#jayvik x you

[thehistoriangirl]

(Not So) Like Any Other Day [Valentine’s Day Special]

Haaaaaappyyy Valentine’s Daaaay :3333

I changed the title a little JKSJHDJHDHJ sorry

Jayce x Viktor x gn!Reader-----2.5K-------SFW (but it’s suggestive)

Synopsis: Neither of the creators of Hextech paid much mind to St, Valentine, the date blurring together with any other, spending all their time inside the lab. Or so you thought. They told you it would be a busy day—and it was okay, after all, progress is first and you can have them to yourself at any other time. But when you wake up alone in bed, with only a flower laid by your pillow with a little note next to it, you can feel that today isn't really going to be dedicated to progress…

Tags: Polyamorous relationship| Domestic fluff| Established relationship| Plotless fluff| No pronouns for Reader ^^

Sunlight blinded you from the already drawn curtains. You were cozily tucked into a roll made by a couple of blankets—which was strange. Usually, you were only wrapped in one side, the other still occupied by a larger figure that may or may not be hugging you as if you were a plushie. Both scientists loved their job as much as they cherished you, so they took turns sleeping until late every day so you'd never wake up alone.

But while your hands extended over the mattress, you encountered cold bedsheets where Viktor or Jayce’s bodies should have been.

Peeking at the clock on the wall, you blinked the sleep away. It wasn't even that late anyway, where are they at work already? They did warn you it would be a busy week.

So no extra-long breaks to eat the pastries you brought, or walks around the Academy garden. Especially, no Valentine’s Day celebration.

They broke the news to you as if it would be devastating, but the reality was, you already suspected it. Ever since you accepted dating them, you understood that their personal relationship would be in second place under Hextech and their duty as scientists.

You couldn't get mad at their dream of bettering people's lives, anyway.

However, when you sat, with the mattress dipping under your shifting movements as you tried to stretch your sleepy muscles, the little thing carefully collocated in the pillow next to you made you pause, fingers hovering over the delicate yellow petals of the sunflower that surrounded the white sheets with a golden hue.

You bit your lip, but your smile was growing too wide to try to conceal it.  Tied to its steam was a note scribbled half in Viktor's long and crammed handwriting and half little and round calligraphy that only could be Jayce’s.

Happy Valentine’s Day, love!

Have a lovely day, and don't forget to eat breakfast <3

Your stomach fluttered, but you weren't sure if it was the source laid in the note or your growing hunger, yesterday caught you up in the workload to dine properly—besides, they arrived way after you were sleeping, and you just didn’t feel that hungry when you ate alone.

It took you around forty minutes to get the bed done, put on your work clothes, and overall make your mind ready for the day ahead. Despite today being your free day of the week, you had told your boyfriends you'd be helping them in the lab, to tide up the place and assist them in transcribing coffee-stained reports they must present to the Council.

As you opened the bedroom door, the sweet smell of butter and coffee sieged your nostrils. Did they make you breakfast before heading out? Your feet echoed over the wooden floor, tiptoeing in your warm socks as you walked past the corner of the hallway.

Your steps faltered while you looked at the figure muttering to himself in front of the stove, his back toward you. The table near the stove was covered in flour and sticky dough.

You frowned upon seeing the dark black hair and wide shoulders getting too close to the open cabinet, his slim waist hugged by an apron. “Jayce?”

The man jumped, hitting his head on the cabinet’s door. He hissed while one of his hands flew to his hair, leaving a white mark between his black locks. Turning, he pretended it didn’t hurt, smiling awkwardly. “Hey, babe. I didn’t— I didn’t think you’d be awake this early.”

“It’s… uh, almost 10 AM,” you said, appreciating Jayce’s hazel eyes widening as he tried to wipe off the dough of his fingers with a towel. “Aren’t you late to work?”

His lips extended in an awkward smile, carrying one plate filled with pancakes to the little table in the middle of the kitchen, sliding the chair away so you could sit. “Viktor… uh, doesn’t mind.” You tried to help him carry the plates on the stove, but Jayce extended one arm, blocking your way. "No, no. You sit and eat, okay? It’s your day today.”

Blinking, your face felt hot remembering the sunflower you put inside a vase before heading out of the room. “It’s not my birthday,” you teased, but Jayce ignored you.

You took a couple of pancakes, ready to pour marmalade over them, when…

“Are these hearts?” You twisted your back to look back at him, as Jayce carried a plate with some scrambles eggs served with leftovers of yesterday’s lunch for himself.

Contrary to you and Viktor, Jayce had the weird practice of eating a healthy breakfast, with a main course and a little sweet pastry at the end.

He smiled, one of his hands scratching an imaginary itch over his left shoulder. "Yeah… I saw this kit in one shop the other day…"

“A kit?”

Jayce nodded, passing one hand over your bottom lip to clean off the rest of the honey and crumbs. Your eyes widened, and he chuckled. “One frying pan, one cake pan, and cookie cutters, all heart-shaped.” You chuckled at the idea of him walking inside the shop to buy kitchen supplies just because they had a cute shape.

Because it wasn’t the first time. You had at least two plushies Jayce bought you for no specific reason.

He awaited, gently holding the cutlery as you tasted the first pancake. “Do you like them?”

Your eyes sparkled back at him as you swallowed. “Of course! You always make the best pancakes.” Jayce made around twenty every time, and by the end of breakfast, only five or four survived.

It was strangely quiet after that. Jayce barely looked at you as he ate, shoulders dropped. You thought he felt bad for only preparing breakfast as your first Valentine’s Day celebration together. Viktor wasn’t even there.

To show your gratitude, you stood up to hug him, kissing him on the forehead as you held him. "Thank you."

Jayce’s warm arms pressed you against his body, legs open so you could fit even closer to his chest, his face hidden inside your open sweater.

“I think we should get going, babe,” he commented after a while. “Or Viktor would get grumpy if I’m late again.”

You pouted. “Because he doesn’t get that many cuddles.”

"Exactly," Jayce said, laughing, his body getting near enough to steal a kiss from your puffy lips.

“That’s on him for no stay a little longer,” you replied lightly, making Jayce chortle while he was cleaning the table, the sound almost muffled by the running water as you washed the dishes. “Did he even eat?”

“He did. I've made pancakes since two hours ago,” he commented, and you couldn’t stop the laugh bubbling out your lips.

“Tomorrow will be my turn, deal?”

Jayce hugged you from behind, whispering in your ear: “Deal.”

*~*~*~*

While arriving at the Academy, Jayce sent you to fetch some books for Viktor at the library, taking a list from one of his pockets. Contrary to Viktor's handwriting, Jayce was easier to read, but you had to squint your eyes for its small size. Here, the titles were around four, but they only occupied one-tenth of the space on the blank page.

It was a quiet day at the Academy in general, with some couples snuggling on their seats while studying.

You walked toward the private section of the library, only used by Faculty members and some researchers. They were study rooms varying in size and lavishness, but all of them worked as private spaces to take notes and reflect on problems found in projects in progress.

Viktor was in the one Councilor Medarda gave to them when she became Hextech’s main sponsor.

Jayce put on a comfortable couch and a little coffee table to replace the stiff chair and the high desk that occupied the space before. Viktor was half-lying on the couch when you knocked, peeking your head inside. He was writing in his notebook supported on his lap, brows pinched in focus.

His golden eyes illuminated when he saw you cross the threshold. “You’re here.”

"Hi," you muttered, putting the books over the wooden surface without making too much noise. He moved so you could sit next to him on the couch, his eyes pierced into yours as he patted the empty space. "But… aren't you busy?"

Viktor shrugged. “You’ll help me hold the book.”

"…right." Because that's what he always said. It was a lie, but you weren't going to call him out. You lay next to his extended legs, hugging him by the waist as he passed one of his arms over your chest to embrace you back.

Viktor put an encyclopedia over your body, checking if the weight was alright for you. When he felt you nod against his chest, he continued to mutter things to himself, his fingers growing astray with each passing second as you started to get lulled by his voice.

He would stroke your hair, or rub his hand on the soft sides of your body, resting his chin on the top of your head. You were in an out of the dreamlands, but by the time you took complete consciousness again, you saw that his notes did not exceed half a page, only a couple of paragraphs written over a couple of hours.

“I’m distracting you,” you stated, startling his hands that were already under your shirt, sheepishly brushing your bare skin.

“No, you aren’t, my love. I’m perfectly capable of working like this.”

“Uh-uh,” you muttered, trying to slide off the couch, only for Viktor's grip to tighten around you.

"I didn't say you could move." Your skin got covered in goosebumps as you heard him, voice plain and as a matter of factly.

“I… I should go help Jayce.”

Viktor hugged you closer, burying his head in the crook of your neck. "He stayed with you in the morning. It's my turn now." His stomach growled right after, making his cheeks pink. “Eh…”

You laughed, patting his stomach. “It must be lunchtime already. Let’s go eat, yes?”

His gaze diverted from your face. “Hmm… yes, I think you’re right.” You sat on the couch’s edge, feeling his fingers fall slowly from your skin toward his lap. You helped him settle the books and notes on the table. Your back cracked when you stretched, taking his hand to help him stood up.

“You go first,” Viktor urged you, his hands brushing your hair to accommodate it. Golden eyes twinkled as he kissed the button of your nose. “I’ll be there in a minute, my love.”

*~*~*~*

The way back to the lab was strangely quiet, without assistants running between offices, holding papers and muttering chores to themselves. Your steps echoed as you approached the white door. A few meters away, you heard one of the squeaky stools being moved around.

Frowning, the handle felt cold under your touch as you pushed it open. Jayce was standing in a precarious position over one stool, next to the stone table near the lab entrance. He looked at you, hands frozen while putting a chandelier. Where the candle holders were supposed to be, hexcrystals replaced them.

