#full chapter

[relatablegirlcomic]

"A Halloween costume reveals far more than it meant to obscure." Chapter 9: Mask, 17 pages

The final panel on page 15 was done by my good friend Shelby Cragg! You can see more of her work at @shelbycragg

[procrastinatorrex]

Merlin woke in the small, stuffy space of his sleeping bag. It was humid, and still smelled faintly of what he hoped was only spoiled milk– if only he could recall the smell. Extra-long, double-thick sleeping bags weren’t easy to come by, especially for recently turned vampires with no jobs and no excuse to tell his mother as to why he needed one, despite abhorring camping, and so… he’d made do. What was that saying? Those who pilfer things from dumpsters behind charity shops in the dead of night can’t be choosers… something like that, anyway. 

The pull of the sun was still strong, much too strong for him to be awake. Merlin groaned into the musty fabric. Why does this keep happening? Unbidden, a pair of serious blue eyes flash into his day-drowsy mind. A strong, tanned neck that matched perfectly with a strong, tanned jawline. Blunt, white, teeth– 

“You don’t need to be afraid. Here, come with me.” 

Groaning again, Merlin scrubbed his palms across his eyes until stars burst behind his lids; That goddamned Pendragon. 

They’d only spoken for a few hours, but Arthur Pendragon had been the bane of Merlin’s existence ever since he’d half-asked, half-dragged the silently panicking young vampire to a Papa John's at 2:30am, leaving their would-be attackers rotting in the alley where they’d fallen. (“I can call someone to take care of it,” he’d said, blithely, then proceeded to do nothing of the sort). The few hours of their acquaintance had replayed in Merlin’s head so many times that it was already a well-worn track in his mind, easy to call to the surface. 

Arthur had been cheerfully oblivious to his own blood, apparently not noticing the torn shirt that flapped away at the collar, revealing the delicate curve of the wound at his neck with each step, but the underpaid, sleepy-eyed uni student working at the counter had gaped at the bloody blonde Adonis for a full minute before putting in their order. ‘Tell me about it,’ Merlin had thought miserably, as Pendragon manhandled him into the order pick-up line. 

He’d somehow convinced Merlin to stand shoulder to shoulder with him at a long silver bar and swallow down awkward bites of greasy pizza that had smelled like death and tasted like wet paper made of death. Merlin had hated every second of it. Arthur had been warm beside him, it had been like standing next to a small sun– if the sun smelled like ambrosia and occasionally bumped its strong shoulder into yours, making lame jokes and never seeming to mind the bony, chilly body it stood beside. 

When they’d finally parted, Arthur apparently deeming one extra-large slice of supreme pizza sufficient repayment for Merlin helping to save his life, Merlin had felt nothing but relief. Nothing. 

He’d made it home perilously close to dawn. The pizza had tasted more like wet, mouldy paper coming back up when he’d discreetly vomited into the dumpster behind his building, but it was better than having the oily lump in his stomach for however long it took for his body to dissolve it. He’d slunk up the long flights of stairs, avoiding the slowly-pinkening windows and reminding himself he never had to see Arthur Pendragon ever again. Uther Pendragon’s son hadn’t figured him out. He was safe. 

He didn’t feel safe. Arthur had spent the whole meal looking at him with those eyes– it was like he saw something in Merlin that everyone else couldn't see… something other than the blood-sucking undead, of course, because Merlin remained semi-alive. 

The thought made his stomach churn and his skin prickle– he couldn’t afford to be seen by the most successful vampire hunter in the UK. 

So, it was all for the best that Arthur Pendragon was gone from his not-life. Forever. 

He couldn’t see a clock from inside his light-tight cocoon, but the pull of the sun was strong enough that he was sure it was still at least a few hours before sunset. Resigning himself to yet another afternoon of marinating in (possibly) milk smell, the young vampire crossed his arms across his chest and closed his eyes, willing himself to think of anything but he stupid blonde hunter who was haunting his every waking moment. 

“You saved me, back there,” Arthur whispered in his mind. Merlin shut his eyes harder, “Good for me.” He muttered to no one, “Now go away.” 

“You’ll feel much better after a bite.”  The voice was low, close, just a little raspy– and Pendragon hadn’t sounded anything like that when he’d actually said it, just five days ago (not that he was counting). The sun pulled on him with what felt like gravity, trying to draw him back into the darkness, where he belonged, but Arthur Pendragon’s voice was like the light; it made him burn, refused to let him rest. “I insist…”

Merlin nearly jumped out of his undead skin when his phone, which he’d plugged in and pulled through the opening of the sleeping bag with him, buzzed against his forehead. 

Panting, he pawed at it and hissed when the too-bright screen burned his tired eyes. 

The text was from Will. It read: “SOS. Cent Lib. Vamps. Srsly fucked. Come ASAP.” 

Minutes later, Merlin was running flat-out down the sidewalk outside his building in his hat, sunglasses, scarf, and long coat, all thoughts of Arthur Pendragon pushed from his mind. Hang on, Will– I’m coming! 

[miiranokaikata]

Chapter 78 – A Costume Party?

