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There were multiple reasons why Viktor faded into the background while Jayce dealt with people, especially as the popularity and usage of Hextech grew. The most obvious reason was that Jayce was incredibly handsome and likable - the perfect face for Hextech, and also good at getting people on his side. Viktor, who tended only to make friends under extreme circumstances, told himself that feeling left out was ridiculous when he would have just been uncomfortable at Jayce’s side anyway. Speaking in front of crowds? So easy to mess up, even if one ignored the fact that Viktor had an Undercity accent, marking him as less than all of these people. Going to parties? Jayce had dragged him to a few, and they always ended with Viktor finding himself a nice corner to sit in - or stand in, in some unfortunate cases, in which he was also reminded that his body was as unfit for this place as his accent was. The rich citizens of Piltover didn’t need braces, didn’t stand at a crooked angle as they leaned upon a crutch; the rich citizens of Piltover had those sorts of things fixed in childhood, if they had them at all. That was another reason that Viktor preferred to stay unnoticed - disdain was quick to come to people’s eyes when they were reminded that one of the people behind Hextech was a crippled Zaunite.
But perhaps that was being too harsh. On bad days, when the weather was cold and his leg was aching, or when he’d slept too long in the wrong spot and his back punished him for it all day, he thought those thoughts and got bitter. Most days, he admitted that people were always trying their best - unfortunately, their ‘best’ tended to veer towards pity, which Viktor would have just about said he hated more than outright disdain.
That was the heart of it, perhaps. One of the first things Viktor had realized when he’d entered the Academy - entered the opulence of Piltover - was that he hated pity. In the Undercity, he’d honestly rarely noticed it, if only because his condition was not all that uncommon, and many other (often worse) illnesses existed besides. So people didn’t really treat him any differently. The Undercity was also a tough place, so few could afford to go soft and coddling for a young man with a fickle body.
It wasn’t until Viktor was in Piltover that he realized he preferred it that way.
He knew that people meant well. They were trying to help make his life easier, after all - showing they cared. The problem was that it was stifling, claustrophobic, to have people suddenly focusing on “Here, let me help you with that!” or “I’ll get those doors for you!” or “Oh, I’m so sorry, I’ll clear the way for you so you don’t have to maneuver so much!” They did their best to never say the words leg or back , even as that became their entire focus from then on out. The way people flushed and looked away, as if his weaknesses were both mesmerizing and blasphemous all at once - and maybe contagious, a theory supported by the fact that Viktor would be instantly reduced to his infirmities the moment that one single person started fawning over them.
Thankfully, Viktor had had quite a bit of time to practice telling people gently and politely that he didn’t need help, when in reality he wanted to snap at them and tell them just where they could shove all of their pity - because he did not want it. Unfortunately, a Zaunite in Piltover - even one who’d helped create Hextech - didn’t have the political stability and clout to do the latter with impunity. He’d mostly accepted that, and only had rare moments when he really, really wanted to do something reckless like be rude.
With Jayce he could have been rude. The two of them had worked together for long enough that Viktor was fairly sure of his limits, and gods’ knew the two of them had argued enough over various theorems to prove that Jayce wasn’t going to just get offended and flounce off. It was nice, really. When it was just the two of them in the confines of the lab, Viktor didn’t really feel like he had to act so much like the nice, reformed Undercity mutt that so many people had labeled him as when he’d first entered the Academy. Sometimes he just sat and had to smother a giggle of delighted surprise when he thought about this, marveling at how lucky he’d been to end up where he was now - not as the co-creator of Hextech, but simply working in a lab with someone who didn’t mind his babbling about numbers and theories and who didn’t actually seem to recognize how Undercity vs Piltover politics worked.
That was the real reason that Viktor never really felt too bad about Jayce getting the lion’s share of the attention regarding HexTech. The real reward for Viktor was the time in the lab itself; not the accolades outside of it.
But that little gnawing issue of pity still existed, an admitted ‘chip’ on Viktor’s shoulder, as he heard people describe it. He’d never sat down and actually explained his feelings to anyone, mostly because he didn’t like to sit down and talk about his infirmities at all - and people rarely liked to have it explained to them that their tender attempts to help him just made him feel like they were putting his weaknesses on a pedestal and leaving the rest of him in the dust. People got offended by that thought. And offended rich people tended to be petty and cruel. Viktor saw it wise to avoid all of that, and therefore hadn’t explained to Jayce just how very much he hated being helped.
Even when he was ignored, fading into the background behind Jayce’s brightness, Viktor was still regarded (however detachedly) as a genius, and given a more than acceptable level of respect. But when people pitied and helped him, then suddenly all he was was a cripple. So he told himself that when Jayce eventually found the… chip on Viktor’s shoulder… he’d try to be polite about it and not get mad. And maybe he’d even be an adult about it and explain why he wanted to be Jayce’s partner, his friend, and his coworker, not a project that needed to be fixed or treated with soft gloves and safety goggles.
That was not actually how things went at all.
~^~
It had been a long day. His leg and his back had cooperated well at first, but the long hours tended to take their toll, and while Viktor would have normally felt at ease enough to put his leg up around Jayce (that sign of weakness had been ignored by the other man often enough that Viktor felt safe doing it), Heimerdinger had made an unannounced visit to the lab, changing up the usual dynamic. As much as Viktor enjoyed Heimerdinger’s vast knowledge and was grateful for the opportunity he’d offered him, by making Viktor his assistant, he knew that Heimerdinger would ask him if he was tired and try to send him home to rest if he saw his old assistant favoring his bad leg. So right when Viktor would have preferred to be sitting down and working through equations, he and Jayce both ended up standing and striding (in Viktor’s case limping) around the room, showing Heimerdinger their latest accomplishments. All in all, a productive, successful evening, but one that left Viktor feeling overextended and tired by the time it was just himself and Jayce in the room again.
And before he could prop his leg up, Jayce had a breakthrough, and suddenly both of them needed to be at the chalkboard again.
Internally bracing himself, Viktor focused on the excitement in Jayce’s voice and his own echoing surge of eagerness. This wouldn’t be the first day that he’d managed to forget his own discomfort in favor of enjoying science and discovery alongside Jayce. Jayce was already expostulating excitedly, and Viktor couldn’t help but smile.
Somehow Viktor kept up with him physically as they moved across the room, something that would have made him suspicious that Jayce was slowing down for him, except there was nothing that felt unnatural about Jayce’s pace. Then Viktor dropped the pencil he’d been idly carrying, and he just sighed and told himself to ignore it - he didn’t need it to work on the chalkboard anyway, and if he bent down to pick it up, his back would likely stage a coup. Determinedly moving forward and pretending that he’d never had a pencil to begin with, Viktor felt his stomach clench as he saw Jayce immediately bend down to snatch up the dropped item.
