lever to your floor number and you both listened to the rattling of the gears and cables lifting you up to your floor.
Decorative paper was plastered to the walls and copper trimmings instead of gold or brass like the majority of the campus. The doors were spaced close to each other, closer than you would have thought for such an expensive campus. You both slowly walked, checking the numbers on each door before finally finding yours. The keys jingled as you turned it with a jerk and the door creaked open with a moaning sound.
Light poured in through the window from lamps outside, not bright enough to illuminate the whole room so you clicked on the light that was just a lamp on the desk.
The dorm was small, tiny, more like a broom closet with a bed stuffed in it than a real room to live in. Viktor was unable to hide his surprise when you invited him to step in with you for the first time. His face scrunched as he assessed the space you had to work with. You didn’t think it was so bad, different from what you were used to by a long shot, but it had not phased you yet. Something about it was freeing.
“Aren’t you going to unpack?” he gave you a confused look when you took your bag from his hand and tossed it under the bed, covering the bags with the long duvet.
“I’ll just get stuff as I need it,” you jumped up onto the bed which was twice the height of your regular bed but was a small twin sized mattress in width.
“Is this room alright for you?” Viktor was seated on the hard wooden chair at the small desk. He couldn’t help but think about how your hotel room had been so grand compared to this and the way you acted towards money earlier that day.
“I don’t see why not, homework, lying awake at night unable to sleep, maybe eating. I don’t need a lot of space for that. Honestly this is amazing.” Stretching out on your bed covered in the academy provided bedding was exciting. You assumed with the tuition you were forking out they would have included better accommodations, but you were not one to complain out loud.
“Compared to other dorms it is very small, it must be from when the academy was first founded,” he rested his back against the chair, listening to it creek with age.
You just loved listening to him talk about mundane things, his accent made everything sound sophisticated. You almost didn’t register the comment he made.
“I’ll show you,” he pushed himself up gracefully with his cane and waved for you to join him.
Following him down the hall, you left your floor, descending a couple of levels before Viktor stepped off of the elevator and onto his floor. The doors were spaced further apart in this hallway, making it obvious that the rooms were already twice the size, or more, compared to your room. You continued to follow him down the hall. Distracted by the gold molding you were not paying attention to when he stopped to unlock his door. Catching yourself before bumping into him only brushing against his arm instead.
He pushed his door open, allowing you to enter first before following. Closing the door behind him he stood by his desk which was larger than yours and already stacked with books.
You started to feel shy looking around and noticing the little signs of life around the room. Imagining how he had been living in the space since last week since arriving from Zaun made you curious about all of the objects in the room. You wondered what that meant to him, being from the undercity, now that he had a place in Piltover at the academy.
Pants were neatly folded and hung off of the edge of the bed frame where his feet would go, there was a book on the nightstand and his drawer was slightly opened. You avoided peeking, especially since he was right there.
Viktor noticed the double take you had with the night stand.
“You can sit on the bed if you’d like,” politely offering and gesturing towards it.
Thanking him, before you could sit you noticed there were two other doors in the room; one was next to the bed behind you and the other was next to the desk. The one behind his bed was slightly ajar which peaked your interest, noticing it was a bathroom.
“You have your own bathroom?!” You gasped like a child as you straightened before sitting on his bed and looked in. “And a shower?!”
“Your room should have had those as well, perhaps they mean to remodel your floor eventually. Though a hundred years give or take should have been enough time,” he laughed more at your excitement than at his own joke and you joined in.
“Where does the other door lead?” you didn’t pry physically this time as you turned back into the main room.
“A small kitchen I share with the room next door. Whoever was supposed to move in never showed.”
“Oh my gods, and it’s too late to switch rooms. Damn.”
“You could probably talk to someone about it,” Viktor’s tone almost sounded hopeful.
Continuing to chat and for a few hours about his books and your future classes, which had been anxiety inducing, put you at ease. It felt good to make him laugh as you talked since he usually seemed so serious when discussing academics.