[tenderwatches]

“Viktor.” Jayce’s hand catches his wrist, stilling his movements. “I’m okay.” Viktor doesn’t look up. He’s staring hard at Jayce’s skin, deep tan, mottled with the outlines of rivulets of mingled antiseptic and blood. He picks up a clean cloth and moves to wipe away the residue, but Jayce catches that hand too. “I’m okay,” he repeats, bending down low to try to catch his eyes despite the pain Viktor knows it must cause him. “Mind your stitches,” Viktor snaps, guilt on the tail of his irritation. He pulls his lower lip through his teeth, hissing in annoyance with himself. He needs to keep a better handle on his emotions—or so he tells himself, falling into the well-worn pattern of diminishing his own reactions, of folding his feelings into ever-smaller parcels to tuck away and abandon. He can’t expect to function if he’s going to be set off by every little thing. But there’s nothing little about this moment, about watching Jayce bleed beneath his hands. Though his fingers were steady enough to administer stitches, his heart trembles with each breath, steeped in a deep, rending anxiety that no amount of clinical distance will spare. “What were you even doing down there?”

Chapter 25: I have always been afraid

“It is not just pollution,” Viktor insists, moving perhaps faster than he ought to, given that he nearly collapsed not but twenty minutes before. “Yes, the Gray has always been with us, but not like this. This is different.”

Ekko’s expression shifts from scepticism to careful curiosity as he weaves through the crowd, easily keeping up with Viktor. “Different how?”

Viktor shakes his head; anything he can say about the matter will seem completely outlandish, bordering on mysticism. Piltover has never been a point of concentration for the magic flowing through their world. It’s one of the reasons that the city has thrived on trade and commerce, rather than manipulation of spirit, void, or the celestial. “Do you know what hex gemstones are?”

“Of course I know what hex gem—”

“What kind of stone are they? Where do they come from?” Viktor doesn’t wait for Ekko to answer, continuing, “Hexite—from Galsite—found only in Shurima.” He speaks at the pace he walks—too fast. “And do you know why they’re only found in Shurima? This increase in the Gray, the synthetic hex crystals—it shouldn’t be possible without—”

“Synthetic what now?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Viktor dismisses, still thinking too quickly to even admonish himself for speaking about their work more than is wise. “Magic flows through natural channels: beings, foci—like genuine hex gemstones. But these synthetics,” he gestures with his free hand, fingers splayed as if trying to physically grasp the concept, “force the arcane through pathways in a land that is barren of it—disrupting a magical ecosystem.” Viktor’s voice grows hoarse with exertion but remains no less passionate. “We have evolved with a certain balance of magical energy in the environment. Now, that balance has been disrupted. Your tree’s growth—it is being unsustainably augmented.”

Ekko frowns as Viktor turns back to lean heavily on his cane and faces him. “Why just this tree, though?”

“I theorise that proximity—”

His explanation stops abruptly as he catches something over Ekko’s shoulder. The intensity drains from his face, replaced by dread. Ekko turns, following Viktor's shocked line of sight. Viktor stumbles a few steps forward.

“Jayce?”

The name emerges as a whisper with ragged edges.

In the crowd of the Undercity, Jayce Talis stands out like a shard of sunlight. Even with his hair uncharacteristically dishevelled and dirt smeared across his face, he is too bright for his surroundings, like the subject of a masterwork lovingly painted with light. Jayce looks up at the sound of Viktor’s voice and dares to send him something that looks like a weary smile as he approaches, still half-stunned with disbelief. “Hey, V, there you are…”

Viktor’s heightened energy from his theorising with Ekko dissolves into immediate, visceral concern that threatens to overtake him. He forces himself instead to catalogue Jayce’s ashen face, the unfamiliar coat he’s wearing, and his hunched-over frame hanging off of Violet, who clearly bears much of his weight. Before Viktor can question what in the gods’ terrestrial realm is happening, Ekko breaks in from his right. “What the—Vi?”

Viktor blinks in confusion, wondering briefly if their worlds have collided—Jayce here in the Undercity, this stranger and Violet, seemingly well acquainted, based on how Violet’s tired expression warms as Ekko takes up Jayce’s other side. “Hey, Little Man,” Violet greets, strained, but with a wavering smile. The thinning crowd pays them little mind, but that will change quickly if they remain exposed on the main thoroughfare.

Violet and Ekko seem to conclude this as well, for they share only the briefest of glances before devouring onto side streets that are shadowy despite the time of day. Viktor’s crutch scrapes against the metal walkway that leads to where the trio have gone. Jayce, in the Undercity, looking like that. This must be some kind of fever dream or a waking nightmare.

They stop further into an alleyway, either to catch their breath or give Viktor a chance to catch up. Jayce leans against a mildewing wall, slats of light through a fire escape illuminating what looks like a smear of blood across one cheek.

“What happened?” Viktor demands, his raw throat constricting around the words.

Jayce’s eyes flutter open at Viktor’s voice, and he manages another weak smile that does nothing to ease the anxiety causing Viktor’s heart to thunder in his ribs and ears. “It’s not as bad as it looks,” he mumbles, though the dark stain beginning to spread across his borrowed coat suggests otherwise.

“Your genius partner decided to play detective down here,” Violet states, her words tight with poorly disguised worry. “Got himself stabbed for the trouble.”

Viktor’s breath escapes in a single heartbeat, and he nearly trips on his crutch in his haste to close the space between them. “Stabbed?” He repeats, every limb going cold with a piercing fear. He pushes aside Jayce's hands where they clutch the front of the coat in a futile attempt to hide the damage.