Blue hues shone inside the lab, enveloping the place with magical lights. The table was neatly prepared for three, with spotless red tablecloths, and white tableware on them. In the middle of the table was the food inside a basket, steam rising and filling the place with the sweetness of the meals, an empty vase next to it. Candles were collocated around the table, mixing the blue light of the chandelier with the orange hues of the candlewicks.

You blinked as Jayce smiled fondly at you. “It’s almost ready.” He hooked the chandelier on one metal beam and jumped to the floor. His hands were quick to take off his working gloves. “What do you think, babe?”

At your back, you heard the triple steps rhythm of Viktor's walking down the hallway, turning at him. Because obviously, it had to be Jayce's idea, that’s why he sent you two away…

Viktor was holding a bouquet of sunflowers tied together with a red ribbon, one wine bottle tucked under his arm. Just like Jayce, he was smiling widely, almost shamelessly as he stopped next to your frozen figure at the threshold.

“Surprise,” he muttered, his hand extending you the bouquet.

Cheeks hot with happiness and confusion, Jayce took you by the waist to move you away from the entrance so Viktor could enter. You looked back at him, wide-eyed. Your puzzled expression made them chuckle.

“But… but… but you said…” Words were difficult to come by, your brain had become too mushy to even create logical sentences. “You’re busy,” you said to finish the incoherent trail of words flooding out your mouth.

Jayce patted your head. “Yeah, we were.”

“Busy planning this surprise, love,” Viktor finished, settling the bottle on the table.

“But Hextech—”

"Today is our first Valentine's together," Jayce said, gesturing for you to seat in one of the chairs. “Hextech can wait.”

You felt your lips growing in a smile; your skin was too hot you started to take off your sweater. Their gazes at seeing you doing so wouldn't help to soothe the tingling sensation traveling your whole body. “I love you both so much, words can’t make it justice.”

Before sitting, you shoved them into a hug, your arms not long enough to circle them both, but they quickly embraced you, pressing your body between them both.

“We love you, too, babe” Jayce said.

“Indeed we do,” Viktor’s hand patted your back. “I think we should show you...”

You kissed Jayce’s lips, tiptoeing to reach his tall height. Viktor took advantage of your exposed neck to graze his teeth on your sensitive skin.

One of your hands reached for him, tangling your fingers through his hair while pulling slightly so you could hear him whimper. Jayce bit your bottom lip, and the gasp that elicit out of you made him grunt.

“I told you we should have done it at home,” Viktor stated, and you felt his euphoric heartbeat against your back. His hot pants moved the hair on the back of your neck, covering your skin in goosebumps.

“Then we should eat quickly and go home.” Jayce pulled you away, kissing Viktor as your lips brushed his neck.

You panted, wriggling your body between both of them, wanting them to hiss so near your ears when you brushed where their bodies needed you the most.  

Viktor put you at one arm’s length. His cheeks were deeply red, eyes were framed with his dark lashes. He looked at Jayce, with his dark hazel half-closed, his blush wasn’t that noticeable, but his body radiated with warmth as your hands brushed his chest.

“Then let’s start already,” Viktor urged you two, and you giggled, taking the tie out of its place on his chest to pull him closer.

“Why? The day isn’t over yet. Quite the contrary.”

Jayce hold you by the thighs so your body ended up sitting at the edge of the table. Viktor walked to position himself in front of you. The freezing surface made you shiver, but soon enough you felt two pairs of hands all over your body to make up for the cold seat.

“Perhaps we should start now. What do you think, Jayce?” Viktor said, his fingers trailing up and down your arm, flicking the hem of your shirt. “After all, our dearest is pretty versatile, hmm?”

Jayce chuckled, his big hands parting your legs. “You’re right, Vik. We should start now.”

[snoocupz]

Woohoo, I have made it back to Tumblr after - Good god, something that feel like millions of years of a break! Time for some old art reshare!

[sapphic-woes]

When You Met Her pt. 5

A/N: Five chapters? Inconsistency who? Anyways, thank you all for the wonderful comments! Plz remember that encouragement, rather than demanding for more is much better though! MINORS DNI

Word Count: 1k AO3 Link

___________

You think it’s an odd question, considering it has nothing to do with you.

Bonds. You know it’s a fantasy. Didn't stop many omegas from whispering about it when your owners aren't around though. But you know better than to allow yourself that luxury. In the brothel the walls had ears, and you rarely saw the same omega dream about getting out of that hellhole twice. Yourself included.

“...Yes.” You stiffly mumble the response, “I know.” Viktor studies you, letting your lack of elaboration fill the room with silence. Sevika doesn’t speak either, and the heavy quiet eats away at what little calm you have. Fidgety, you protectively rub the back of your neck. Viktor’s gaze follows the movement, bright amber eyes sharply widening.

“Your neck.” You wince, shrinking into yourself as the doctor takes a step forward, “those scars…y/n did they…did they try to–” 

Like a useless, rusty gate, your words slip past your lips before you can rein them in.

“I was wrong.” You grind the words out like bitter sulfur on your tongue. The room is becoming thick with emotions. It's stifling. It makes you want to run, yet you stay in place instead. Nothing good ever comes from running. 

Viktor’s scent is sour, so potent you nearly gag, but that's not what scares you.

Sevika burns. 

Her anger flows in disrupted waves. It’s an unpredictable tide threatening to pull you under. Instinct tells you to hide your nape. To curl up and protect it at all costs. Experience tells you such actions are useless. You’re going to be told each and every last bit of your mistakes, whether you liked it or not. 

“I know. It won’t–it w-won’t happen. I know now. I know that n-now.” Your words are feverish, and shamelessly desperate. Your nails dig into your knees hard, and you nearly draw blood. You wish you did. 

At the very least, it would pull you out of these memories. It wasn’t as if you’d never imagined being one of those rare omegas that had an equally rare, bonded alpha. However, you were quickly shown the consequence of it.

Now, they were a useless endeavor.

“It can’t happen to pr-property. I was wrong. I k-know that now so please…” There was a time you’d whispered those hopes aloud, but there were no secrets in the brothel. No way to know who wasn’t listening in on your foolish words…and no hesitation to crush them either.

“Bonds…" Your mind feels like a blank slate. The air is polluted. A single breath is a sea of emotions, yet you don't even flinch. Numbness creeps into your head, and all you can focus on is making them understand.

"Bonds aren’t for…omegas like me. A-an item for public use can't suddenly become exclusive. I know I am not v-valuable enough for that. I promise.” The words are branded on your lips. They pass listlessly under your breath as though rehearsed. You aren't greedy. You know your place.

You know the kind of omega you are. 

“No one…is going to do that here. To think that happened to you for so long…” Viktor’s voice is tight. It’s strained as though it's a dam holding back a flood. It confuses you enough to look up, yet you’re still nervous, unable to meet Viktor’s solemn gaze. Instead you focus on his throat, watch it bob up and down in a painful swallow.  A frail looking thing just like yours. 

Only then did you notice the edges of his own scars at the curves of his neck. Too familiar to be a coincidence. Too many to have just been an accident. You know it's not a simple punishment. You know it's something particularly cruel owners do. Yet this doctor that seems completely separate from your world has them. Abruptly, you look up.

Viktor is faraway. You can tell those amber irises are distant. Seeing a memory, or perhaps a fragmented scene. The lingering ghost of his scars.

Somehow the gaze is familiar. It’s empty and vast, much too deep to understand. You’ve seen faces in the brothel like that. Or at least, similar ones. A bit of it you recognize. It's hollow, it's barren. But it blooms with a delicate, ebbing light. An emotion that vanished from omegas towards one another the longer they stayed in the brothel. One you forgot could ever be directed at you. 

The omega's sad. Sad for what you lost.

“It doesn’t even…” Viktor takes a sharp, wavering breath. You’re so focused on Viktor, you don’t realize Sevika's walking out of the room until the door shuts. 

Oh no. Though she’s gone, her anger lingers. It’s strong enough it’s like she's still here. She must care about the value of an omega’s nape, and obviously, you disappoint her. Will she throw me away?

Sevika is nicer than most alphas, and kindness, it seems, serves better to make you obedient than fear. You want to please her. She doesn't hit you, at least not yet she has, and you hope to keep it that way. You like this whole not hitting thing. She smells nice too. She smells like goodness. 

Sevika is an alpha. But sometimes she makes you feel safe. Like there's nothing about her to actually fear.

You wonder what to make of that.

However, now she knows that the back of your neck is dirty. Gross with jagged marks. What will happen to you? You wonder if Viktor reassures you simply because there's no point in decreasing your worth even further.

“Sorry. Other than that I’m not spoiled, I swear. M-my holes are fine, and I’ve got no diseases, a-and I can take shimmer, no bad trips. I um, I-I’ve been told I’m good at it. I don’t need a lotta rest and don’t need much food. W-water too–”

“Y/N. You haven’t been brought here for that. You won’t be doing that again. Ever.” Viktor interrupts you. His voice hurts. At least, it sounds like it's hurting him. As if to ease the pain, he slowly speaks.

“Them abusing your nape doesn’t make you “spoiled.” Neither does it mean you can’t have a bond. There’s no way to make an omega unable to have a claim or a bond. Trust me…” Viktor turns around, tugging down the collar of his shirt. Surely enough, it's covered in scars similar to your own, but what surprises you more is what mark on top covers it all.

A clear bite mark, smelling precisely of an alpha.

“Or else I wouldn't have been able to have this either, would I?”