‘Ah, here it begins,’ he thought to himself resignedly, ‘Now there will be the concern in his eyes.’ Viktor’s mood had been buoyed by the prospect of chewing through a problem with Jayce, but now it seemed like he was about to run up against a new problem, as he anticipated Jayce thoughtfully returning his pencil to him like Viktor was incapable of keeping track of his own utensils. Which truly was the case in this moment, yes, but that didn’t make Viktor cringe any less.
As Viktor reminded himself that this was just a small thing, however - just a dropped pencil, something Jayce would pick up for anyone, crippled or not - and that he was only getting angry because he was in pain already, Jayce simply… didn’t do what he expected. Instead of handing the pencil back, instead of looking proud of being helpful and rueful because Viktor so obviously needed help, instead of smiling a pitying smile that Viktor never wanted to see on Jayce’s face, Jayce merely scooped the pencil up and kept walking and talking. It was like he hadn’t even noticed he’d done it. In fact, as Viktor came to a halt in bewilderment, Jayce finished his trek to the chalkboard, entirely engrossed in laying out the fresh ideas in his head. He didn’t even look back and ask why Viktor had fallen behind, so Viktor quickly got himself moving again, not wanting to invite the very focus that he’d somehow just avoided.
Jayce now had a piece of chalk in one hand and Viktor’s pencil still in the other, using the latter seemingly for emphasis as he kept gesturing while he talked. Viktor watched, confused but pleasantly amazed, as Jayce continued to show no indication that he’d gone about rectifying Viktor’s clumsiness.
After a few moments of this, Viktor reached out and snagged his pencil mid-Jayce-flail, although the only thing that actually got Jayce’s attention was when Viktor spoke up to pose a counterargument to one of his ideas. Even then, all Jayce did was listen in his usual way, frowning as Viktor threw a wrench into things. After that, their talk evolved naturally, with both of them putting their brains to full use and both supporting and challenging different ideas that popped up along the way. It was utterly normal, and all the while Viktor marveled at the inexplicable way that Jayce had helped him without actually seeming to realize it.
~^~
This soon became a thing - or else, maybe it had always been a thing, and Viktor hadn’t noticed because he hadn’t been looking for it. Jayce had seemed singularly immune to the usual coddling actions that Viktor despised so much, but now that Viktor knew what to look for, he saw that Jayce actually was helpful. And Viktor would have been annoyed by that, except… it was like Jayce never realized what he was doing.
He’d pick up things that Viktor had dropped, like the pencil, all without breaking his train of thought; he’d put things on Viktor’s desk that the Zaunite would otherwise have had to laboriously fetch, but it was always in the process of other tasks that Jayce already had to do, never going out of his way. Looking back, Viktor also realized that Jayce got the door for him quite often, but he’d never really noticed because it tended to happen only on bad days, when Viktor woke up with pain and was distracted by it - and Jayce always had a robust conversation going by the time they approached the door, so Viktor’s mind was so engaged that he apparently didn’t notice Jayce moving ahead to reach the door first and hold it open.
That last realization in particular made Viktor question whether or not Jayce was truly oblivious to what he was doing. Jayce definitely had the capacity to be thoughtlessly genius, and he was one of those naturally dynamic individuals who did things without thinking all the time - Viktor had seen it in the lab almost constantly, and even at parties when he was coaxed into attending (usually by Jayce). But were these instances of helpfulness in that same category? Viktor wasn’t entirely sure. If he cast back in his memory, he was able to see patterns that pointed towards purposefulness, especially in Jayce’s habit of starting up involved conversations right as he did something to make Viktor’s life easier. The frustrating part, though, was that these conversations felt so natural (and also happened so often between them, separate from these moments of assistance) that Viktor never realized until after the fact that one of them had covered up a moment of helpfulness.
There wasn’t enough data to come to a definite conclusion - or, at least, a conclusion definitive enough for him to confront Jayce with. So Viktor was just left where he was before: flustered that this kept happening, bewildered because usually these events were so uncomfortable and hateful to him, and tentatively grateful that at least Jayce didn’t want to put all the focus on Viktor’s infirmities. Whether Jayce was doing all of this unthinkingly or not, he was subtle and quick, and Viktor didn’t feel like he was under a microscope like some sort of failed experiment.
Maybe that last bit was why Viktor started hesitantly allowing Jayce to help him more.
It started as small things; just accepting what he already knew, really. Viktor’s increased awareness of Jayce’s little bursts of helpfulness could have allowed him to cut them off or avoid them, but instead he took a risk and decided to let the status quo continue. ‘If he begins to coddle me, then I will bring it up,’ he decided logically, and when nothing of the sort happened, Viktor found himself calming down. Oblivious or not, Jayce’s help was refreshingly benign, and seemed likely to stay that way.
When they were bending over a project and Viktor felt his back spasm, he reminded himself of this firmly and a bit desperately, and took the risk of placing his hand on Jayce’s shoulder and leaning into him a bit more heavily than normal. As he did so, he braced himself for the usual reactions: surprised and then worried and then sad eyes looking over at him, asking if he was okay or just assuming right off the bat that it was his back or his leg betraying him. Already holding his breath a bit until the spasm passed, Viktor tried to run through potential responses in his head, desperately wanting to find something polite and friendly and yet dismissive, because if Jayce asked if he was okay, it would be the height of cruelty to just snap at him. After all, Viktor had never gotten around to explaining how much he hated pity, had he? So Viktor would do what he did with everyone else, which would be to put a stop to the concern as firmly as possible without actually admitting how unhappy it all made him.
But Jayce never said anything. In fact, much like before with the pencil, he didn’t even stop talking besides a brief noise as he took on Viktor’s unexpected weight. Then the dark-haired young man was bracing his right arm (the side Viktor was leaning on) a bit more firmly on the tabletop, and gesturing to some of the details in the diagram with his left. Viktor nodded and hummed his agreement at first, the spasm still locking up his back and lungs as if in a vice, but Jayce didn’t turn and look at him like that was odd, and soon Viktor was able to respond verbally again. He kept his hand clenched tightly upon Jayce’s shoulder for a couple minutes more, though, as it took that long for his back to remember its duty again. Feeling stable once more, Viktor sucked in and sighed out a soft breath of relief, and let go of Jayce’s shoulder as subtly as possible.
And maybe, just maybe, quick hazel eyes flashed over to him, but they only looked him over for a second before the science talk continued. No mention of Viktor’s weakness was made.