“It was a small knife—a kid’s knife. Literally,” Jayce offers, as if this fact might be consoling.

Viktor wants to shake him and demand what he could have possibly been thinking, but the newly revealed sight of blood seeping through a crude bandage steals his voice. He swallows hard, willing himself to think past the rush of blood in his ears and what feels like a drumbeat reverberating through his spine. “Keep your hands away,” he orders Jayce as his hard-headed partner moves as if to cover the injury again. Viktor drops his crutch and half-kneels, half-falls before Jayce to carefully move aside the makeshift bandage. Someone—Violet, he assumes—has done a passable job at field dressing the wound, given their limited resources.

In the dim alleyway light, Viktor squints to examine the dark, angry mouth in Jayce’s right flank, just below the ribs. Necessity awakens dusty knowledge from his youth, and he finds himself reluctantly grateful for the time spent with his old mentor, poring over anatomy books until he’d memorised them. He can almost see the stained pages now, their diagrams of abdominal muscles and blood vessels crystal clear in his mind.

The wound stretches approximately seven centimetres, its edges clean. Thankfully, it doesn’t appear deep enough to suggest immediate danger. The bleeding remains steady but doesn’t pulse, indicating the ‘kid’ had missed any major vessels. Still, the location across such an active muscle concerns him.

“We can take care of this back at the lab.” He redresses the wound, his work slightly messier than he’d prefer, but time for neatness is not a luxury they can afford. If they can reach the upper city quickly, they should be able to manage without involving the hospital—and the questions such a visit would inspire. His breath hitches as he inhales, forcing him to cough to clear it, and he's unable to help the rest that follow. “Can you walk a bit further?” he questions when they subside, wiping his hands (trembling, stained with Jayce's blood) on his shirt hem before he allows himself to touch his partner’s face.

Jayce’s skin is clammy, but he closes his eyes and tips his head ever so minutely into Viktor’s fingers. “For you? Always.” Jayce’s attempt at a smile comes out more like a grimace, and Viktor resists the urge to jerk his hand away in frustration.

“Save your charm. We must move quickly—and keep pressure on that.” He can hardly believe this man. He’s practically bleeding out in an Undercity alleyway, and he has the gall to waste his breath on foolish words when Viktor can’t imagine it’s so easy for him to breathe at all.

“We can keep going this way,” Violet says, angling her head towards the path onwards into the alleyway. Viktor must look sceptical, as she flashes him a shameless grin. “Guess we’ll go on a little adventure.” She shoulders Jayce’s weight again despite his protests, and she silences him with hissed words Viktor can’t hear but supposes might be a threat. “Ekko,” she continues, letting Ekko take up Jayce’s other side again, “do you still know your way through the service chutes?”

“Do I still—” Ekko breaks off with an indignant scoff, but Viktor catches the way his eyes dart to Jayce’s wound as their steps quicken. “Half those routes only still work thanks to me.”

They begin their journey upwards through illicit paths Viktor has never seen. He wonders if they’ve always been here or if they are a development he’s missed in the many years he’s been away. The metallic tang of corroded scaffolds and pipes mingles with the ever-present haze of the Gray, thinner though it is up towards the border. Their surroundings morph into a maze of rusted metal and dripping condensation, shafts of dim light breaking in from above. Each inhalation feels like drawing air through wet cotton, and the darkness creeping into his periphery warns him he will shortly make their problem worse if they don't rest soon.

But he finds himself watching Jayce, detailing every wince, every shallow breath. After everything—after what he’s seen Viktor through, what they’ve promised they’re going to do—Jayce put himself in this kind of danger to look for him. I did this, he thinks, and it settles like something waterlogged in his lungs.

Viktor thought he’d figured out how to let Jayce worry about him—but never in his most outlandish imaginings was there any possibility Jayce would wind up stabbed in the Undercity. A refrain made up only of ‘why?’ and ‘how?’ taunts him, bringing a tightness to his chest to accompany the stabbing labour of breathing.

Through the sheer force of his notably stubborn will, Viktor manages to keep up with the three others as they wind through the Undercity. Though half-carrying Jayce hindered their pace, Viktor is wheezing when Violet and Ekko’s ‘service chute’ route spits them out to the side of the bathysphere station.

Winded, Viktor leans on his crutch hard enough that his shoulder begins to go numb. He silently attempts to will away the faint whistle of his inhalations as he looks back at his Undercity fellows and his very, very idiotic Piltie partner. All three of them lean back against the side of the bathysphere station, unnoticed by the crowds of people bustling out in intervals. Ekko tilts his head back as he takes deep breaths of the relatively clear air, but when he opens his eyes, they go wide with shock.

Viktor’s eyebrows crease with concern. “What is it?”

“Holy shit,” Ekko breathes, “Vi, what did you get me into?”

“Me?” Violet laughs. “Oh, no—you were already with that one,” she asserts, gesturing at Viktor.

“Well, ‘that one’ is trying to get this one back to the lab,” Viktor scoffs, his irritation evident, but Ekko pays no mind and remains frozen as though he has leapt into the Pilt on a winter day. Viktor tracks Ekko’s sightline to the nearby buildings that boast a mix of Piltovan architecture and Undercity flair, but nothing strikes him as alarming. All he sees are boutique windows, stencilled shop names, and painted advertisements for attractions like Count Mei’s Menagerie, Zindelo’s Incognium, and Progress Day.