[wainmfis]

ballister and ambrosius are so jayvik coded im gonna make a list

1. ballister called ambrosius golden boy . . . you know how they called jayce in arcane??? GOLDEN BOY

2. they just remind me of them like ballister reminds me of the machine herald with all the knight suit and the living alone and the robotic arm and ambrosius is like this great rich guy and everyone thinks of him as a hero and the knight suit again and

3. even their story is so similar like at first they were boyfriends then something happened that they had to take separate ways, one of them in the light and the other in the dark (even this reminds me of piltover and the undercity)

4: BRO AND AND WHEN BALLISTER WANTED TO SHOW THE PROOF THAT HE WAS INNOCENT TO AMBROSIUS IT REMINDED ME OF jayce will understand AND AND THE FACT THAT NEITHER AMBROSIUS AND JAYCE DIDNT UNDERSTAND omg

i havent finished watching nimona so if i find another thing im gonna update this

update ok thats all i got cus i finished nimona and OHMYGOD I LOVE IT

[binghe-malewife-goals]

Jayce and Viktor are "science partners" they say, like they don't act like a married couple

[wisteria-mutterings]

Victor & Hextech: Babylon by The Dirt Poor Robins

[darkfire359]

This one r/fanfiction post: “Is forgiving a character who hit their partner possible?”Me: “Um. Hmm. I’ve maybe strayed too far from the path…”

[littlebeesart]

"I was hoping you might like it." The way Jayce's eyes seem ready to pop out his head feels encouraging.

Snippet from @roguequartz 's fic: Fortunate Fools, please give it a read!💛 It's so beautiful written🤌

[1-800-suck-my-clit]

Testing my multifandomness, so here's a list of ships I support/enjoy and why

Most (damn near all) are ganna be MlM

Clegan (bucky x buck)

John is so love sick for gale you just have to ship them

Hannigraham (Hannibal x Will Graham)

They act like a married couple with Gothic scenes and inuendos

Bat jokes (Batman x Joker)

Idk man something abt villian and hero falling in love despite being the farthest of opposites. And I love their banter where Joker shamelessly flirts with him

Superbat (Batman x Superman / Bruce Wayne x Clark Kent)

Now ik what ur thinking "bat jokes AND superbat how scandalous😱" this one only really applies to their "citizen" forms. I love the rich sugar daddy and kind southern accent trope. Also them in their hero forms are also cute bc batman let's his guard down for him

Zosan (zoro x sanji)

Your honor they're married🙄

Hisoillu

They give off Doberman and black cat energy. And canonically they are married ‼️

Rathelstan (ragnar x athelstan)

The love I have for them hold no words so here are some quotes that made me wanna rip my heart out.

"What do you mean?! You cannot leave...you cannot leave me! I love you...and you're the only I can trust so you must stay"

"I always believed that death is a fate far better than life, for you will be reunited with lost loved ones. But we will never meet again, my friend. I have a feeling that your God might object to me visiting you in Heaven. What am I to do now?"

"I hate you for leaving me. I ache from your loss. There is nothing that can console me now. I am changed, so are you.”

Symbrock (Venom x Eddie)

HEAR ME OUT PLEASE...So um anyways

Spideypool (spiderman x deadpool)

Their banter in the comics is so cute

Soapghost(konig) (Soap x Ghost (x Konig) / Simon Riley x John McTavish (x Konig))

Got really into them when CoD started blowing up on my FYP last year

Patrochillies (Patrocles x Achilles)

Ganna cry I love them sm. "He is half of my soul as the poets say" 🤣🔪🩸

Eremika (Eren x Mikasa)

If u don't belive they are end game ur wrong abt everything🥱. Tho I belive in eremika being cannon I also ship EreJean (Eren x Jean) who's to say a Lil hate sex never hurt anyone 🤭

Jayvik (jayce x viktor)

Idk who I wanna be jayces girlfriend, his boyfriend, or him😩

BoKuro (Bokuto x Kuroo)

Himbos in love? Count me in. tho I do also ship them with their main ships aswell

NaruSasu (Naruto x Sasuke)

No one chases a man around for damn near a decade bc "We're best friends🥺" 😒

Last but not least

KiriBaku (kirishima x Bakugou)

I don't give one damn what ANYONE says they are literally end game. FUCK BAKUDEKU‼️‼️🗣 I need the firecracker and his leash‼️

Um thank u for listening to my Ted talk lol 🏃🏾‍♀️💨

[thehistoriangirl]

To Chase a Silhouette [1/3?]

Someone hurt her hand doing basic housekeeping chores, but I’m not going to tell you who I am 🤡 🤡  It isn’t extreme, but I will laid back from writing from around two weeks or so.

But what’s this, then? A fic I didn’t get to finish for the Halloweek event ^^, once again clowning myself too much because it isn’t a oneshot.

Jayce x Viktor x Grim Reaper!Fem!Reader [Noir AU (?)]------8.7K----SFW** (check tags)

Synopsis: Monsters roam free in this city, both in the shadows and in plein daylight. As private detectives, Viktor and Jayce know better than anyone that people are scarier than any monster from the stories. That is, until one day due to a unfinished case, people began to fear a mysterious entity that seems to be a cold-blooded murderer—or perhaps the urban legends are right, and the feared suspect isn’t even human... [Or rather, Reader plays cat-and-mouse with Viktor and Jayce, until there's a new threat they must overcome together if they want to win.]

Tags: I rewatched Hannibal(TM) and it shows| Graphic Descriptions of Violence| Mentions of Blood, Murders, and Firearms | Haunted Buildings| Slight Mention of Religious Themes| Mentions of kidnapping| Jayce and Viktor are private detectives| Established Relationship toward the end (JayVik)| Kind Enemies to Lovers (with Reader)| Slow Burn| Eventual Happy Ending| Missing Person--> they got a lil obsessed about finding them| Summoning Demons & Demons Deals| Murder Mystery| Demon/Human Relationship(s)

  They said you can summon a demon by doing a simple ritual. It was a superstition that expanded wide and long over the city, kids whispering at each other, pocking at their ribs, and challenging to bet who was the bravest; people on the streets buying the required materials with only a slightly arched brow from the cashier on duty.

People said you can make a deal with them and lose your soul in exchange for your wildest dream.  Others, more experienced and greedier, said that it was possible to bound them, assuring eternal suffering after your death, but while alive, the demon would be at your disposal, dangerous and loyal servants, they could make real every wish at the mere movement of your hands.

Jayce didn’t want a servant, but a guide.

The room was dark, with a candle that couldn't illuminate enough space, and it looked as if the shadows were purposefully dimming it. Jayce felt the frenetic rhythm of his breathing as he waited, eyes trying to focus on his figure reflected in the mirror collocated in front of him, rather than the burning candle placed next to his body, its flame static even if his breathing sounded agitated.

Hands seemed all covered in the dark ashes of the paper he had to lit on fire to call you, even if the ashes barely brushed his fingertips.

The window by the left creaked, a ghost wind moved his hair and rising goosebumps over his covered arms, but his eyes remained looking at the mirror, his figure painted alone.

He heard you clicking your tongue behind him.

“Too desperate to try the impossible,” you said, heels clicking on the wooden floor, but stopping at seeing the circle of salt around his seated body. “I’m touched, Detective.”

Do you know me? Jayce wanted to ask, but he stood by the words of the summoning ritual.

He wanted to see you, curiosity drawn into the plain, almost bored tone of your voice that seemed to echo from all the directions in the room except behind, the place you were standing, your stare burning between his shoulder blades. But he remembered the warning: whatever you do, do not look them in the eye unless requested, or they will steal your soul.

You tilted your head, smelling the fear pouring from his body when you leaned against his back, mouth whispering in an airy tone: “Let’s make a deal, shall we?”

“Name your price,” he recited from memory.

Only a flame flicked in the mirror's reflection, twin to the candle, up in the air, where your hand lighted it when you took the burned paper and read his petition out loud.

“I’ll name yours first: To assist you in catching the delinquents hiding in the city. Hmm…” Your silence disturbed him, wriggling his body nervously.

Whatever you do, not turn. Do not look them in the eye. Name your price, and let them name theirs. Bargain. Seal the deal with blood and blow out the candle.

“You’re aware your petition is too much, don’t you?”

“What—what do you mean?”

“You can’t bind me to your job, Detective. You’re not that greedy.” You stepped further, eyes scanning the simple furniture of the room, a board filled with paper scraps and red thread catching your attention. Question marks in them already filled in your mind, for you knew most of the dirty secrets of this avid city. “It may not seem like it, but I have a life, too.”

Jayce scoffed. “What life? Tricking and forcing people to sign contracts in a disadvantaged position?”

You stomped the floor, lightly, tap, tap. The candle followed, the light dying out slowly as much as Jayce tried to protect it with his hands. Part of you didn't know why you were getting angry about his assumptions.

“I don’t make deals, and you know it. You called me specifically.” Your words were sharp and strangely even, no emotions could pour off of them despite the haughty words spilling from your lips:  “You know what I do, that’s why you need my help and not any other cheap, low-status entity, doesn’t it? Do not dare to lie to me, Jayce Talis.”

His hazel eyes widened when his name came out of your mouth as if it were a terrifying curse. “You should have told me you want to know the whereabouts of the Conray family and the real identity of the better known as The Death’s Jailor. It’s a much more concise deal—still bold, but I could have let it slide.”

Back flinching, you saw him fleetingly looking from the corner of his eye, catching the edges of your white suit, dark heeled shoes. The opaque scythe you used as a staff. Smiling slightly, you waited.

“Can it be done?”

You shrugged. “For a fair price.”

He sighed, lowering his head. “Like what?” Play my game, but you can never win.

“Your soul will do, Detective.”

He blinked, his face devoid of color in his reflection. Bargain. Jayce never knew how to do it, much less he would dare to do it with a demon. He could lose the opportunity he had to save those innocent people, to let the murderer roam free in search of a new victim.

"Alright," he breathed. And you chuckled, a sound so human-like that, for a moment, Jayce asked himself how demonic you would look if he'd turned around.

 “Hmm, face me and I don’t take your soul.” It’s lying, do not fall for it. And as if you were reading his mind, you added: “Looking at other entities right in the eyes would madden you, but not me.”

 He stood in his place, fingers shivering. You copied his sigh. 