You spent the following school days together sharing ideas and listening to him talk so excitedly about his plans. The persistent longing for connection that was finally his, something you knew nothing about yet, and you were just glad he felt this comfortable with you.
As classes started you were pleased to find out you had a couple lectures and an elective together. The lectures were bearable with him there to explain things you failed to understand or when you had trouble paying attention. The elective was a robotics class focusing on streamline machinery for factory assembly lines. Which would make sense in the city of progress. Viktor had already been improving machines like those back in Zaun less than a year prior so it was calming to know you would have someone to get advice from.
Routine was forming between you two. From meeting downstairs at the entrance to the dorms to walking together to grab tea or coffee on your way to classes. When you weren’t together in classes you already knew you would see each other anyways on the way back to the dorms every now and then.
Enjoying the company of someone else was foreign to you, especially when that someone was so new. It was surprising enough to you that it had not fizzled out after a couple weeks. His calm demeanor did wonders for your anxiety, especially when you were stressed or faced what seemed to be unsolvable problems in classes and unwarranted social settings. It took no time at all for him to gently talk you down from whatever was stressing you out or he would at least listen to your concerns. Solutions were only offered when you asked, making sure to not overstep a boundary by trying to give you unsolicited advice.
During one long lecture about the properties and definition of matter you felt particularly intrigued by the topic. You furiously scrawled notes into your pad, memorization was difficult for you without something to read. Compared to Viktor who only took a note here and there, you seemed like a madman. This had been the running theme so far over the last month, and some change, you would write a stack of notes and in the margins of your textbooks while Viktor understood the material with ease.
Not that he didn’t work hard, he definitely did in his own ways. Studying outside the material and topics of his courses, as he loved learning, was the norm for him.
Sometimes it made you feel inadequate having to work harder than a majority of your classmates, but the results were worth it when you always got excellent scores. Earning praise for your academics from someone other than your parents was fun; Viktor always wanted to see your assignments and tests when you received them from the professor. He was fascinated with how much work went into some of your answers.
Your train of thought was completely visible to him as he read through your work in all of its chaotic steps. Those chaotic steps would sometimes get you scolded by the professor, but you could never work through some of the assignments without them. You weren’t sure if your work made Viktor think less of you as a scholar in the making, you decided it was better to not ask and just let him enjoy analyzing your work.
Well into the school term, you were improving with Viktor’s help in academics. It was like having your own personal tutor who had endless patience with you. You would spent late nights in the library study rooms in the beginning, keeping academics out of your leisure time in the dorms when you worked together in silence. For you it was art while he read. Something about staying in his dorm all night seemed like overstepping a boundary when you were huddled together over paperwork, instead of sitting across the room from each other relaxing and reading.
You had gotten to the point where rationalizing and reasoning never crossed your mind in relation to your friendship, it existed as it was, comfortably.
During your robotics elective with Viktor, feeling your hands clam up, you waited your turn to present your project. The class was moved to a large lecture hall for presentations for a better view of the gadgetry. Something about the wall of students made your stomach drop.
Viktor was nervous as well as he presented, but was calm enough on the outside to make it through with no mistakes before rejoining you in the audience.
All you could do was wipe your hands on your pleated uniform skirt. Whatever bewitched you to wear a shorter skirt that day of all days escaped you, maybe you thought it would grant some false confidence. Hearing your name being called made your heart hammer against your ribs. You squeezed past the classmate next to you, legs awkwardly brushing against his knees as you stepped out into the aisle and down the stairs after apologizing to him.
Viktor didn’t appreciate the smirk the guy had on his face as you passed. Viktor’s eyes traced the guy’s gaze which led to your skirt bouncing slightly with each step you took to the presentation stage.
It was far from the first time another guy had noticed you beyond just another classmate they passed by occasionally. Viktor would be lying if he didn’t at least admit you were cute on the daily, the way your eyes lit up over the smallest aspects of the day was the sweetest thing to him.
The guy had noticed Viktor and you were making eye contact as you finished setting up your machine.