Oh.

Progress Day.

Viktor’s gaze lands on a handsome painting above them that depicts the freshly stabbed member of their party, sans stab.

“I can’t be seen carrying a bleeding Jayce Talis through Piltover,” Ekko protests in a low whisper, pointed jabs emphasising Jayce’s name.

“You are about to be carrying a dead Jayce Talis, Man of Progress, through Piltover if we do not move,” Viktor retorts, invoking the full of Jayce’s moniker like a threat as he hefts his crutch to his other side and shakes out the tingling arm.

“Hey, I’m not dying—” Jayce argues, but his expression goes strained with the effort. “I think.”

Viktor resists the urge to roll his eyes and gestures for them to hurry. “As the resident expert on dying, I get to say. Now, move.” He can see another group alighting the bathysphere through the station’s tinted glass walls; if they go now, they should be able to join this crowd without trouble.

As it turns out, moving through Piltover in the middle of the day, half-carrying, half-dragging the aforementioned bleeding, possibly dying (Viktor’s mind denies this possibility with vehemence), Man of Progress through the streets is both more and less of an affair than Viktor might have thought.

Though suspicious eyes watch their unusual procession, no one tries to stop them, perhaps each assuming that they must be someone else’s problem. The three lead in front, Viktor laboriously following at length, each step bearing so heavily on his crutch that he feels he uses it more to drag himself through the streets than to steady his steps. By the time they reach the lab, Viktor is coughing again and has to relinquish the keys to Violet to unlock the doors with her one free hand as he doubles over, spasms in his chest forcing out bright blooms of red blood into his well-stained handkerchief, which had been white this morning.

Once inside, he leans against the wall, closing his eyes and giving in to the bout of vertigo; he’ll just rest here a moment whilst Violet and Ekko get Jayce in, and then he will need to clean the wound, anaesthetise the flesh, stitch the laceration, and dress the injury appropriately—hasn’t it only been a couple of months since he’s last given Jayce stitches?

“Hey, V, you okay?”

Viktor looks up as calloused fingers touch first his jaw, then his chin, and Jayce tilts his head up. The pallor of the other man’s skin makes it look dull and waxy, and he’s broken out in a cold sweat, but he looks at Viktor with a concern so deep that Viktor pulls away. “I’m fine.” He wishes Jayce would stop looking at him like that—with this immense sadness and the oft-present shadow of things they’ve not yet said about what has changed between them.

Jayce frowns at him, worry emphasising the lines of his face. “V, you promised you wouldn’t lie about how you’re feeling.”

“I wager that of the two of us, I presently have the higher blood volume, so if you would please lie down so I may do the necessary.” They must not fight. They do not have time for fighting—and Viktor seems to be losing his grasp on language, besides. He nods to Violet and Ekko still standing on either side of Jayce, who protests as they haul him over to one of the workstations.

Viktor manages to lock the doors, shutter the windows, and retrieve their first aid kit without collapsing (again). He sinks onto a stool, gripping the edge of the table as he pulls himself closer. When he sets out the materials, his hands are steadier than he anticipated—a small mercy. With a quiet, readying breath, he begins cleansing the wound with short, gentle strokes, the antiseptic running pink down Jayce’s side.

Silence reigns in the lab as he works; he’s glad to see his initial assessment is correct—the knife wound is hardly a pretty sight, but it’s not life-threatening. The amount of blood Jayce has lost is suboptimal, but Viktor works with a concentrated efficiency that suggests he has blocked out everything else in the lab except for the skin and sutures in front of him.

The meticulous work swallows some length of time he can’t quite fathom. He simply goes through the motions, making neat stitches from one end of the gash to the other, until it no longer gapes like a bloody maw. His hands, not as deft as when he started, struggle with the last knot, but he manages to tie it off as neatly as the first. “You will need to keep this clean and dry,” he instructs, his voice as short and neutral as any Piltovan doctor. He presses a clean pad to the wound and reaches around Jayce’s waist with a length of bandage to wrap it in place. “And you will need to rest—”

“Viktor.” Jayce’s hand catches his wrist, stilling his movements. “I’m okay.”

Viktor doesn’t look up. He’s staring hard at Jayce’s skin, deep tan, mottled with the outlines of rivulets of mingled antiseptic and blood. He picks up a clean cloth and moves to wipe away the residue, but Jayce catches that hand too.

“I’m okay,” he repeats, bending down low to try to catch his eyes despite the pain Viktor knows it must cause him.

“Mind your stitches,” Viktor snaps, guilt on the tail of his irritation. He pulls his lower lip through his teeth, hissing in annoyance with himself. He needs to keep a better handle on his emotions—or so he tells himself, falling into the well-worn pattern of diminishing his own reactions, of folding his feelings into ever-smaller parcels to tuck away and abandon. He can’t expect to function if he’s going to be set off by every little thing.

But there’s nothing little about this moment, about watching Jayce bleed beneath his hands. Though his fingers were steady enough to administer stitches, his heart trembles with each breath, steeped in a deep, rending anxiety that no amount of clinical distance will spare. “What were you even doing down there?”

Now, it’s Jayce’s turn to wince, though Viktor sees it’s not from the wound in his side. “You… weren’t back—I was… worried something had happened,” he admits, unable to meet Viktor’s eyes as he gives the explanation.