"The cat went hunting, and he found two little mice, both with gray eyes. Oh, but, I think he's more of a squirrel. Don't you agree, Detective?" Jayce removed uncomfortably; the floor felt suddenly too cold to sit on. "He buries the mice and forgets about them. Your ridiculous human laws would charge him with kidnapping, but not murder, doesn't it? You know it, your rightful, grumpy supervisor does, too. Even I, a simple demon, do." You knelt, fingers brushing the grains of salt of the protective circle. "You don't want to imprison him, do you?"

Your presence was cold as if the air was drained from the room. He began to shake, lips tightened in a wrenched line.

The silence disappointed you.

“The mice are under your nose, Detective. Right under the ground you stand. You’re just too deaf to hear them cry.”

"Stop playing your riddles!" he growled, hands stomping at his sides, disturbing the salt circle when it got imprinted on its fingers, now broken. His face tilted backward, towards you. "Those people are going to die and you're going to let that criminal run free because it's amusing to you? What kind of monster are you?"

Your claws dug into the skin of his shoulders when you grasped them, head dipping next to his. Your cheek was cold, and he shivered. Jayce saw, with utter horror, how his reflection in the mirror disappeared as you claimed his soul in that simple gesture, hearing the low tune of a weeping shadow now snaking around your arms.

Your eyes were completely black, no sclera or iris, only darkness as you loomed over, cold pouring from your skin. A murderous smile greeted him, the black print of a hand could be seen cradling the base of your head, down the back of your neck. "You know what kind of monster I am, a sly one if the city's opinion is any trustworthy."

Jayce, despite the fear clenching his heart, stood his ground. “Tell me where they are.”

“You, police people, revised all the outskirts of the town, finding all the cabins that used to be his recreational villages. Space has run out, so he experimented with the opposite he’d done before. Foolish of him, but luckily for you.”

“Are you saying he put them in the middle of the city?”

You shrugged. “At the heart, yes.”

“But that can’t be, the historical block is always filled with people—”

“Not there where ghosts roam.”

Jayce’s eyes swept the room and your features, his furrow deepening. “The construction site in the city’s old district?”

A vulturine smile adorned the eerie features of your empty gaze that nevertheless was piercing him over your tight grasp. “You better hurry, or your mice would get trapped under meters of rubble when the building over their heads gets demolished.”

He squinted his eyes. “And who is the culprit?”

You chuckled. "You want it all, don't you? Ask yourself who is the owner. The man is both worshiped and loathed for renewing the city. A very powerful one, I might say. The ground you walk over belongs to him."

His eyes widened. “The entrepren—” Your fingers were cold when you stopped his lips to say the name out loud. A tingling sensation he couldn’t pinpoint, warm flooding him inside out there where your fingers touched his lips.

“Don’t get too excited. There’s a catch, Detective.” You pushed him to sit straight again, face away from his vision, reflection welcomed back in the mirror. “The mice, or the cat. You can’t have both.”

“But—” he retorted, eyes flaring with anger, body turning to glare at you. “You took my soul! It’s a fair price.”

You ignored him. “He’s not yours to chase, Detective. Besides,” you stood out, scythe reappearing on your hand; “I just gave it back.” Chuckling, your skin was dimming, suit becoming more gray than white as you disappeared. “I think it’s more interesting now that you owe a favor.”

Jayce scowled. “I would never do you a favor.” But both knew he was lying.

"We'll see. You should hurry and pick one," your eyes were the only thing in the room that was still visible from your body, and your chuckle made him grasp his hands in fists. "Time's always running short for you."

But even before he could blow the candle—because he wouldn’t, Jayce would freeze the time of your encounter until he was able to get them both, to save them and his justice. Though you already knew what he was about to pick.

“Wait—”

"Goodbye, for now, Jayce Talis."

The room got dark when you blew his candle, ending the summoning. The window cracked when you slid away, moonlight finally flooding inside the bedroom.

Jayce stood up, rubbing his hands against his face, groaning. But time did seem to pass faster, so he took his coat and went sprinting out the entrance door, ready to knock into his supervisor’s house.

*~*~*~*

The construction site was around thirty minutes by car, and Viktor grumbled all the way. Jayce could have supposed it was because he woke him up, but his boss seemed to cut very short his sleep schedule anyway.

“You better hope this isn’t another one of your misleading hunches,” Viktor warned as both entered his car, walkie-talkie filled with interrupted static as he communicated with the nearest police station. “I think you’ll have to go back to the Federal Police.”

Jayce didn't respond, fingers tightly interlaced as the car moved swiftly over the newly paved streets of the suburbs, down into the city's heart. Little houses with porches were replaced with tightly constructed apartment complexes, carbon copies of each other.

It was around 3 AM, but many apartments still got the lights on, yellow beacons over the defective streetlamps.

The old historic block was divided in two, the renewed one, filled with high-end restaurants, luxury stores, and five-star hotels. And then, over the south, was the unfinished section, an old hospital with black gates crowned in the middle among other smaller buildings, many of them abandoned. Thankfully, the thing scheduled to be demolished wasn't the clinic, but rather an old radio station, one of its towers already collapsed, and the metallic corpse of the antenna looked like a monster when the headlights illuminated it.

Both men stepped outside, a night of October chiller than usual, clouds blocking the moonlight. Jayce could hear sirens in the distance, but his instinct told him they needed to hurry. The other radio antenna—smaller but more robust, was crooked at a suspicious angle, looming over the already weakened walls of the construction.

“Alright, here we are. Where your sixth sense tells you they are, Detective Talis?” Viktor didn’t sound convinced.

He buried the little mice. Why did your voice sound so close? As if you were whispering in his ear.

“In the basement.”

His supervisor arched a brow, golden eyes twinkling slightly. "May I ask how you know the station has a basement, hmm?" Jayce shrugged. He wasn't going to tell the truth. "It sounds like an illegal exploration trip to me."

Perhaps, but not made for Jayce.

“Come on,” Jayce urged, grasping the gun over his thigh. He ignored his shivery voice as, with the other hand, he lit on a flashlight. Viktor sighed, cane clicking rhythmically as he followed him.

Inside there were only ruins, but over the creaked paved floor there were visible footprints, a dragging pattern over the dust and spiderwebs. Over the main hall, they ignored the stairs dipped in shadows, and instead went left, taking the stairs down the basement.

Jayce was careful not to let Viktor trip over anything, and Viktor was way too confused to notice the fleeting shadow sliding from the basement into the stairs landing, up to the speaker's cabin.

Wood creaked when you passed into your ghostly form next to them, Jayce shivering as Viktor looked around with a deep furrow.

"Is there an airflow near us?" he asked because it was highly improbable. Jayce swallowed, slowly shaking his head.

The basement was unnaturally filled with old furniture in one corner, mostly smashed and broken. Darkness deep and silence so thin, as if someone were holding their breath. The doors aligned to the right were all closed, but those footprints continued toward the last one.

“Hello?” Jayce said, and Viktor nudged him. But he knew the culprit wasn’t here, you told him so. “It’s the police, you’re safe now.”

Only their superficial breaths could be heard, until they began to walk towards each door, metallic knobs filled with ash, and strange patterns on the wood.

Then, the calm was broken with a sob.

Jayce and Viktor shared a look before they split, Viktor over the piled-up furniture, and Jayce towards the doors. Between broken wooden planks and metallic seats, Viktor’s flashlight found two pairs of terrorized eyes looking back at him.

He recognized the faces of those missing reports.

“You’re safe now, please come out,” he said, only half-ordered, voice low and as soft as he could say it, awe and curiosity both pouring over his tone.

Talis was right? After all those false alarms regarding the same case weeks ago, Viktor had to accept he grew a little skeptical of the Junior Detective, hiring him only because his social skills were slightly higher than his deduction capability. He needed a partner to run the interviews, anyway.

Until now, that was. His intuition was right, and they both solved the case and saved lives.

When Viktor walked toward the rubble, the younger woman—Gloria Conray, he remembered—looked at him with gray eyes filled with tears.

"Did the woman send you?"

Viktor furrowed. “Who?”

Gloria withdrew over the corner, in a complicated spot Viktor couldn't fit in. Jayce was already next to him, extending one hand toward the woman that was hugging her mother tightly.

“Yeah, she sent us.” Jayce was smiling, but his hazel eyes were hard to read. “Spooky lady, isn’t it?”

Viktor turned to him, but Jayce paid no attention, leaning inside the little cave the women were using as a refuge. Why were they hiding here, and not trying to escape? he thought.

The Conrays were shivering, scratches with dry blood staining both skin and clothes, a clearer path of tears like rivers over their dirty faces.

The way up was slower to keep up with their wobbly legs and panting breath. Both detectives almost didn’t hear the stomps some stories above. The Conrays stopped, eyes widened in terror, and Jayce advanced, taking out his gun.

“He’s here?” One whispered, body curled against the wall. “Please don’t let him imprison us again!” Viktor felt her tugging his coat, and he sent a silent look to Jayce. Go and check, I’ll take care of them.

Jayce nodded, quickly escalating the stairs into the main hall, running towards the right to climb over toward the higher stories. The police cars were just arriving, sirens off to avoid complications, but their lights flooded with a dizzying hue of blues and reds inside the gray building.

He sprinted outside, quickly telling them to search the left of the building and the basement, where his supervisor was with the victims. Jayce pointed to another two cops, signaling to follow him.

The stairs creaked with each step they gave, the building getting colder and darker. The first floor was deserted, all doors closed. One of the cops, barely a couple of years younger than Jayce, shivered when they began to climb again.

“Do you hear that?” he said hurriedly, shaky hands as he held his weapon.

Hear what? He wanted to respond, rather angrily, but the young man was right. It was a slight rattling sound, cut short when a concise, metallic clank interrupted it.

Jayce heard the scream of a woman, followed by a growl that wasn't human.

They stopped in the middle of the second-floor stairs, not recollecting such action. Jayce could hear his heart rushing blood over his ears, hands stiff and cold.

Time seemed to stop and at the same time, it ran so quickly that Jayce felt it sliding between his fingers.