~^~
Time passed and Viktor got more used to accepting help from Jayce. It felt strange at first, and made him anxious and tense, but Jayce remained his usual, outgoing self, never slowing down to coddle Viktor. The relief of realizing that Jayce would still consider him an equal partner even after catching sight of Viktor adjusting his back brace one day was incalculable. Viktor could tolerate (and had tolerated for years) the higher-ups of Pultover’s citizenry re-categorizing him as lesser the moment they saw him leaning on his cane, or saw the braces that he needed in his daily life to function… but he couldn’t have tolerated that same thing from Jayce, not after realizing how wonderful and freeing it was to work alongside someone with such a quick and impressive mind. Viktor had saved Jayce’s life that day he’d called him back from the ledge, he knew, but sometimes Viktor wondered if Jayce likewise knew what vitality he’d given to Viktor’s life in return.
Viktor had recently experimented a bit with his brace. While they worked daily with groundbreaking new Hextech inventions, Viktor often felt stymied by what felt like archaic implements for supporting his own body. Sometimes when Jayce gave in and went home to sleep, Viktor would stay longer just to see if they could perhaps utilize anything that they’d learned or created to make his braces a bit more tolerable - although he kept those projects on the back-burner, his old fears lingering as he thought about the attention paid to the weaknesses of his body. It was as if his own attention to his weaknesses would further invite outside interest, and as illogical as that thought was (and detrimental to his health at times), it somedays made him loath to think about himself. Besides, Hextech had bigger things to worry about than the metal and gears wrapped around one skinny body.
So when Jayce came in that morning, he had no way of knowing that Viktor had been up all night trying to adjust both of his braces - a bad idea from the start, as he should have known from past experience that tinkering with just one brace was his limit. Working on the contraptions required taking them off, which not only made him feel vulnerable and naked but also forced him to move without them for the interim. This had gone as well as could be expected at the start of the night, tweaking a few things on his leg-brace (he hadn’t fallen, at least), so Viktor had optimistically decided to keep up the momentum and switch over to looking at his back brace. Not quite realizing how tired he was and ignoring the warning signals his body was sending, letting him know that he was overtaxing himself, Viktor ended up instead struggling to just get the damned thing back on before he either fell asleep or cried.
Fortunately, neither crying nor passing out happened by the time Jayce walked in, but Viktor was still in the process of getting his shirt back on over his brace. Already swearing in his mother tongue (something he generally kept to a minimum when he was around the Piltover citizenry), Viktor was too tired and frazzled to even register the sound of the door opening for a second. He looked over just in time for him and Jayce to share an awkward, startled stare, both of them freezing in place in a way that would have been comical to any outside observer.
Usually, now was the point where Viktor would say something light and diverting - polite and maybe funny, if he could manage it. He’d just been up working all night, though, and his head felt like it was stuffed with wool, so precisely zero words came to him. All he could do was sit with the hem of his half-raised shirt still in his hands, body aching in half a dozen distracting places, and watch as Jayce’s eyes did a quick and probably involuntary once-over of the situation.
But all Jayce said was, “When you’re done there, do you want to start where we left off last night?”
Viktor blinked. He tugged his shirt down a bit lower, half-noticing when the material caught on one of the metal bands for the dozenth time. “I actually managed to work out the problem,” he admitted, a bit more stiltedly and vaguely than usual as his brain tried to catch up with the topic. He’d been prepared for Jayce to ask what the hell he was doing, and then bombard him with questions about his body and how little it worked. Instead, Jayce was asking him about the answer that Viktor had accidentally stumbled across while trying to balance out comfort and stability in his leg brace.
As always, Jayce’s eyes lit up at the mention of their work, and some of the anxiety in Viktor’s mind quieted. Jayce was looking at his eyes, and talking like this was still just Viktor - his partner, his colleague, the person he had blatantly said was the only one around able to keep up with him when he started talking formulas and hydraulics and Hextech. “That’s awesome! So you got it stabilized?”
“At a cost,” Viktor admitted guiltily, grimacing. He managed to get his shirt the rest of the way down, however, and reached for his cane so he could stand and tuck it in. “I am afraid we will now have new impossibilities to balance.” He hissed painfully as he dragged himself into a standing position, an involuntary response, and once again braced himself for the usual, ‘Are you all right? Do you need help? Why don’t you sit down again? ’ at which point Viktor would have to explain, ‘I am never all right, but this is my normal, so no, I do not need help. And I can’t sit down, because I stood up for a reason, and need to tuck my shirt in.’
“Hey, I’m always here for new problems - it keeps things interesting, if nothing else,” Jayce said, and while his eyes did follow Viktor’s movements, he once again beat Viktor’s expectations by not shifting the topic of conversation. He didn’t move away either, but Viktor decided that Jayce had earned his trust enough for a little bit of… almost hovering… to be okay. Besides, they were just talking about work. Jayce could stand wherever he wanted so long as he wasn’t in the way.
“You may not say that after you see the new problem,” Viktor had it in him to joke now, even as he got his clothing righted. “It is quite a-” He cast around in his vocabulary for the word he’d heard Heimerdinger using. “-Doozy.”
Jayce’s grin was broad and challenging, a bit of fabricated hubris that looked good on him even as he stated, “You’re just saying that because I haven’t gotten a crack at it! Point me towards this doozy!”
Chuckling at Jayce’s theatrics and shaking his head, Viktor nonetheless pointed towards a pile of papers on a nearby desk. He’d tossed them there to get them out of the way once he’d decided to go back to working on his braces. Chest puffed out in a way that was probably for show but also drew Viktor’s gaze in a way he tried not to admit, Jayce strode towards the papers - but on the way, came near enough to Viktor to snag his vest and bring it over to him. Viktor had just been asking himself how he planned to stretch over and grab the article of clothing from where he’d angrily tossed it earlier, and was honestly too thankful for words when Jayce dropped it on the table within Viktor’s easy reach.
And, as always, Jayce didn’t make the slightest fuss about it. Instead, seconds later he was working out loud, applauding Viktor’s discoveries as he read them and already thinking up potential solutions to the new troubles that had been unearthed. Viktor relaxed enough to sit on the edge of his own desk, putting on his vest unhurriedly and joining in the conversation. It felt like some hurdle had been overcome - not only in terms of their latest project, but in terms of Jayce seeing Viktor a little bit closer to his worst, and still treating him like he was capable of his best.
~^~
Sometimes they had to travel to exhibit their work, something that became more common but also much more simple after the implementation of hexgates. The problem was, with the discovery of travel by hexgates came the discovery that Viktor got very ‘air sick’ when using them.