Viktor wants to berate Jayce for, yet again, failing to trust him—but in this one instance, Jayce was correct. As it happened, he crashed into a perfect stranger in the midst of a near-episode right there in the Undercity. That the affair has turned out to be rather serendipitous doesn’t much alleviate his feelings of shame and embarrassment.

“Jayce? Viktor?”

Thomas sounds alarmed and eager, as if he’s been waiting for them to return. Their young lab assistant comes barrelling out of the stairwell, stopping short at the sight of their unexpected company. He looks from Ekko to Vi and back again in startled confusion, then finally to Jayce and Viktor. “Oh, I didn’t realise we were… expecting anyone—” he says, slowly setting down a fern that appears to be several times too large and shimmering faintly. He nudges it towards the wall with one foot, though seems to have trouble with its weight, if Viktor has to guess by the grimace on his face and the way the plant almost tips over.

“Mr. Prescott, this is Ekko,” Viktor sighs, gesturing between them as if there’s nothing unusual about the situation. “And I believe you have met Violet.”

“In passing,” Violet supplies, helpfully glancing between Viktor and Jayce and raising her eyebrows high into her pink hair as she eyes Jayce and the distance they have neglected to put between them. She clears her throat, tucking her bloodied hands beneath her jacket as she pivots towards the doors. “And that’s my cue. I need to get back to… well, get back.” She gives one door a sharp tug, grunting when she’s only met with unyielding resistance. She remembers with a swear that Viktor locked them in to avoid any unhelpful new visitors during his tending to Jayce’s wounds. “Got it!” She announces when she manages to free herself, turning the latch so it catches again behind her.

Viktor coughs. “And I suppose, also—Jayce, Ekko. Ekko, Jayce,” he introduces, nodding at each of them‌. The two of them look at each other for a moment that feels too long, the younger man scrutinising his partner as though trying to place him from someplace other than the buildings plastered with his face. “Still contemplating the Man of Progress…?” Viktor ventures, unsurprised by this, at least.

“Oh, no.” Ekko snaps back into focus, turning his attention towards Viktor again. Now Jayce is blatantly staring at the young man’s back, eyes lifting only to meet Viktor’s with a curious ‘No clue what that was either’ look on his face. “What did you say about your work with the plants?”

Viktor pinches the bridge of his nose and turns to look at Thomas, desperately hoping the boy has managed to learn how to read minds. Thomas fidgets with his tie pin, and Viktor can practically hear their young lab assistant flipping through a mental Rolodex of what he might want. “Oh, uh, I don’t know if I can—” Viktor shakes his head a fraction as Thomas starts to protest Ekko’s question. Thomas’s confused expression turns slightly more panicked, the obvious answer now ruled out. “No? Okay—then, um—” Viktor flicks his eyes to Ekko, then to the open door frame to the stairwell. “Mr. Viktor wanted to… show you the plants…?” Viktor nods once, and Thomas heaves a sigh of relief.

They’ve never before brought anyone else into the work, but between the blood on the workstation (which Thomas thankfully hasn’t questioned), Jayce still looking haggard, and Viktor calling the shots for once, Thomas seems to find it best to simply go along with the prevailing winds, uncanny as they are. “Right! Okay, Ekko, you can call me Thomas, by the way; he’s the only one who calls me Mr. Prescott—the plants are upstairs, and they’re really more Sky’s forte than mine, but she’s over at the Arbour Botanica for more reference material, so I’m afraid you’ll just have to imagine my better half is regaling you with the details…”

Their footsteps echo up the stairwell, then fade, leaving Viktor and Jayce in a silence that feels both heavy and oddly fragile.

“Oh, hey—I found—” Jayce rummages through the jacket, discarded on the other end of the workstation. He procures a crumpled, blood-stained parchment, which Viktor takes with tentative fingers. “I found this in the warehouse—”

“Where you got stabbed.”

“Where I got a little stabbed,” Jayce emphasises, and he doesn’t need to look up to know that Jayce is looking at him with the pleading eyes he uses when trying to wring an ounce of leniency from whoever he’s looking at.

Viktor turns the paper over, seeing only scribbled calculations on the back side. “You say that as though you expect me to be reassured by this.” He moves to set the parchment aside, but something in Jayce’s expression makes him pause. His partner looks almost wounded—beyond the actual wound—like Viktor has just dashed his hopes and dreams. With a sigh that pulls at his chest, Viktor smooths the crumpled page against the workstation.

His eyes roam over the page, taking in what he’s looking at—equations, hasty mathematical notations, half-formed theorems. It’s a crude amalgamation of runes and a blueprint for a vessel whose sophistication leaves much to be desired. The framework for the patterns, despite being horrifically rudimentary, is all wrong; domination is used several times over where there should be at least one instance of precision or resolve, and inspiration has been completely left out of the diagram, much as he did in his early research. And in the margins, barely legible: increased yield = increased waste. Containment???

Jayce leans towards him, reaching for the blueprints. “You see it too, don’t you? Here, let me show y—”

“No,” Viktor interrupts, holding the paper just out of reach. Where his mind normally latches onto equations and formulas with a ravenous appetite, he finds himself unable to focus now, despite the implications of the notes on the page. “This blueprint is evidence you found in a dodgy warehouse in which you were stabbed. It will go to Officer Kiramman.” Since his mention at last month's gala of the Ferros' suspicious, if not potentially criminal, activity, Caitlyn has been looking into the family's interest in the Undercity. Gods, that was only a month ago? It feels more like a year.