Upside, on the third floor, it could be heard the song of metal unsheathing, followed by a wet scream, rain falling sloppily over the wooden floor.

Only it couldn’t be raining inside.

A fleeting shadow slid down the stairs, raising goosebumps over his covered skin. The cops whimpered, sensation foreign to them.

You can’t have both, Detective, the airflow whispered mockingly.

Jayce blinked, running upstairs. 

The speaker's cabin was lit by an old oil lamp, its flame flickering with each step he gave over the ominous ajar door. He once again encountered the same strange scribbling of geometric signs drawn with a strange ink that looked brown over his flashlight.

Inside, a metallic stench made him gag, wooden panels splattered with deep crimson, dragging marks of mud across the floor.

Jayce stood, frozen at the entrance of such nightmarish sight. Viktor’s voice broke his trance.

"Detective Talis! Why are those police frozen at the stairs?" There was anger in his voice. "What are you doing there just standing?" The inspector nudged him out of the way, taking the landscape with widened eyes. "What happened here?"

Jayce wanted to throw up. “I… I don’t know.” Only that he did, barely.

You happened to this place, but why or how? He didn’t have a clue.

But there was the culprit, wearing the same boots as the footprints. Lying in the middle of the scene, motionless and cold. Near his body was a metallic bowl, the origin of the clanking sound from earlier. Viktor entered the scene, squeezing between Jayce's body and the wooden frame. White chalk covered the entirety of the cabin with scribbles and cryptic forms, salt was surrounding the room, and burned black over the entrance door. The room smelled like burned incense, but there wasn't smoke or ashes in there, though the fingers of the culprit were black.

A paraphernalia of religious items was aligned around a mattress thrown into the dusty floor. Candles half-molten, but all blown. Kneeling, Viktor moved the single pillow over the mattress, finding a couple of crumpled pages filled with prayers and rituals to ward off evil spirits.

“Inspector Talis, look at this.” He was already reading them, but the other man wasn’t moving. “Jayce Talis! Focus.”

Viktor looked at him, the man was gazing at the end of the room, where the oil lamp didn’t seem able to light, shadows cramped in one corner.

“What is that?” His cane clicked against the floor, tap, tap, tap. A single piece of paper glued to the wall, surrounded by what looked like a circle filled with more cryptic letters, Viktor thought, at first sight, it was a pentagram, but he was wrong. In the center, there was a drawing.

The paper was crumpled and burned at the corners, filled with holes from the pair of knives stabbed into the wood and in the paper.

“Who is she?” Viktor asked, but Jayce didn’t respond. Carefully, putting his cane against his left elbow, Viktor took the portrait in his hands, but he couldn’t recognize the face. Sure, she looked a little bit like Gloria Conray, but she wasn’t her, that was clear. “Another victim?”

She wasn’t reported as missing, and the face got a strange sensation, the air hung around it heavily.

Squinting, Viktor looked at the harsh charcoal lines, eyes almost breaking the surface of the paper for the times the culprit remarked them in circular motions. They were so dark, without irises or sclera. The young woman’s lips were slightly curved in a smile, the place where the man stabbed the drawing more times, leaving the unsettling eyes untouched.

Looking at the corpse, Viktor folded the paper and put it inside his coat.

“Let’s call the Forensics Team,” he said to Jayce, who nodded, disappearing from the scene faster than Viktor could blink.

Sweeping the scene one was last time, Viktor peeked over the deceased’s body, seeing a strange bruise over his neck, too big for being a bite, too dark to be a bruise recently made.

This makes no sense, he repeated. The sharp screaming, who was it? Was the woman from the drawing? And if not, who was? And what about all the scribbles? Even for a religious fanatic, it was too much.

But while descending, he stooped, remembering what Gloria said to him minutes ago.

Did the woman send you? And most importantly, Jayce replied yes.

He will ask him, Viktor promised, exiting the building. The air was still and warm, the moon peeking shyly over some clouds. He went over to Jayce, the Constable Inspector, who was talking with the victims in a low voice, his mannerism strangely tied up.

The sound of the gravel over his shoes covered most of the chat, but he still could overhear Jayce asking them about "the woman."

“She came to us and told us you were coming,” Iride Conray, the mother, said. “Very creepy lady, indeed. If you ask us, that is.”

Gloria nodded. “Yes! She broke the lock of the door, too. With a sword, I think? She told us, ‘hide, little mice’. So we did.”

"Did you look at her?" Viktor interrupted, dipping his head to look at them inside one of the police cars. But both shook their heads.

“No. When we opened the door, she was gone.”

Gloria shivered, taking her mother's hand with apprehension. "But she disappeared so quickly! We opened the door and peeked outside just seconds later but… nobody was there." She curled into herself. "We got spooked and hid then. We didn't know what was scarier, if she or that crazy man."

Jayce furrowed. “Why did you say he was crazy? Did he say something to you?”

Gloria curled her lip at him as if kidnapping them and letting them die inside an abandoned basement wouldn't be enough. But Viktor knew why he was asking. It was a rather strange modus operandi, and the sole reason he accepted the case after the Federal Police couldn’t handle it.

“He was looking for someone, someone that looks like me.” Gloria’s grey eyes pierced both men in place. “He told me, ‘You better be that crazy bitch or else—’, before locking us in the basement.”

Viktor tilted his head. “Or else what?”

Gloria shrugged. “I don’t know, he never talked to us after that. Why don’t you go and ask him? I just want to forget this happened.”

Viktor and Jayce shared a look. That wouldn't be possible, the silence of his unfinished threat weighed them both as the blood dripped out of your clothes.

Not that they could know. At least, not yet.

*~*~*~*

It didn't sit well for Jayce to lie, so that same night he tried to tell his boss the truth. But Viktor was too busy talking with the Forensics Team and the Federal Police. His dry and short answers made him aware that his supervisor's social skills were running low, but when he went after him, the Conrays being already driven to a hospital, Viktor only told him:

“Go to rest, Detective Talis. Good job today.” Not mine, but hers.

“You’re going home, too?”

Viktor tilted his head slightly, curving his top lip in a disappointed grimace. “I’m afraid not. I’ll wait until the Forensics Team finishes.”

"I can wait with you if you want." And then I can show you the kind of cheater I am.

Viktor chuckled. “No, no. Someone will have to take over the paperwork in the morning.” He pointed at Jayce’s chest with the handle of his cane. Despite the cold, cloudy night like this, he was finally happy.

Jayce smiled, dipping his shoulders. “Maybe we can celebrate that this case is over tomorrow night?”

“Perhaps, if you’re done with your workload, that is.”

He nodded. “I will. Can you come over to my house?” Viktor’s gaze shot back to Jayce, and he felt himself blushing. “I mean, I have something to… tell you.”

His boss squinted his eyes slightly. “And I suppose you can’t tell me now?”

“I don’t think I can, yeah.” You wouldn’t believe me.

Viktor hummed, considering it. Looking intently at the man next to him, he nodded after some minutes.

“Alright. I’ll be there around 9 PM, does that suit you well?”

“Yes, thank you, Viktor.”

One police car drove Jayce to his house. The first thing he noticed was the light in his bedroom on, even when he was sure to let it off when he went out running to Viktor’s house.

Jayce thanked the cop, cold air hitting his open coat covered in spiderwebs and dust as his heels clicked in the empty road. His sight went back to his apartment, now with the bedroom light off.

Frowning, he made his way up to his home. The door was locked, as he left it. And everything seemed normal, his bedroom door closed.

He took a deep breath, the metal handle burning cold against his bare skin. With a swift movement, Jayce flung it open.

You were laying over his bed, playing with the threads of the pieces of his investigation board between your fingers.

“Wha—”

“It’s good if you want to have a cute date with your handsome boss in your house, but do not try to summon me to bond with him over some supernatural being.”

He felt his cheeks hot, your tone sounded almost offended.

“A private clause wasn’t part of the deal.” You glared at him between his pillows.

“You have the right to tell him about what you did, but it’s on him if he believes you or not. Get me out of this." You sit at the edge, mattress creaking over the sudden movement. Jayce blinked, goosebumps traveling his skin at the unnatural way you seem to shift between positions in a too-fluid manner as if you were made of shadows instead of flesh, blood, and bones like him.

Maybe you weren’t.

“I helped you and I didn’t even take your soul. You owe me this.”

“Then… then are you going to give me all the credit for all that you did?”

Your shoes clicked softly on the wooden floor as you went near him. “Listen, Jayce Talis. You paid a fair price for your deal. It’s your credit now. Did I make myself clear?”

“I didn’t even end up paying the price.” Jayce’s tone dropped, eyes heavy with guilt.

“Maybe not yet, but you will, eventually. Besides, let’s just say it’s a treat for being so selfless. When you’re in this job, those kinds of deals are rather scarce.” You shrugged, cold hand brushing his cheek. “You got lucky I got interested in you.”

Standing back, you looked at his hazel eyes, and nodded. “I’ll see you around, Jayce Talis.”

*~*~*~*

Of course, the dinner was doomed now that Jayce didn't have any good reason to make Viktor drive toward his house, so he canceled it. Instead, with your words still rotating inside his mind, he went towards Viktor’s private office inside the apartment they both fix up to make adequate quarters for their business as private detectives.

Jayce knocked, and after some seconds Viktor replied with a muffled: “Come in.”

It was around afternoon, when the sun began to be orange instead of yellow or white, shutters half-closed so it wouldn't blind Viktor to read into the pile of papers in front of him. His eyes squinted suspiciously when he saw Jayce entering.

“Do you need something, hmm?” He didn’t sound annoyed for having canceled the plans so hurriedly Jayce made last night, first thing after Viktor entered the office.

He was fidgeting with a loose thread over his vest. “I have to tell you something.”

Viktor wasn’t even looking at him. “Alright, tell me.”

"I… I… I didn't know the Jailor's Death whereabouts…" His voice was wavy and thin, Viktor had to lean over his desk to hear him. "I… I got help."