“Come on, Viktor, they really do want to see both of us - we’re partners. And you explain the math better than I do,” Jayce coaxed, as if he hadn’t already gotten Viktor up out of the lab and onto the ship.
Already full of dread since six that morning when Jayce had gotten him, under duress, to give in and come, Viktor grumbled back, “That is a bold-faced lie, Jayce Talis. You have done many of these exhibitions on your own, and I have heard not one complaint that you explained the math poorly.”
“No one understands the math, though!”
“Exactly,” Viktor agreed, but nonetheless stepped onto the ship because he was already here and to turn around and stomp all the way home would be to cause a scene. Plus, deep down he felt warmed by just how much Jayce wanted him here. What Viktor said was true: Jayce didn’t need him. Jayce was the face of Hextech for a reason, and not only was he brilliant enough to explain their technology to people, but he was eminently likable and friendly, very handsome, and didn’t have an accent that would make people whisper behind their hands, ‘He’s from the Undercity, isn’t he? ’ And yet, Jayce had been whining at him since the invitation arrived, using everything from bribery to puppy-dog eyes to get Viktor to come with him.
In the end, what had gotten Viktor to bend hadn’t been any of those things. Well, maybe the puppy-dog eyes, a bit… But mostly it had been Jayce just looking at him and admitting, “I just want you there by my side, okay? You deserve to be in the sun, too.”
‘I am in the sun ,’ Viktor had thought to himself, ‘every time I’m with you .’ That thought had been too sappy and sentimental to ever be voiced, however, so Viktor had instead pretended to be exasperated with Jayce while also saying that he’d come. Just this once. They spent the rest of the day with Viktor arguing that he didn’t need notoriety - Jayce arguing that he had earned it, and that people should give him the adoration that he was more than due - and Viktor silently soaking in the praise.
Now he was on the ship, however, and really starting to wish that he’d not folded so easily to Jayce’s stubbornly kind words. He hated ’gate travel.
“Come on, I even got us a box all to ourselves,” Jayce tried to put a silver lining on the situation, trotting ahead of Viktor while the latter just rolled his eyes.
“That is wonderful, Jayce, but all it means is that I am going to have only you to vomit on.”
Insuppressible, Jayce smiled his crooked smile and winked, replying without missing a beat, “Good thing I packed an extra suit.”
Trying not to let his expression soften into a smile at his partner’s antics, Viktor settled for another roll of his eyes even as he limped over towards the nearest bench. While he truly did appreciate the fact that they were the only travelers on this airship (a small one, likely designed for ferrying very small loads), he knew that the jump itself would be no better. They’d worked for ages to reduce the feeling of vertigo, and seemed to have succeeded for ninety-nine percent of the populace - Viktor was just unlucky in that he seemed especially sensitive to the sudden spatial transition. He also swore he could feel the magico-mechanical transition like a harsh vibration right through his braces, a buzz that lingered in his back teeth for hours. His threat to puke on Jayce was not an idle one, and had come true at least once in their past travels.
The wind shifted. Not a big deal, considering how well tied down the airships were, but enough to make the floor shift beneath Viktor’s feet - something else he didn’t like about airship travel in general. Already as tense as a cat on a hot tin roof, he shifted his weight and braced himself, but one of the crew members (still moving about the ship as they got ready to set off) noticed. “I am all right,” he mumbled quietly, reminding his mouth to smile politely even as the crew member jumped over to grip his elbow and steady him. To his frustration and mortification, the crew member still insisted on walking him over to his seat, not letting go until Viktor had sat down, smiled, and told him "Thank you very much" three times, and "No, I don’t need anything else" twice. By the time he was left alone, his smile had already fallen away, and he just felt tired. He leaned his head back against the car’s window, willing his fingers to unclench from his crutch.
He heard Jayce sit down next to him. He didn’t question how he already knew the man by sound, his pace familiar. Instead of asking if he was okay, Jayce said, “I told the crew that we were all good, so they should leave us alone until we disembark.”
“Hm. That is good,” Viktor replied truthfully, letting his eyes stay closed a moment longer. If this were anyone but Jayce… But this was Jayce. And Jayce wouldn’t see him with his eyes closed and worry that he was dying, or assume that the world had become too much for him. When he opened his eyes again, he glanced over at Jayce and dared to add with a sly bit of humor, “Although the individual who helped me to my seat is likely to return with an entire host of medical professionals if I so much as sneeze.”
Jayce’s expression had been calm and a bit serious, but now split into a grin, a laugh startled out of him. “Yeah, I told him in particular that he should stick to steering,” he said, proving that he’d noticed, which… surprised Viktor. Well no, not quite surprised. It was no shock that Jayce had noticed - he could be easily distracted when in the middle of a discovery, but out of the lab, he was a fairly observant person. Of course he would have noticed someone walking his partner over to his seat. Less expected, however, was that he seemed rueful and annoyed by the exchange, as if he perhaps understood that Viktor hated it. That in and of itself was something of a wonder to Viktor, who simply sat and stared for a moment, mulling over the possibility of someone understanding without him needing to laboriously explain.
He was pulled back to the present by Jayce frowning at him. “Viktor? Did you hear what I just said?”
“Yes!” Viktor immediately replied, then made a face and admitted before the knee-jerk response could get him into trouble, “...No.”
Jayce just shook his head and rolled his eyes at him much as Viktor had done to him earlier - the playful flash in his hazel eyes said that the mimicry was purposeful. “I was saying that I was researching gate-sickness.”
Frowning, Viktor canted his head suspiciously. “Gate-sickness?”
The ship was getting underway, although thanks to Jayce’s orders, it felt like there was a bubble of quiet space around them. It was a lot like the two of them were back in the workshop instead of up in the air already, especially as Jayce started expostulating on this new thing he had dug his brain into: “That’s what I’m calling it anyway. I’m sure you aren’t the only person who has adverse effects to traveling via the hexgates, although there aren’t really a lot of stories out there - and honestly no real studies, which was frustrating.” Jayce was looking off into the distance as he talked, something that he often did when deep in his head, meaning that Viktor didn’t have to feel self-conscious about just watching him and smiling fondly. “I think we need to test some things out, just to find the best way for, you know, everyone to travel.”
“Such as what?” Viktor asked, partly to humor Jayce in what seemed like a very minor problem (even Jayce had just admitted that virtually no one but Viktor had any issues, or at least virtually no one was speaking up about them), and partly because he was always fascinated to hear what was going on in Jayce’s brain.