Viktor sighs, putting aside his frustration at how quickly time passes when an unpleasant future lies ahead. “And besides, I must clarify something with you.” He sets the blueprints aside carefully before turning to fully face the other man, who stares back at him with anticipatory energy. “I did not lie earlier. When I said I was ‘fine.’” He hadn’t meant to lie, anyways, but the words feel feeble.

Jayce’s earlier plea echoes in his mind—”You promised you wouldn’t lie about how you’re feeling.” The weight of that promise sits heavy in his chest, alongside the sharp ache that has become the constant companion of every breath he takes. It is important that Jayce sees he is trying.

“It…” Viktor searches for the words, teeth worrying at the inside of his lip as language eludes him. He is normally articulate, able to conjure specific words to convey his exact meaning—but now, he finds himself at a loss for words that don’t sound too weak on one hand or too clinical on the other. “I am accustomed to… managing these things on my own,” he finally states, idle fingers picking at the corner of the parchment lying otherwise disregarded on the workstation.

“V…” Jayce’s voice is soft, so plaintive as to make some inner pain quite obvious.

“No,” Viktor cuts in, but his tone remains gentle. “Do not start with that. When I say that I am ‘fine’, I do not mean that I am without pain or discomfort. I believe you will need to adopt this understanding if we are to… communicate properly,” he asserts without looking at Jayce’s reaction to his statement. “I have spent so long categorising my symptoms, compartmentalising what I can and cannot handle—so when I say I am ‘fine’, I mean there is nothing concerning about my state, even if it might be…” He gestures vaguely at Jayce’s worried expression. “… Concerning to others.”

“Concerning?” Jayce repeats with a laugh that holds no humour, voice gone rough. His hands clench where they rest on the workstation. “Viktor, you stopped breathing. In my arms, you just—” His breath hitches with a sound like he’s choking, and Viktor sees his chest heave. The next time he inhales, it’s too shallow, and he breathes faster in a futile attempt to compensate. “I don’t think you understand what that’s like—to—to have you there, and you’re—” His words come rapidly now, like raindrops, one after the other, bleeding together. “It wasn’t even like you just stopped—it was like watching you drown, right there, and I couldn’t—”

Viktor places his hands on Jayce before even registering the thought to do so. He soothes with his palms up the sides of Jayce’s thighs, first to his hips, then down to his knees, and finally up again, where his hands come to a rest. Viktor leans in, letting the contact steady them both. For a suspended moment, he’s sure neither of them breathes.

“You are correct.” He speaks into the tension humming in the space between them. He’s acutely aware of every point of contact—his palms against Jayce’s legs, the heat of him even through his clothes. “I cannot know. But I am… sorry.” He knows Jayce will likely brush the apology aside—it isn’t, after all, as if he’s suffered a near-death experience for the sole purpose of worrying Jayce. But he is sorry. Jayce’s eyes hold the look of a cornered animal; his breathing is still short and panicked. Viktor’s thumb worries gently at the crease of one hip joint, a slow ministration. “I am sorry for frightening you. For… putting you through that.”

He’s sorry for being the cause of that fearful look; he’s sorry for being the object of such worry; and he’s sorry for all the times he’s pushed away the only person he’s likely to accept help from. He’s tried to weather these things alone, has always prided himself on his independence, but he sees now that this is not the time to rest on pride. This is beyond him.

“If… I had not been at the lab with you, when it happened… Had I been alone…”

Jayce tenses under his palms, hands moving to grip both Viktor’s wrists with an intensity that almost hurts.

They don’t speak. Neither of them can finish the thought. Instead, Viktor lets Jayce hold onto him, even though his hands are beginning to feel cold and bloodless. He leans down with a breath of hesitation before his head comes to an experimental rest against Jayce’s thigh. He’s thought about this countless times before, but in his mind’s eye, it’s always been Jayce where he is. That’s how it always has been: Jayce in surrender, bowed in supplication. But now it’s Viktor, and he feels himself yielding, weathered walls receding.

“I do not know how to do this,” Viktor murmurs after a moment, his lips brushing against Jayce’s still-tense muscles as they form the words. “I do not know how to… share this burden. It has never been necessary before.” A trembling rises in him, starting from somewhere low. It’s a feeling that could be sensual, but the vulnerability that cracks him open is unmistakable. He presses his fingertips against his partner’s hips to keep his hands from shaking.

Then, the grip encircling his wrists disengages, and Jayce’s hand comes to a rest in his hair. He feels released in the moment; the contact is a quiet recognition that, despite the complexity and challenges ahead of them, there is something here. Something small, perhaps, but profound—it is both eternal and fleeting all at once. “You don’t have to know,” Jayce says, warm but crumbling, soft and rich with the promise to break against him. To give way to what he needs, whatever it may be. “We’ll figure it out.”

Viktor closes his eyes, allowing himself to relish in this, to be held, to be comforted. He has spent so long holding himself rigid against the world, against the pain, against this very tenderness that now threatens to undo him.