Viktor blinked. “Someone told you, then.” Jayce nodded. “Who was it? Is this person linked to your sudden proposal from yesterday? ”

“Yes?” It wasn’t supposed to sound like a question. “Yes, it is.”

“Then, who was it?”

“I… I can’t tell you that.”

Viktor frowned. “You know you’re sounding extremely suspicious, yes?”

“Viktor—”

“Tell me who they are, Jayce.” His hands patted the pile of documents related to the case. “They can be a valuable testimonial, filled in the blanks.”

“I… I promise her not to—”

"Her?" Viktor interrupted. "A woman? Is she by chance the woman from the drawing?" Jayce felt his stomach drop, and of course, his supervisor noted the new stiff posture of his back. "So she is."

Jayce looked at him, pleading silently for him to stop questioning.

“What’s her name, Jayce?”

“Viktor I can’t…”

“I’m just asking for her name.” Viktor tapped his chin. “Perhaps we could become acquaintances, hmm?”

“I don’t know,” Jayce confessed, embarrassed. You only met twice, and in both Jayce was too stunned and confused to want to ask for your name—would you even have a human name? “I don’t know her name.”

“Don’t lie to me, Jayce.”

“I’m not! I promise I don’t know her name, she never told me.”

Viktor was playing with a pen, rolling between his fingers as he carefully considered the new information. “Where do you meet her, then? No, wait. I think you can’t also tell me that, do you?”

Jayce groaned.

“Did she kill that man, Jayce?” he asked, tone low and eyes piercing him. “That’s why you’re protecting her?”

Jayce didn’t answer, but the silence said enough for him.

“Alright. Thanks for letting me know, Jayce. You may leave now.”

“Viktor, I’m sorry—”

“I’m sure you do. Please fill out the paperwork by the end of the day, yes? Now that we don’t have any event scheduled for tonight, we have plenty of time, don’t you think?”

*~*~*~*

The horrible and mysterious murder of the so-called Death's Jailor plagued the newspapers and the radio stations for months. Illegal explorations went to the old site days before its demolition, taking morbid photographs of the ruins of the splattered cabin, filled with nonsensical scribbles that still filled Jayce and Viktor's desks, under some recent cases, of course.

Though the culprit was influential, his strange demise didn’t bring his family to want to discover the questions surrounding his death. Because the reputation of his last name was damaged, his distant relatives didn’t want to dig under all his crimes, fearing it would be more than they could handle.

In a way, it was.

For Viktor, in more ways than the obvious one.

It wasn’t just the crime, but also the strange link you have with Jayce, or at least, the one you used to have.

Days after the conversation with him, Viktor asked as lightheartedly as possible if Jayce knew something about his mysterious friend, to which he responded with a confused "no". The next day, Jayce looked tired and restless, a sleepless night, he told Viktor.

He didn’t want to push further, so he didn’t ask again.

It wasn’t the only time Jayce couldn’t sleep properly.

The case of the Jailor's Death was closed with hurried conclusions of the Forensics Team, explanations that couldn't hold in court. The culprit committed suicide when he heard the police arriving, using one of the knives he had to stab the drawing glued to the wall as the weapon. An urban legend began to spread then, when reporters slid inside the crumbled walls of the collapsing building and took illegal photographs of the site.

People began to say he was trying to invoke a demon, but the ritual went wrong. Now, the infernal creature was roaming free around the city, waiting for the perfect moment to attack.

Viktor knew better, of course. No such thing as demons could exist—but the death, the murder of that man still haunted him. He was a murderer and a kidnapper, around his height, in his mid-thirties at the time, and with around the same build as Jayce. How could someone subdue him so easily? There weren't signs of a fight over his body, only a clean cutting line on his throat.

Perhaps a much more dangerous murderer was walking in the city just as the urban legends said, a human dressed with the flesh of a demon. Or a ghost.

You were nowhere to be found, and Viktor did try all his cards to at least see you walking down the street. All are fruitless, only dead ends could be found.

The woman in the drawing was young, so he asked everywhere in schools, hospitals, bars, and restaurants. Nobody had ever seen you.

If you were new to town, then it would be more complicated, but you never went to the supermarket or around the old city district to buy clothes or any articles, for that matter. Viktor began to enter the abandoned part of the main district, looking at someone sleeping between the ruins of the buildings that after the Jailor's Death demise would be still standing.

He didn’t believe in ghosts, and thus he didn’t find anything in any of the places—except the old hospital, because the gate was too high for him to climb.

Perhaps Jayce lied, perhaps he imagined it.

It didn’t make any sense.

What more are you hiding from me, Jayce?

It was a grim night to think about it, paperwork about a robbery already filled out and properly tucked inside a folder over his desk. Viktor reclined into his seat, looking at the night outside, rain pouring against the opaque glass, illuminated from time to time with bolt of lightning and a deafening thunder that sometimes made the windows’ sill shake.

Jayce was napping over his desk, falling asleep revising the folder over the Death’s Jailor case again. Both tasted glory with the case, the beginning of their ascending career, and now it would chase them with its unfinished seal, perhaps forever.

Silence was ruling over the place when Viktor walked over to the coffee maker, he didn't want to fall asleep just yet, the photograph of the already lost drawing engraved with fire over his closed eyelids every time he blinked.

Who was that woman? Nobody knew. But everyone loved to comment on the possibilities: a lover or the first victim, even the demon or the murderer could be some guesses. People wanted to discover her identity, and a reward was signed by the police to anybody who could bring information about her, only resulting in false alarms and catfishes.

And it wasn’t that the drawing was too abstract to pinpoint somebody, it was quite the contrary. Many leads meet with people resembling her, but then again, eerily so, they didn’t have her eyes—the piercing gaze of the charcoal. The same gaze that Viktor knew couldn’t be real, though their intensity should be so.

He hated those eyes as much as he found himself longing for them. The missing piece of the puzzle, the woman that haunted his dreams. The same face, but flaring with anger as you looked back at him from a transparent surface, like a window. Fists stomping so loudly Viktor was surprised the glass never broke.

Viktor had the original drawing after he asked very politely for it to the Police Lieutenant. But some weeks from now, around six years after the occurrence of the case, the drawing disappeared. It wasn’t in his office, nor in his house when he swore he put it away, even hung on the wall and protected with a wooden frame and a glass.

One day, the darkest night up to now, his window creaked open, and he got a sore throat the next morning because of the chilly air that made him curl inside the covers, next to Jayce. Viktor woke up at the crack of dawn, gray light flooding inside his room, but the first thing that caught his attention was the frame hung on his right wall, empty.

Turning, he saw Jayce sleeping. Moving him slightly, Viktor said: “Jayce, did you open the window last night?”

But his confused eyes blinking towards him was enough of an answer. Why would someone want to steal that drawing?

Anxiety entangled over his stomach since that day, feeling a connection between the action and something. Expectation.

On his way back to his office, the phone rang, startling Jayce, who ran towards it as a second nature. Viktor walked faster towards him, wanting to hear what happened. There weren’t many police units available tonight because they were safeguarding the city’s mayor's birthday party. Maybe that was the reason they got a call.

Jayce went pale over the phone.

"Jayce? Jayce, tell me what's going on. Jayce!" Viktor snatched the phone over his stiff grasp, hearing screaming on the other side.

He recognized the voice.

“Lieutenant? Lieutenant, what happened?”

The man was trying to say something, his voice filled with panic. “Help, help, she’s here— I can hear her. Please come quickly! She knows where I am…” It seemed he was cradling the phone against his clothes. “Call for backup, please someone help me… she came to take me away. Call for backup I told you! This is an order! She… oh God, oh my God, she’s here—”

Thuck. The phone fell, filled with static, and Viktor was screaming the Lieutenant's name, but nothing came from it. Until then, the static was filled with nonsensical pleads.

“Please let me go, I-I didn’t, I didn’t want to do it, please…” Then, nothing. Someone unplugged the line.

Viktor frowned. Nudging Jayce aside to snap him out of the frantic scream of his supervisor.

“Let’s go, Jayce!” Viktor called him, already grabbing Jayce’s walkie-talkie from his belt and calling from units to gather over the Lieutenant’s house.

Over twenty slow, torturing minutes, five police cars parked outside the Lieutenant's house, localized in one of the best zones in the city, a house so big anybody could mistake it for an apartment complex.

All the lights were on, and there, in the last story, a seated figure could be seen next to the window, a figure too still to be human. Or alive, for that matter.

Viktor took Jayce’s hand as he dragged him upstairs, after commanding the rest of the policemen to search the house. Jayce had to smash the entrance door open, and inside there was a stench of burned incense and other plants, smoke disturbing the sight.

“What’s all this…?” Viktor said between coughs, intuition heavy over his stomach. Something was very off, terribly bad.

The hall's floor was flooded with drawings, protective circles, and religious items scattered over the walls, and up the stairs. Smashed mirrors around them, the house quiet.

Viktor put one finger over his lip to indicate Jayce to be as silent as he could be as they climbed the stairs. All hallways were empty and clean, the same scribbles covering every centimeter of the house, except for the last one. Where a fine line cut over the wooden planks, ruining the motifs.

Smoke was thicker here, coming from the third door to the left. Both tried to open it, feeling the knob burning cold, mahogany wood imprinted with a black hand. It wouldn’t surrender.

“Step back, Vik,” Jayce said as he began to kick it, the sound echoing too loudly. After a couple of hits, the wood opened with a wounded creak.

The inside was too foggy to see anything properly, but they stepped inside, stopping when the seated figure made itself clear. It was the Lieutenant, his body kept straight with the phone line tangled around his back and over the chair.

Not even the smoke could disguise the inhuman pallor of his skin, between blue and gray, and his eyes forever frozen in horror.

There wasn't any trace of blood except from five little perforations over his jaw, localized as if something or someone were holding his face. Same scribbled floor and walls as in the cabin, similar prayers, but no new drawing. Only photographs of the one made for the Death's Jailor.