When you stopped to take a deep breath, composing yourself, you looked to him for reassurance. In response, Viktor gave you a soft wave and a thumbs up which prompted you to start speaking.
“Hey, eh Viktor right?” The whisper came from Viktor’s side and he turned to look at the guy. He was large, muscular, like he trained often.
“Yes, and you?” he accepted his outstretched hand and politely shook it.
“Caston,” his sly grin made Viktor internally cringe. “Hey I was wondering about your friend, how long have you known her?”
“A while,” Viktor’s answer was brisk as he didn’t like where the conversation was heading.
“Are you seeing each other?” Caston chewed his bottom lip as he watched you present, noticing how you were basically presenting to just Viktor and the professor.
“Why do you ask?” Viktor avoided the real answer instead of answering sarcastically by telling him you saw each other everyday.
“Just wondering since you always arrive and leave class together. I’ve seen you guys around campus sometimes, seemed cozy to me.” He leaned towards Viktor, “if not I was thinking about asking her out. I’ve had my eye on her for a while, she’s nice.”
“I see,” he turned his full attention back to you. You looked so sweet, passionately explaining your project as you summarized your findings and began to wrap things up. He didn’t want to lie, preventing you from experiencing life by telling every interested person that he was yours.
Resting his chin on his hand as he thought about you dating someone else cut him off from Caston going psst repeatedly next to him until he felt his shoulder being tapped.
“Well are you or not?” he asked quietly as you started putting your project away, making the stage ready for the next student.
“Oh… eh, no, just friends.” Viktor admitted as you waved at him, he grinned and gave you a small wave back. The apathy in his eyes did not go unnoticed by you as you sat back down next to him.
“How did I do?” you buzzed next to his ear, still nervous from the presentation.
“You were perfect,” Viktor assured you with his usual smile, shaking his head when your eyes gave away your worry, he tried to wipe the sour mood from his face.
During the rest of the presentations you spent your time drawing in your sketchbook, leaning your head against Viktor’s shoulder. He watched you draw in-between paying attention to the other presentations. Occasionally catching Caston eyeing you both closely, especially when you would look up at Viktor to ask him an innocent question about the other projects or about where you were going for lunch after class.
Caston watched you with invested interest, remembering all the times he had seen you interact with Viktor in and out of class. He figured you were just being nice, and he honestly knew nothing about you outside of academics, as he watched you pick a piece of lint off of Viktor’s pant leg.
When class was dismissed you waited for Viktor to stand before joining him, Caston had stepped out into the aisle to let you both pass. He watched you walk out, following close behind waiting for a break in your conversation to ask you out. You had already met before so there was no need for introductions.
“Hey, y/n,” Caston reached out to get your attention in the middle of you talking to Viktor.
You stopped and looked at him in confusion, “yes?”
“I’ve been wondering if you wanted to go out sometime,” his charming smile made you blush when you realized what he was asking.
“Oh, uh, when?” You didn’t want to schedule anything during your regular study times with Viktor. “We kind of have research to do.”
Viktor stepped off to the side, giving you ample space so no one felt awkward. Plus, this was the last conversation he wanted to be a part of.
“Like just coffee or something,” he suggested, a friendly smile mixed with his words. “We could go when you’re free from,” he glanced at Viktor who was pretending to be nose deep in a pocket sized book, “studying or whatever.”
Caston loomed over you, he was taller than Viktor and you felt a little intimidated. You couldn’t deny he was classically attractive with his nearly flawless olive skin and dark eyes. His square jaw was artistically defined, perfectly kept curls adorned his head, occasionally falling over his forehead. What possessed him to ask you out was far from your index of explanations.
“I’m free tomorrow morning,” you practically blurted out and blushed.
“Sure,” you smiled at him as you left, taking in his dark eyes one last time over your shoulder as you went back to Viktor.
He saw how glad you seemed to be noticed by someone romantically. He cared about you enough to be happy for you as he listened to you change the topic from Caston and instead asked him about the book he was reading.
Regardless of his support for you, Viktor couldn’t help but feel his heart sink.