At that moment, the ship started the unmooring process, which had the floor rolling again. This time Viktor was more ready for it, but still frowned as he was forced to grab his cane with one hand to keep it from sliding and the window-edge with the other.
“Well, for starters, we need to try out some designs for hand-rails,” Jayce immediately opined, “and it would be nice for somewhere to hook a crutch into place.”
“I don’t think that many people coming to and from Piltover need a crutch as I do,” Viktor reminded with a faint, ironic curl of his lips.
Thankfully, instead of pushing and trying to convince Viktor that he was oh so important that changes should be made just for his comfort, Jayce adjusted and took another route, never losing momentum, “But a lot of people use canes - even decoratively, they still have to think about what to do with them when they’re sitting. And other small bits of luggage! They stow most luggage below-decks, but really, we should consider a flexible system of hooking things into place. It could be a safety thing. Not all rides are smooth.”
Viktor found his miserly little smile relaxing into a softer, more real one, his chest warming with the reminder that Jayce had a big heart - another thing that made Viktor like working so closely alongside him. “This is a significantly better supported argument,” he allowed, perhaps still in a slightly patronizing tone, but they’d worked together for long enough to know just how to tease one another.
Instead of giving Viktor a look in return for the tone, Jayce seemed suddenly a bit nervous, fidgeting a bit. The ship moved more, though, and while that had Viktor tensing again at the reminder of the discomfort to come, it seemed to galvanize Jayce into action. “We could experiment now!” he piped up suddenly.
Viktor looked at him, perplexed. “With handrails?”
“No, no,” Jayce waved that off. His mind had clearly made a leap somewhere, and now he was backtracking to show Viktor what path it had taken. “I mean - with your gate-sickness. With gate-sickness in general. I’m thinking - theorizing - that if you lie down it might be, you know, easier on you.” His expression looked hopeful and earnest. “You’ll be less likely to puke.”
While Viktor definitely appreciated less puking, he was having a hard time following this particular curvature of Jayce’s thoughts, and was shaking his head in bewilderment more than denial by the time Jayce finished his sentence. “I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”
“Let’s just try it,” Jayce pressed, adding a cajoling smile now that… admittedly tended to work on Viktor. It usually preceded the puppy-dog eyes. “We need to collect data anyway, since no one has exactly studied this before. So just lay down - here. On the bench.” When Viktor scrunched up his nose at him, eyes narrowing and the start of a refusal on his tongue, Jayce went on swiftly, “Come on, Viktor, the crew is all running the ship so no one is watching. And you can put your head on my lap, so it’s comfy.”
That last bit was somehow lost on Viktor as he tried to just catch up with the entirety of Jayce’s premise. By then, Jayce’s expression was at its most coaxing and pathetic, and Viktor melted with a swiftness that he was glad no one was around to see. “Fine - fine! But only because an untested premise needs data.”
“Exactly.” Jayce’s smile was instantaneous, as warm and pleased as a summer sun. “And it’s not like it’s the most dangerous experiment we’ve ever done. You’re just lying down. Worst case scenario, you puke on me, which has already happened once.”
“For the record, I am not hopeful that it will not happen again,” Viktor said a bit grimly, but nonetheless let his crutch go into Jayce’s beckoning hand and then shuffled awkwardly to begin the process of lying down. Jayce said nothing and offered no help as Viktor went through a much-practiced routine of gripping the main support of his brace where it was hidden beneath his trousers (when in the lab, he felt more free to just put it on outside his clothing where it was visible), assisting in getting his bad leg up onto the long bench. He did look behind him uncertainly then, brain belatedly derailing at the realization that he was going to end up with his head on Jayce’s lap. His mind and his libido had different thoughts about that, and his stomach flipped over as it was caught in the middle - not a good start when they were trying to find ways to reduce vertigo and nausea.
“No pressure,” Jayce said then, in a more gentle voice than before. When Viktor’s eyes danced up to his, he was met with warm but understanding hazel eyes and a familiar kind smile. “If you really don’t want to do this, I understand.”
Somehow, that was what got Viktor to lean back. Maybe it was a previously dormant stubborn streak, or maybe there was something reassuring about having an out if he wanted one, but either way he just took in a deep breath, thanked fate that the benches were already nicely cushioned, and eased himself down. Within a moment, he was feeling the warm firmness of Jayce’s thigh beneath his head, an inexplicably strange sensation that sent little shocks through his nerves that, for once, had nothing to do with his various chronic pains.
In fact, this position was… surprisingly comfy.
“Perfect. All ready for hexgate travel,” Jayce declared, and it was strange to look up at him like this - almost too intimate. Viktor felt like he didn’t know what expression to put on his face, an unexpected feeling of vulnerability crawling up his throat and making him want to roll right off the bench to escape. But then there was Jayce’s face, smiling down at him like this was all good and okay… and if he tried to escape he’d probably just end up in an ungainly, painful heap on the floor anyway. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly, trying to tell himself that this was for science and nothing to be alarmed about.
“You all good there, Viktor?” Jayce asked. It was one of the rare times where he asked if Viktor was okay, but since this had nothing to do with Viktor’s disabilities, he didn’t even register that this was an offer of helpfulness. In fact, Jayce was wearing his trademark crooked grin - the one that Viktor had seen girls go wild over - and the teasing edge felt natural enough for Viktor to respond with a wry smirk of his own.
“This is exceedingly odd, but I am good, ” he echoed back the wording with a small dose of sarcasm.
And then the ship started moving and he felt sparks of anxiety and alarm replace everything else, his usual reaction to hexgate travel. Even as Viktor grabbed at the edges of the bench, however, and tensed his entire body up, Jayce’s hand came down and landed on his chest to keep him from attempting to sit up. “Easy! If you get up, it’ll ruin the test,” Jayce reminded. Viktor was mostly focusing on his hand, however: firm and warm, it looked both natural and utterly out of place against his chest. It was resting low enough that Jayce had to be feeling some of the edges of Viktor’s back-brace, but instead of seeming weirded out by that or moving to avoid the strange, hard edges, Jayce shifted so that his hand was entirely atop the structure - which made Viktor feel at once more secure and more at risk, because no one ever touched his braces but him, even through his clothing. “Just relax. ’Gate travel only takes a few seconds, so we’ll know in no time whether this keeps you from puking.”
“If I fall off the seat entirely-”
“You won’t,” Jayce assured, and his hand slid over so that it was now cupping Viktor’s side. Jayce was strong, Viktor was reminded; this physical promise to hold him in place was not an idle one. “That would ruin the test results, after all,” he finished up with a knowing nod.