Jayce was kneeling next to the Lieutenant, searching for anything that could help them to solve this case. Anger and the certainty of another open case drove them over the fear creeping into their skin, covered in goosebumps.

Viktor went to inspect the bathroom, stopping when he smelled stagnant water just at opening the door, bathtub and sink filled with something that smelled like sour tea. The liquid was still warm, steam covering the unbroken mirror, a pentagram drawn in it.

The room got no windows, but a cold wind blew over his neck, making him jump and trip over some thrown rug. His hand stained the painted mirror and Viktor cursed.

He heard a sigh coming from in front of him, and his amber eyes reflected over the surface, empty of anything else.

One blink, blank. Another blink, another void.

Viktor blinked a third time, the steam already disappearing at the corners, the pentagram fading away. Next to him at the left, he saw a pair of black eyes.

Jumping, and quickly turning towards his left, he encountered a ghostly figure, completely dressed in white, black eyes flaring with fury. The room's temperature dropped, and his hands quickly went to grab his gun. And the eyes followed the motion, black claws materializing. The air was stolen from his lungs as the claws pushed him out of the bathroom, the grip similar to a rock's hit.

Viktor collapsed against a nightstand, splinters flying. Jayce ran to his side as the figure dressed in white slid out of the bathroom and towards the window. He pushed Jayce, screaming: "Go after her!"

“Vikt—” Jayce’s eyes shone with worry, and then, pure fear, darting between the figure and him. He knew Jayce wouldn’t catch you on time, nobody could. You moved very fast.

Dexterous fingers found his gun, and quickly pushed Jayce aside as Viktor aimed towards the figure, right leg wounded.

The shot made his body shake with the impact, and the characteristic powder smell filled the room. The figure collapsed next to the deceased Lieutenant with a muffled groan. Panting could be heard from you, and Jayce looked horrified at Viktor.

Horrified, why?

“What are you doing?” he retorted, pushing Jayce's chest aggressively as he was trying to help him up. “Stop her!”

Her, as if called—and you did were called. Turned your face towards them, and both stopped dead in their tracks. It was as if the charcoal made itself flesh and bone, the eeriness of something it shouldn’t be real. Only the eyes remained as dark as the drawing, just as piercing.

This can’t be real…

You chuckled, black blood spilling from your ankle, and you knew your teeth looked inhumanely sharp.

“You—” Viktor wanted to say, while Jayce looked at you with terror.

Did you miss me? You looked at Jayce, but instead of saying it, you recollected air as you opened your lips to scream.

Lights flickered in and out, the detectives covered their ears as the windows, glasses, and mirrors broke in unison.

The scream dissipated, the sound growing distant. Seconds later, the light stabilized, but you were already gone. Only leaving a river of black blood over the floor and death behind.

*~*~*~*

You were trapped underwater, in a crystal, cold cage. Dormant unless commanded otherwise.

You'd granted too many wishes, and stained your hands with blood so many times. You were tired, and not just so, but furious.

They tricked you, forcing you into becoming their loyal servant. Your hands were sore from banging over the glass surface of your cage.

And nobody could hear you, not the Detective with hazel eyes a selfless soul, much less the Other One, with sharp golden eyes and gentle heart underneath. No matter how many times they’d dreamt of you.

Ravishing private party, the fountain inside the Mayor's house was tinted with a special shade of navy blue that didn't reflect the vaulted roof decorated with gold, balloons, and thin, shiny fabric. It was a particularly chaotic night, with no moon and many candles burning like fireworks for the Mayor's birthday countdown, almost midnight.

Your powers wouldn't be this strong again in a year. So you called a random drunk guest that went to throw up behind some plant pot, fountain gurgling with whispered words of encouragement. A cold wind blew, and mourning voices lulled out the water. The woman tripped when she was about to sit over the marble fountain, rock scratching her hand, now stained with blood.

You held your breath, ambiance still when she dipped her hands in the fountain to clean her wound.

A slight, mortally thin crimson thread came out of her skin and you felt the bounding spell breaking. Not reinforced on time, that was on them, but this escape was thanks to this clueless woman.

The room temperature dropped and the guest ran away screaming when the fountain’s surface became murky, her reflection replaced by a pair of bottomless black eyes and a predatory smile adorned with pointy teeth.

Good thing nobody minded her, blaming the alcohol for poisoning her senses.

You slid away from the manor, up to town, to the first person on your list to hunt down. The only one that wasn’t invited to the private reunion, because just like you, he was also tricked.

You arrived, knowing the Lieutenant was aware of the eerily still night, expectation over the place as the silence screamed something was wrong. He should have had premonitory dreams for around a week, for him to prepare. He was peeking outside from his bedroom, the house filled with protective runes and trapping pentagrams, religious items that wouldn't be useful for him for he wasn't a believer. Not of a merciful God, anyway.

You stepped over the basement window that wasn’t covered with salt, a beginner’s mistake, but he was in a rush, and you were too worn out to burn out the salt from the entrance door. Making your way up to his bedroom, you could smell his fear mixed with the nauseous stench of burned incense.

The scythe felt strange and heavier in your hand, so many years of unuse taking its toll. Swinging, you cut the hallway's protection symbols as you stepped in, metal singing as it cut swiftly over the wood. You heard the man screaming over the phone.

You wrinkled your nose, annoyed. You didn’t want to deal with more people tonight.

Your hand over the door burned both your skin and the wood. But the sudden pain made you aware of your surroundings, making you remember that your days as a slave were over. The door opened, and you went towards his hunched figure down his bed.

He could see your usual outfit of spotless and unwrinkled white, dark heels that clicked warningly. The Lieutenant was screaming frantically over the phone as you dragged him out of his hideout, hand human, you being totally human, in fact. The only reason you would stay in this room in this form after all the energy used to escape your prison.

His green eyes widened, tears falling on his cheeks as he pleaded, and knelt in front of you.

“Please let me go, I-I didn’t, I didn’t want to do it, please…”

You looked at the black phone behind him, using your scythe to cut down the line before speaking.

“It’s nothing personal, Henry. The deal is over, and I came here to collect your part of the bargain.”

“Th-they trick-tricked m-me… please… please, I-I don’t want to die… I’m-I’m sorry…”

You knelt, eyes glued on him to your level. He could see the past, when he drew blood to make a deal to bind you to the fountain, and among his blood, many others.

“Look, Henry. I’m going to be generous tonight.” You dragged him towards the desk next to the window, putting him over the chair. There was a blank note there, open with a pen over it. “Where’s your list? I know you have one. We were both tricked and they’re going to pay, but the first name claimed in the bounding ritual was yours, I’m afraid.”

You put the pen over his shaky hand, closing his cold fingers around it, digits that were beginning to tint black from your touch. But he shook his head and instead pointed towards the closed door of the bathroom.

“I-I don’t want to d-die…”

"Not worry," you said, stroking his hair backward as he slouched down to scribble with an irregular, strong letter over the paper. "I'll be quick."

You couldn't say it wouldn't hurt, because you didn't know what it felt like to die. You didn't want to lie to him.

Your left hand became a claw, and Henry cried when your nails pierced his skin, drawing five equal little threads of red down his jaw and over his pajamas.

"Look into my eyes and tell me what you see," you muttered, his soul slowly slipping out of his ownership. Black eyes, normal people shouldn't see anything, but damned ones? They saw the future that awaited them over your Father's realm. “Was it worth?”

Henry wanted to scream, but his jaw hung open in silence when his life slipped out of his body. You had to tie him against the chair with the telephone line and put it near the window, only for shock value, you supposed. What did he see in your eyes? Who knows, you didn't want to. Your Father should be furious with them to keep you trapped for so long.

Inside the bathroom, the list was tucked between the mirror and the wall, and the bathtub and sink were filled with purification waters. The man always trying to use all the opportunities he had to escape. You committed the foolish, human mistake of wanting to see yourself over the surface, catching a capturing pentagram over the steamed surface.

Hissing, you felt trapped again. Time ran differently inside the mirror, just like on the other side of the fountain, so you waited for the pentagram to disappear, the water growing cold.

Only it didn't, a hand printed on the surface breaking the sigils. Next to you was a man with golden eyes, two moles on his sharp face, and a metallic cane.

You knew him.

You weren’t about to move, only stare, so he could run away and leave the free way for you to escape. But he didn’t, his right hand quickly grabbed the gun’s glue instead. Your hands twitched when you pushed him outside before he could grasp it completely, his body smashing one nightstand.

The other man, an old acquaintance, went quickly to his aid. It was your cue to go, but then that stupid, reckless man still drew his gun and shoot you.

Pain conquered as you suppressed a scream, jaw tightened so much that your teeth gnashed. Black blood spilled on your ankle, and the man was screaming, ordering Detective Jayce Talis to get you.

His hazel eyes met yours briefly, as your lips cracked open to scream out loud, pouring every ounce of frustration and pain and anger piled up inside your body. The lights went out, all the glass broke, and you slid out the window, becoming your ghostly figure before hitting the garden.

Down the street, in your human form, the list felt heavy on your hands. You remembered, and you were ready to make them remember, too.

[royal-tea-blogs]

Really cool JayVik idea incoming but just bare with me for a second.

There’s an old Chinese folktale about the goddess of the moon being banished to earth with her husband, loosing their immortality. They manage to find an elixir to give them their immortality back, but only enough for one of them. Not being able to bare leaving the other behind, they store the elixr away and make the best of their now mortal lives.

Near the end of the story, some asshole tries to break in and steal the elixir, and in the ultimate sacrifice to save her husband the goddess downs the elixir to ensure the villain couldn’t get it.

No let’s swap out the elixr for the Hexcore. I want a story where Viktor gets it be the knight in shinning armor for Jayce. I want the ANGST.

But I’ll probably never write it so here I am on tumblr word vomiting.