Over the years, Jayce has proven himself, again and again, to be the one who gives. He gives as if service is his divine purpose, offering up his reputation, his position on the Council, and his ambitions for Hextech—all in sacrifice of… what? Viktor? Viktor feels insubstantial in the face of it. What has he given in return? What can he give? His fingers curl into the fabric at Jayce’s hips, no longer to still their trembling, but to draw him closer as he makes another confession. “I have been afraid,” he admits, his voice hardly rising enough to be heard, “of leaving you with nothing but regrets.”

“Viktor, I—”

Viktor lifts his head, finding himself just a whisper away from the other man’s face, his warm golden eyes alight with surprise at their proximity. The jolt of pain that runs through Jayce’s body crashes against Viktor, but he speaks through it, heedless of Jayce’s unfinished thought. “I do not wish to hear your protests or what you think I have given you.” The words come much easier now, like sea foam drifting together on the tide. Is this what Jayce feels during his impassioned speeches? This sense of words building up inside, threatening both abandonment and destruction if left unspoken?

“Your dream, your life—the things you always say.” He stares down at the sliver of workstation he can only just see between Jayce’s knees, swallowing past the ache in his chest. It doesn’t subside, exactly, having metamorphosed into something beyond the lesions in his lungs. He sees, now, what Jayce has needed all along—not Viktor’s brilliance or his determination, but this: his trust, freely given.

Understanding makes its way through Viktor like dawn breaking over the twin cities, warm, inevitable, fragmented. His mortality has always stood between them, a wall neither can scale. But at this moment, Viktor wants what Jayce has always wanted for him: to live—not for progress, not for their work, but for himself. For them. “I will… give you this,” he continues, not yet looking up. His fingers tighten at Jayce’s hips, seeking to anchor them both to this moment, trying to convey without words what ‘this’ is.

A lifetime of meticulously constructed walls has begun disintegrating, years of fastidious maintenance giving way to this newfound understanding. Viktor has held his illness close like a jealous lover, as if preventing anyone from seeing the face of it might let him wrest the weight of his future from beyond his grasp. “I thought that… to keep it all to myself was to retain some measure of control over it.” He realises now that his possessive company has been false. Illness is not a lover kept, but a growing shadow, spreading further and further until isolation is all he knows. “As if by parsing it into pieces small enough to bear alone, I could somehow…” He trails off, losing his conclusion in the tangle of the ever-present reminder of his mortality. When Viktor looks up, it is to meet the forlorn concern in Jayce’s eyes with threadbare honesty. “I am tired.”

“Let me.” Jayce’s request is a revelation. Viktor knows this is the end of his twisted relationship with his illness and the nascence of something much more complicated. It begins as a flutter, delicate as moth wings against his ribcage, frantic wing beats under his sternum. “Do you trust me?”

Viktor acknowledges Jayce’s question with a minute tilt of his head. “That is an asinine question, but…” That sensation grows in his chest, threading between his ribs—a warmth that borders on ache, a fullness too vast to cage behind ribs and reason. “Of course I do.” Something in him finally succumbs.

“Then let me carry this with you, Viktor. Please.”

Viktor exhales, counting seconds as the weight of years spent holding himself together begins to dissolve against Jayce’s warmth. He hears the soft whir of machinery, something humming with energy, and whispers of pneumatic messaging tubes around them. These familiar laboratory sounds, ones he’s heard for so many years now, envelop them like the respite of this moment made tangible.

Death may soon claim his future, but this moment—this vital serenity—belongs to them both.

[first chapter | previous chapter | next chapter on AO3]

[weevercomic]

Chapter 18 - Who Am I To You?

[011sfootstool]

murder drones - lost in time - complete chapter one

[positronic-crisis]

Plants Don't Need You To Smile - Chapter 10 Holodecks

Data x Gender-Neutral Reader

First Chapter

Or read it on AO3

When you arrive in the arboretum again, Seral and Keiko are standing in front of one habitat, discussing something. Only then do you see that Seral has brought the bee-like creatures you saw flying around his lab yesterday. They seem busy pollinating the Sonara orchids at the moment.

When you walk closer, you can actually hear the hum of the flowers mixing with the buzzing of the bees. They make the pollination sound like a piece of musical art.

“Ensign,” Seral addresses you when he spots you.

“Lieutenant, Keiko,” you nod at both. Your legs are still wobbly. Walking here had been hard, but now that you are back in the environment where you feel most safe, your heartbeat slowly returns to normal.

“How was the meeting?” Keiko asks with wide eyes.

“Good,” you lie.

Keiko knows when you do. “So bad. I get it,” she nods.

“Why was the meeting bad?” Seral wants to know. He clearly has a problem with the vagueness of the word bad, judging by the way he says it.

“I couldn’t talk.” You shrug and watch the bees sitting on the flower petals.

“Is this a good idea? For you to be on the away mission’s team?” Seral asks, still watching your expression closely.

You feel a boulder dropping into your stomach as you process his words.

No, of course not. It’s the worst idea. Not just because you are not a good team player and shy around others. It’s also that you get overwhelmed quite easily and only feel truly safe when you are among plants. And there is also the thing with Data.

But as you reflect on all that, noticing Seral and Keiko still watching you, waiting for your reply, you also notice another thought.

But what if it is a good idea?

You know that if you tell Seral you don’t want to be on the team, he will simply ask Commander Data to remove you. Seral has, until now, always been on your side. As a Vulcan he knows how hard life can be when simple smells annoy you, noises startle you, or you don’t understand what others mean when they talk indirectly.