Viktor was beginning to wonder if Jayce was being entirely serious or teasing him in some way. Unfortunately, the ship was lining up, leaving no time to ponder those possibilities. Viktor pursed his lips in a grim expression and resigned himself to the inevitable rottenness he was about to feel - mitigated, perhaps, by the comforting warmth of Jayce’s thigh beneath his head and his strong, tanned hand upon his side. On impulse, as the blue-white rings of light flared into existence around the ship, the air starting to buzz with potential energy, Viktor snapped a hand up and grabbed Jayce’s wrist, and was aware of Jayce looking down at him, startled, just as the gate fully activated.
As always, Viktor snapped his eyes shut and grit his teeth; his stomach clenched in preparation for the swooping sensation. He was being moved across vast distances in the blink of an eye, his brain and body both knew. ‘Unnatural! ’ his body screamed, no matter how many times his brains ran the calculations to remind himself that this was possible in today’s world - thanks to him and Jayce and Hextech. Bodies were illogical things, however, Viktor’s most of all…
But this time, the feelings didn’t come.
Well, they did a bit. His stomach lurched, and he felt the pulse of energy that he always did. But instead of his whole stomach turning over while his head spun, all he could focus on was Jayce’s firm presence, and the way the tendons of his wrist moved beneath Viktor’s hand. He felt Jayce’s thigh flex beneath his head distractingly, too, a moment before he heard a concerned, “Viktor?” For once, he didn’t even care about the concern, and how often it led to people treating him like he was not only breakable - but already broken.
Forcing his eyes back open, Viktor realized that they were at their destination.
“Feel any urge to vomit all over me?” Jayce asked, sounding half serious, half joking. Viktor, still a bit dazed from how little trauma that trip had entailed, was brought back to the present moment when Jayce moved his hand - it slid from over Viktor’s middle, where the brace kept him from feeling too much, to Viktor’s chest, where he most certainly could feel the presence of Jayce’s hand through his vest and shirt. He looked up to see Jayce frowning at him, brows drawn together, the golden flecks in his green eyes very visible from this angle… and from this close.
Brain catching up with the rest of him, Viktor opened his mouth and made a garbled noise for a moment as he realized that he’d been asked a question and had no idea what it was. At the last second, he remembered something about vomiting, and managed to murmur uncertainly, “I have not puked yet?” He cringed internally at how his accent thickened up, his brain scrambling for words and just barely picking the right language.
Jayce’s mouth went from turned down tightly at the edges to quirking upward slightly, a change in expression that made his eyes glint and warm up. Viktor was unavoidably aware in that moment of just why everyone found his partner very appealing and charming. “Sounds like a positive result to me,” he declared, giving Viktor’s chest a pat that further rattled Viktor’s brain somehow. “We’ll have to repeat it on the jump back, just to see if it was a fluke,” he went on idly even as he moved his hands beneath Viktor’s shoulders to help him sit up.
“Repeat?” Viktor parroted back like a broken record. Only then did he notice that the buzz in his back teeth was absent - another symptom avoided. It was like Jayce’s stabilizing hand on his middle had magically absorbed the vibrations somehow. If there was a more scientific explanation, Viktor’s mind was in no condition to explain it now.
Jayce merely hummed and nodded, reminding “Come on, Viktor, that’s how good science works!” and then handing his partner back his crutch before the crew finished docking. He even reached out and set Viktor’s cravat to rights before standing and preparing to disembark, and Viktor let him because he was still trying to get over the phantom sensations of Jayce all over him - and the realization that this was going to happen again.
At the meeting that followed, Viktor was pretty sure he spoke - and even answered some questions, theoretically correctly - but he honestly didn’t remember. Everything was white noise and something akin to low-grade panic. But when it came time to go back on the ship, Viktor once again let himself be coaxed into lying down, and for the second time that day he had an existential crisis with his head in Jayce Talis’ lap and Jayce’s unfairly chiseled jaw hanging over him.
But he did not puke.
And instead of feeling like the jump had sent a tremor right through every piece of metal around his body, the only lasting effect was the external warmth from Jayce’s hand - soaked through Viktor’s clothing and into the bands of his back-brace. He was also stupid enough to admit, when asked by an excited Jayce if the experiment had worked, that his back had actually benefited from the horizontal position.
~^~
After that, Jayce was fixated on improving hexgate travel. “Jayce, if we keep doing this, I am going to lose my lunch eventually,” Viktor warned exasperatedly, although he feared that his tone softened too much by the end to really sound convincing. He was already halfway to the ship, leaning on his cane as they walked alongside one another.
“You haven’t so far,” Jayce pointed out, which was true. When Viktor further argued that this wasn’t worth their time - surely their other projects would benefit more people - Jayce had reminded him again that there was no way he was the only person who would benefit from this. And besides, they needed to take measurements to draw up better storage for canes and umbrellas and crutches like Viktor’s. Jayce could be a very persuasive person. Eventually, Viktor just got used to lying down on the bench, a process that was always a bit awkward as he maneuvered his bad leg, but which remained inexplicably nice on his back.
“Probably less pressure,” Viktor theorized at one point, while he was lying with his head on Jayce’s lap, “When I stand up for long periods of time, my back often aches. It’s just the nature of gravity.” It had become normal at some point to just keep talking as if he were upright, especially since Jayce was happy to theorize and discuss no matter what was going on.
“So it’s good for you to take the pressure off periodically and lie down?”
And Viktor, fully in the swing of the conversation and not really hyperfocusing for once on the fact that he was putting his disabilities in the spotlight, waved a hand vaguely and replied in the affirmative.
Jayce immediately lit up, all sorts of new ideas visibly dancing behind his eyes. “We should have something in the lab then! For lying down!” When Viktor tried to protest, balking at the idea of special accommodations, Jayce once again managed to avoid the more delicate topics - instead of focusing on how Viktor needed special help to function, and needed to be treated with care, Talis merely shrugged and said, “Honestly, a change in posture seems to be good for me, too. I feel like I go stir-crazy when I’m in one place, but whenever Heimerdinger is around he says I pace too much.”
“You do pace rather a lot,” Viktor admitted, sidetracked. He liked Jayce’s pacing most of the time, but harbored a secret dislike of it sometimes, because he could not easily follow. On bad days he could only watch as Jayce’s athletic figure moved smoothly and easily through the room, and Viktor felt guilty for his own pangs of jealousy.
“I actually think really clearly like this, so I could cut back on the pacing,” Jayce replied in a pondering tone, looking off into the distance. He had one hand on Viktor’s torso again, since they were going to jump through the hexgate soon; a habit he’d formed. Jayce’s other arm was stretched out across the back of the bench in a way that made his shoulders seem broader, and it was difficult for Viktor to keep his eyes (and mind) from wandering. In fact, his thoughts were wandering enough that he nearly missed Jayce saying, “We could do this in the lab if you want.”