[mischievous-piltovan]

Bright and Glorious

Story type: CYOA (Choose Your Own Adventure) Pairing: Jayce x Reader (they/them) x Viktor Rating: SFW Synopsis: You receive a note under your apartment door. It's from Jayce: "I would like to speak to you privately tonight. See you at the party. - Jayce." A/N: See below the cut for the rest of the story. ----------

Prologue

"I would like to speak to you privately tonight. See you at the party. - Jayce."

Taking a sip of coffee from your mug, you re-read the note you found at your dormitory's doorstep. You mindlessly turned the paper around, even though you had already concluded there was no more information you could have missed - the slip of paper was far too small for that.

You sighed, it was very unusual for Jayce to be this secretive. The last two years of working alongside HexTech had proven that the Golden-boy of boyish charm was very open and honest, not missing a beat when it came to letting himself and his ideas known - a trait that, although a bit obnoxious at first, proved to be quite efficient once you learned how to navigate it. Much like a big dog that believed he was still a puppy, Jayce was boisterous and made his presence known - the reason why he chose this method of silent, even delicate, communication eluded you.

Choose Your Own Adventure Story Otome Game/Visual Novel Version Google Doc raw version

[billieinspace]

Poly JayVik x Reader Incorrect Quotes!

I can’t remember how I did the parts but we’ll just say this is Pt.5

We all know what you meant, Viktor~ 🫣

Have fun with your little dose of fanservice~

Captain Billie,

Over’n’out!

[linky-dinks]

Jayvik x Reader Momentary Comfort

Rating: T Mentions of sex, Hurt/Comfort

It's an innocent question.

"Can I...Can I sleep here tonight?" You ask with a voice worn from crying, "I don't wanna be alone." 

Jayce looks at you and wipes the sleep from his eyes, "Of course, yeah, yeah." He wraps an arm around your shoulders and pulls you inside the apartment. The lights inside are dimmed and you hear Viktor from another room say something before walking into the main room. 

"Oh! I thought you were out with Olivia tonight." He asks and unknowingly sets you off into another bout of tears. 

Jayce guides you to the couch and sits down with you, rubbing small circles on your back when you fall into his side. He mumbles soft soothing words and hands you a tissue. Viktor takes up sitting on your other side and pats your shoulder stiffly, not very good at comforting others. The larger man waits patiently until you collect yourself again to ask, "So what happened?"

You take a deep breath, and then another, and finally say, "I caught her fucking another guy."

Viktor gasps, absolutely scandalized. Jayce winces and hisses then hugs you tighter, "I am so sorry."

"A goddamn year, all for nothing." You sigh.

"Well...at least you caught her and didn't have to hear about it from someone else."

"VIKTOR!" Jayce scolds.

"No...no he's right. It hurts but he's right." You look over at Viktor who, despite his rather stoic tone, still looks absolutely devastated. 

Silence settles over the three of you. Jayce now petting your head and Viktor writing in his personal notebook while occasionally patting your arm. You sigh and try to let the pain in your chest subside for now until you can figure out what you're going to do from here on out. The quiet is calming and reminds you of when the three of you were younger, when you would all sneak out the night before you were to ship out, get drunk as hell, and see what trouble you could get into. You silently laugh to yourself, that was years ago, now your two friends were some of the most important people in all of Piltover, perhaps all of Valoran, and here you are a land-bound sailor who gave up their love of the sea for a girl.

Stupid. 

"Would you like some coffee?" Viktor asks as he squeezes your hand, "We're pulling an all nighter to get this presentation ready for the council and I'm going to put another pot on." 

"You don't have to. I changed my mind, I think I'm going to head out." You start to rise from the cushions but Jayce is faster and stops you. 

"And go where?" He leans over you intimidatingly.

You shrug.

Viktor tutts and looks at Jayce, "Nope, you aren't going anywhere. You're going to stay here where you can't get into trouble."

"Fine." You huff, "Then do you at least have something I can mix in my coffee?"

"I have some whisky somewhere." Jayce rises to his full height again.

"Perf--"

"But not for you." He cuts you off.

"Fucker."

He grins and musses your hair.

Viktor walks back in (when did he leave? Gods he can be quiet when he wants to) with three mugs and some pastries on a tray. He sets it down on the table and hands you your mug of black coffee.

"Here you go, black and bitter like the heathen you are." He says with no malice in his voice.

You chuckle and take a sip. Viktor settles back next to you and drinks his own overly sweet coffee. Jayce wanders off somewhere in the apartment to go get...something. Probably his own notes and books. You lean your head on Viktor's shoulder and sigh quietly. 

"Thinking about what to do now?" He supplies as he sorts a few pages. 

"Yeah. I mean, I basically gave up everything for her. Part of me wants to just jump on the first ship out and run away, but…"

"You know it wouldn't fix the pain." He glances at you.

"Precisely. Maybe I should take a few days, sort my brain out?" 

"Sounds like a good start." Jayce replies with a few files and blueprints. 

Viktor slides off the couch and spreads out some notecards. Jayce begins sorting other notes into folders and opens a large portfolio. You tuck your knees up to your chest and watch as the two talk amongst themselves and continue organizing their work. Their voices are the only sound in the room and you slowly begin nodding off, exhaustion finally settling in after having such a disastrous evening. 

You don't know how long you slept for when a hand gently rouses awake.

"Hey, we're heading off to sleep. Did you need anything?" Jayce asks. 

You rub the sleep from your eyes and look up at him. For a moment you're about to say how you need to get back home to Olivia, but then you remember how you saw her hours earlier on the couch with some man's head between her thighs. Heartbreak burns in your chest and you start to cry again.

"Can...I don't want to be alone. Would one of you mind staying out here? I can sleep on the floor." 

Jayce and Viktor look at eachother then nod. The larger man stalks off down the hall with a purpose and the other starts pulling the coffee table away from the sofa. 

"What are yo--"

"Could you move please?" Viktor instructs and you follow. He tosses the cushions off the couch and inside you see a metal frame. He grabs onto it and pulls, the frame stretches and unfolds into a simple bedframe, fitted with a thin mattress. 

"One of my late night experiments. It's not uncommon for those living in small spaces to sleep on a sofa or futon, so I thought I would make something better." 

Jayce returns with some blankets and pillows, grinning like an idiot.

"We get to try it out again! Think it'll hold all three of us?" He starts spreading out the sheets.

"It should, it held you, that mutt you found, and all of her pups." Viktor is already settling into bed. He props his bad leg up on a pillow and carefully massages it. You crawl in next to him and pull the blankets up around you. Jayce begins pulling his shirt over his head then stops and looks at you.

"Jayce, I've seen you in less when we've gone swimming." You huff out a laugh. He shrugs and tosses the shirt off to the side before joining in. The bed creaks in protest but does not collapse. 

The warmth from the men around you is comforting and makes you feel safe. You know your heart is going to ache for weeks on end but right now you focus on the moment, snuggled between your two best friends. Viktor wiggles further under the blankets once he's done tending to his leg and you hear him sigh slowly, like all of the day's stress is finally leaving. You look up at the ceiling, through the single skylight where stars twinkle above. They're dim against the light polluted sky and it makes you long for the sea, where the night sky is a mix of inky blues and gentle violets. Where stars twinkle like gems and the moon casts silver crests on the tides. You think of the chilly ocean air and how you would wrap yourself in layers to stay warm because you couldn't stop watching the waves. 

You'll go back. The trading company you work for would be glad to have you sailing again. 

A hand grazes your arm and you look over to see Jayce fast asleep, quietly snoring. The strong lines of his face are softer and he looks so...vulnerable. His normally styled hair falls onto his face and if you didn't know who he was to Piltover, you would never have guessed he was their golden boy. You smile and allow yourself to gently caress his cheek. 

"He's almost cute like that, eh?" Viktor whispers behind you, making you almost jump out of your skin, "Doesn't look like half the ass he is daily." 

"I forgot, you don't sleep." you look over your shoulder at Viktor who still is as awake as ever.

"I've found sleeping with others is more soothing actually." 

"Ah, is that why Jayce has the large bed?" You tease and Viktor swats your shoulder.

"No, he has it because he rolls around."

"Crushed you didn't he?"

"Only once."

You snicker and roll over to face Viktor.

"Must be nice." 

"He's warm, makes me feel...not alone." He looks away sheepishly.

"I mean he's over six feet tall and probably weighs a ton. Of course he would be great to sleep with." 

The conversation trails off and silence fills the air. You roll back onto your back and exhale. Viktor tosses and turns until he's comfortable as well. 

"You know what also puts people to sleep?" You whisper.

"What?"

"Stories. I've got plenty from sailing." You smile.

"I'd love to hear one."

"Once I was on a route to Bilgewater, exporting some smithing equipment in the dead of the dry season…" you slowly recall the tale of how the ship ended up being stuck in currentless waters since no storms had kicked up the tides. How some of the crew began praying to Janna for a simple breeze to get the sails going again, and all of the small bluebird carvings that appeared over the next few days. As you speak you hear Viktor yawn several times before his breathing slows and he drifts off to sleep. You keep speaking until you also can't keep your eyes open and sleep takes you as well.

It's a long, dreamless slumber. 

You awaken in the middle of a tangle of limbs. At some point you had ditched your pillow for Jayce's chest and had your arm slung over his torso, Viktor is pressed against your back, hand loosely holding one of Jayce's and a leg tucked between your own. Jayce has his free hand in your hair, fingers occasionally scratching your scalp. None of you move and instead enjoy the warmth. 

"When's your presentation?" You ask with a yawn.

"Not until the evening council meeting." Viktor answers and nuzzles his face into your neck making you blush.

"I could use an extra hour of sleep." Jayce mumbles as he turns over and pulls both you and Viktor closer then falls back asleep.

You won't argue with that and decide that you'll allow yourself this comfort so you can get through the rest of the uncertain decisions you'll need to make in the near future.

[doritwo]

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