He will make up some reason, like he can’t spare you at the moment. That way you can remain dignified and return to what you actually signed up for when you applied to the academy.

If you share your doubts with him now, he will act. He will act the way he thinks you want him to act. Because he is a good lieutenant, and even though he never said it, you think he sees you as his protégé.

“I think it’s a good way for me to learn more,” you say. Because apart from the dread you feel about the mission and everything that comes with it, there is also Data.

Seral nods and looks back at his bees. One lands on his hand, crawling around, maybe searching for food.

Keiko is still watching you with suspicion. But then she averts her eyes again.

You eat a small lunch that day. On the one hand you are not hungry at all. Your mind is already at the holodeck, thinking about training with Commander Data. But you also think that training on an empty stomach would be reckless and might even result in you getting kicked off the team.

Which now, after you had time to think about it and screw on your head a different way, you don’t want anymore.

You now feel like this mission needs to happen. Like the time you learned to swim and your father pushed you into the pool. You screamed, but when you found out that you could stand in the water, you had the best time.

Maybe this mission is like this pool.

After eating your lunch in the company of some other ensigns from the science division, you make your way to the holodecks. Today everything seems a little brighter, but also quieter than yesterday.

Today people aren’t shouting through the hallways at each other. That makes the walk to the holodecks easier.

When you arrive at Holodeck Two, you see that you are alone.

The computer tells you no one is currently inside. So you stand outside and wait.

“Ensign,” you then hear a cheery but authoritative voice. “What are you waiting for? Get in there, have some fun.” Commander Riker walks over to you, grinning.

“Sir,” you greet him, and while awkwardly bowing you realize that is not how normal people act.

Then you cough.

“Is it broken?” he mumbles and looks at the control screen outside the holodeck to check its functionality.

“No sir, I am waiting for Commander Data. He wants to train me for the mission in the Thelmar system,” you stutter and watch him watch the screen.

Commander Riker raises a brow and smirks at you. “Train you? For what exactly?”

You feel your face blushing, your eyes darting around, avoiding his cheeky stare.

“The mission, the planets, the…”

“Really?” He furrows his brow. “There is a training program for this, and haven’t you prepared yourself already with the other ensigns? They did that training a few days ago.”

Commander Riker types on the screen, locating a program and almost selects it.

“I just joined the mission,” you mumble. Somehow you are ashamed, even though it is really not your fault.

The Commander stops and steps away from the screen without pressing the button.

“Oh, you are the botanist that found the Auravine,” he says — mostly to himself.

He smiles at you. This time there is another expression on his face. It looks almost sad.

You feel the heat draining from your cheeks. In its place there is now an utter lack of blood in your face.

What did he mean by that? Do you have a bad reputation already?

But before you can muster the courage to ask him, Commander Data turns the corner and greets both of you.

“Commander,” Riker greets him mock-serious.

“Sir,” Data nods back. Just serious.

“Well then,” Commander Riker begins and takes a few steps back, “I have some holodeck time reserved. Have fun with the training, you two.” He salutes and disappears into Holodeck One.

Commander Data turns to you. “Are you ready to begin the training?” His brow is raised again.

“Yes, sir,” you say quietly. Unsure of this whole situation. Because what you really would like to ask is why this is necessary. You know that it is because you are you.

A botanist who barely leaves the arboretum and only does if forced. But technically you are an ensign in Starfleet. This kind of training is covered in the academy. You had a whole semester of planet drills.

You weren’t good, but you passed.

As you are deep in thought, Data selects the program Riker had found before.

“I would like to start with the L-class,” he explains. “When we step inside, you will experience problems breathing. You will find your gear to your immediate right. Please put it on and then follow me into the simulated environment.”

Your heart drops as he explains it all in detail. Did he do that because he read your file? Because somewhere your professor for planet drills wrote needs detailed instructions to perform adequately?

The doors of the holodeck open, and you step inside. The program is already running. You find yourself in a simulated shuttlecraft. Its doors of it is already open.

While you mutter to yourself why this is necessary, you look for the gear you need.

When you find it, you hastily — with trembling arms — put on the breathing apparatus and secure the small tube around your body.

Only when you have everything on does Data stroll into the holodeck. He nods at you approvingly and gestures for you to follow him outside.

You both step out of the shuttlecraft, and you immediately feel it.

Even though you have the tube, you feel a burning and almost floating sensation.

The gravity on this planet isn’t different from an M-class planet. But the oxygen reacts somehow with your body.

At least that is what you assume as you wobble over to Data.

“You did not turn on the breathing machine,” he informs you.

Oh god, no.

Of course you didn’t.

Before you can do anything, Data’s left hand reaches around your waist and pushes a button.

You can’t breathe.

Even though the tube is now supplying you with just the right amount of oxygen, your breathing momentarily stops as Commander Data has his arm almost wrapped around your waist to help you.

That is why Riker smiled sadly.

That is why you can’t do this alone, you sigh to yourself.

Next Chapter

[maydawn]

Finally finished my first full-length book.There are still three left, but the catch is that there might be three characters in this series, not four as I planned. It's just that one of the characters belongs to my friend, but at the moment, we have some strange things in our communication, I would say we had a conflict of misunderstanding, in which instead of to figure it out, she ignores me.

Well, time will tell what happens.