Viktor dragged his eyes from the shape of Jayce’s jacket stretched over his extended arm and shoulder, instead staring at Jayce’s face with something probably between bewilderment and comical alarm. “Do what?” he asked intelligently.
To his credit, there was a bit of color on Jayce’s cheeks, and he looked all over the place instead of at Viktor as he cobbled together an answer, “This! Just… You know. You get to lie down and take a load off, and I get to sit and think instead of stalking around. We’ll still have to get up to write down things on the chalkboard, of course.”
“Of course,” Viktor agreed, at this point honestly curious to see what would come out of Jayce’s mouth next. It was enough to distract him from the hexgate starting to activate, the hum and pressure of the building magic almost ignorable when Viktor had Jayce’s blushing to focus on.
“But for when we’re just tossing around ideas,” Jayce went on determinedly, the arm not on Viktor’s chest waving randomly now as if that would churn Jayce’s words into a better order, “we can just do this! I’ll sit and you can put your head on my lap. It’s a win-win.”
Just as Viktor was about to ask what in the world Jayce got out of this, the ship jumped through the hexgate. The process continued to be much smoother and less hard on Viktor than when he was sitting up, but it was still distracting, and when they were at their destination Jayce instantly jumped topics to discussing new seating arrangements for passengers. Maybe ships should have individual cubicles in them, so people could lie down for travel but not feel scrutinized by other travelers?
~^~
A long couch soon appeared in the lab, and by this point Viktor was finally beginning to suspect something other than ‘science’ as Jayce’s motivator. He felt embarrassed to have not suspected this sooner, but in his defense, Jayce was very distracting. Jayce was also unlike anyone else he’d ever met, as the man did so much for him without putting any focus on anything that he was doing at all.
So when Jayce (far too innocently and with far too much nervous energy) suggested after a long day of work that they should retire to the couch for some brainstorming, Viktor went along with it. He then took his courage in both metaphorical hands and settled himself down on the couch as calmly as possible. Now that he was paying more attention to Jayce instead of his own nerves, he saw that the other man looked alertly anxious - Viktor had seen the look before when Jayce had gone before the council with their ideas for the first time. Notably, though, Jayce actually seemed more tense now, which was more amusing than Viktor had expected it to be. In fact, he had to resist the urge to giggle a bit hysterically even as he carefully laid himself down, head finding Jayce’s thigh.
Folding his hands primly over his stomach, Viktor looked up to see Jayce looking at him, and away, and back again like he didn’t know where he was supposed to put his eyes.
“So. The power problem,” Jayce said, a bit too brightly.
This time Viktor didn’t let himself get swept up in the energetic tone. He just looked at Jayce consideringly, finally saying, “You know, if you wanted me to put my head in your lap, you could have just asked.”
Jayce immediately stopped glancing around the room and jerked back to stare at Viktor as if he’d put ice down his shirt. It was actually a bit gratifying to watch the usually smooth Jayce sputter for a moment, clearly caught out and at a loss for words. Viktor found himself smiling, but he held back a laugh to be polite - after all, Jayce hadn’t laughed at him thus far, despite the various moments when it had been him struggling with forming complete sentences. Finally Jayce just wheezed out a thin, disbelieving, “Really?” and Viktor, still on the verge of hysterical laughter, sort of shrugged. He wasn’t really thinking about his answer all that much, to be honest, just marveling at the sheer ridiculousness of their situation.
Therefore he was utterly unprepared when Jayce’s face suddenly melted into an expression of happy relief and the larger man sort of folded down over him, engulfing him in a hug that was more cuddly than Viktor could properly measure from his limited experience with hugs. He was vaguely aware of Jayce breathing out, “Oh thank god” into the crook of his neck. The next words that were said, however, had Viktor’s shock fading away into something almost painfully warm in his chest, as understanding began to bloom between them: “You’re just so hard to get close to, and I didn’t want to fuck it up. I don’t think I’ve even seen you hug someone before.”
“I don’t really have much cause to do it very often,” Viktor admitted, feeling his cheeks heat up as he truly took in the way that Jayce’s arms were wrapping behind his shoulders, around his back. It was such a warm hold, though, that Viktor found himself smiling instead of panicking.
Especially when Jayce exclaimed, “But why?!” as if this were the biggest affront to humanity ever.
“Jayce, I don’t know if you’ve noticed, but not a lot of folks are all that eager to hug crippled Zaunians,” Viktor said wryly but without any particular malice. He added as a pertinent afterthought, “Also, I am bony.”
Jayce immediately pulled back enough for Viktor to see his very affronted expression, so clearly angry on Viktor’s behalf. “What?” he said with much the same righteous indignation that he’d shown so long ago when Viktor had first met him - and told him that he was to be removed alongside his research, being considered dangerous. The comparison did funny things to Viktor’s heart, somehow more so than the physical contact had.
Trying to find a place to brace his hands so that he wasn’t being held up solely by Jayce’s body… but also not wanting to put his hands anywhere untoward… Viktor replied a bit distractedly, “Have you really been so eager to hug me?” Damn but it was difficult to hold up a conversation while at the same time being so flustered. Viktor tried to watch where he was putting his hands, but still ended up splaying a palm over Jayce’s thigh when he reached back to brace himself.
“Well, yeah…” Jayce replied, looking pretty ruffled himself now. Defensively now, he went on, “You mean a lot to me - as my partner - and you deserve to know that.” Perhaps very belatedly realizing that this situation might be construed as embarrassing, he eased his arms off Viktor, but didn’t pull away very far. His blush was strong enough to show through the tan on his cheeks, so Viktor figured that his own flush had to be incandescently visible.
“You do compliment me often,” Viktor tried gently to mollify him, when he saw Jayce begin to look crestfallen at the reception his affection was receiving, “So I am very aware of your appreciation. And I return it.” As much as Viktor hated seeing the ‘sad puppy’ look on Jayce’s face, he also didn’t want to give Jayce the wrong impression… because the hug had not been bad. In fact, if he looked past the mortification and surprise, it had felt rather wonderful. Viktor hadn’t lied when he’d said very few people felt the desire to hug him, so he hadn’t had one in a very long while.
“Yeah, but that’s not the same,” Jayce huffed, looking to the ceiling as if for guidance. By now, Viktor was sitting more upright, but still holding himself up awkwardly with one arm pushing down on Jayce’s left thigh - not a comfortable position, and one that still kept him nearly in Jayce’s lap. This notedly did not seem to bother Jayce in the slightest, and Viktor began to rethink just what sort of personal boundaries Jayce had. Was the man always this… cuddly? He started looking back in his memories of other social interactions that Jayce had, paying particular attention to any that had included people that Jayce considered friends. Oblivious to the deep thoughts going on in his partner’s brain, Jayce went on in a frazzled, frustrated tone, “I say nice things to a lot of people, and I say them to you so much that it’s like… I mean, doesn’t it get old? It feels like I can’t say everything, and you avoid letting people praise you so often.”
“This is about how I avoid public appearances, isn’t it?” Viktor guessed.
Jayce immediately shook his head in denial, then stopped and admitted weakly, “Maybe? A little?” He stopped to lift a hand and rub awkwardly at the back of his head, looking away and somehow blushing even harder. “I also spend, like, at ten times a day reminding myself not to grab you when I get excited at something we’ve done.”
Viktor could do nothing but blink at this revelation, mouth opening a little in surprise. The hand not holding him up lifted to rub at his chin consideringly, although all he could say was, “I’m flattered,” because he wasn’t used to having someone so incredibly eager to touch him. To help him and coddle him? Yes. But the limp and the braces and the strangeness of his accent tended to keep him at arms-length, as if everything about him was a contagious disease no respectable Piltover citizen wanted to catch.
“Flattered… but annoyed, right?” Jayce suspected, visibly deflating with sadness.
Viktor looked up quickly. “No!” Beyond that one denial, however, he was less sure of his words as well as his feelings, so he looked down at his lap and paused as he thought. To his credit, Jayce let him, showing again that Jayce could be very pushy at times but also very observant. Viktor readjusted his right arm idly, ignoring the ache in his shoulder and back as the position slowly became untenable. The way they were physically so close mattered less right now than getting his thoughts and feelings worked out - so that he could speak accurately to whatever was between them. “I’m not annoyed,” he was able to say with certainty, glancing up when he heard Jayce sigh in relief. It was honestly assuring to know that Jayce - Piltover’s golden boy, handsome and fit and so comfortable in the world they lived in - was a bundle of nerves over this, too. It coaxed Viktor into revealing a small smile. “Surprised, but not annoyed.”
Jayce barely looked like he believed it, the growing smile on his face full of both hesitancy and excitement. “Really? So… hugging is okay?”
“I suppose,” Viktor shrugged with a wider smile, and then was immediately caught off-guard by another of Jayce’s all-enveloping hugs. Since he was sitting up a bit more, the hug felt more natural, but it was no less of a shock to Viktor’s brain as he took in the way that Jayce hugged with his whole body - the way his hands didn’t flinch away from the sharp definition of Viktor’s shoulder-blades (doubtlessly felt even through layers of clothing) or the edge of his back brace, so alien and strange as it supported human flesh and bone. Viktor had to remind himself to bend his arms around Jayce in return, even as he felt a riot of confused emotions in his chest.
Then Jayce let go and Viktor nearly fell backward off the bench without the support, causing a startled Jayce to make a noise of apologetic surprise and grab for him again. They probably both would have ended up on the floor were it not for all the time Jayce still spent in the forge, keeping his reflexes quick and his limbs strong. His shoes still skidded on the floor and Viktor ended up grabbing panicked fistfuls of Jayce’s vest and jacket, although after staring at each other wide-eyed for a moment - accepting that this had not ended in disaster - both cracked up laughing.
“Sorry, I forgot-” Jayce eventually got out past his chuckles.
“That I’m not quite as agile as you?” Viktor finished in good humor.
Jayce shook his head, though, dismissing that idea so easily that it caused an ache in Viktor’s chest - because while Jayce was admitting that he always recalled Viktor’s limits, the way he moved past it made clear that this wasn’t a fact that he dwelled on. That was how Viktor liked to think of himself, too. “No, I just forgot that we were sitting like this. Do you want help up, or…?”
For once, the offer of assistance didn’t grate on Viktor, but he still shook his head. When Jayce obligingly pulled his arms back - he wasn’t going to force his assistance if it wasn’t wanted - however, Viktor instead laboriously slid back down again. It took some effort, especially since the strange posture had twisted his back a bit, but Jayce just watched the whole while. Occasionally he made bewildered noises, and his hands were lifted like he didn’t know what to do with them, of course, which Viktor found more than slightly hilarious. “I’m good here,” Viktor declared mildly once he was lying down, hands clasped over his middle, with his head on Jayce’s right thigh again.
Jayce just stared at him for a long moment like a moth that had just flown into a window. “Okay,” he finally said in a strangled sort of tone, and Viktor had to resist the urge to laugh at the bewildered panic in Jayce’s eyes.
Taking pity on his partner and also taking a risk, Viktor reached up and clapped him on the shoulder. Not one of Jayce’s strong, firm claps, but one of Viktor’s: he patted gently, then left his hand in place to just give a slow, lingering, reassuring squeeze. “Thank you for working your way up to hugging me,” he said sincerely, “You did it in an incredibly indirect way, but it was appreciated.”
Jayce relaxed back against the couch but lifted his own hand to place it over Viktor’s, his calloused palm a warm and reassuring pressure against Viktor’s slender digits. “You’re worth it,” he said with a light shrug, as if that were the simplest of facts for him to say. Then he took a breath and went on in a more normal, businesslike fashion, “Which is why we’re going to talk more about fixing up those damn airships so that they aren’t so hard for you to use.”
For once, Viktor didn’t flinch away from being the focus of a project, instead smiling crookedly and chuffing out a small laugh. “You might have to let go of my hand for me to do this,” he pointed out gently, “If only because this stretch is a bit hard on my back.”
Once again Viktor was treated to the delightful sight of Jayce looking like a stunned banana, staring first at Viktor’s face before jerking his head to look over at their hands - still both pressed to Jayce’s right shoulder. Muttering apologies and again flushing starkly enough for it to be painfully obvious, Jayce stopped pinning Viktor’s hand in place. As an olive branch (and perhaps just a little test of how much Jayce really craved contact with his science partner), Viktor carefully caught Jayce’s hand and guided it down until it was resting over his middle. “So I don’t fall off,” he echoed back what Jayce had said once before, albeit on a moving airship.
“Yeah. Sure,” said Jayce a bit breathlessly.
But he didn’t move his hand; in fact, he flexed his fingers a bit as if reminding himself of the ribbed feeling of Viktor’s brace, then flexed out like the paw of a cat relaxing. And then the two of them were off again, talking about dimensions and calculations and possibilities as if this new shift in their dynamic were not so strange at all.