Fascinated with the delusions I fabricate

League Jayvik Fic

Kicking machines, fundamentally, has never done anyone any good. I mean sure you could kick a machine and it’d work again, but that was only sometimes, and Jayce needed this to work perfectly, All the time, because quite honestly If it didn’t work perfectly all the time, he was going to put his hammer through the ground, or a window, he hadn’t taken the time to calculate which would statistically be More Satisfying, in the event of a small fit of rage

(This was, of course, a lie, it was the window. Always Always the window. He had done the calculations)

This is how he found himself precariously balancing one of the small hextech chips he’d thrown together in a 4 day no sleep bender, between his lips, as he applied thermal paste to the small connector unit, which he had for some ungodly reason made an impossibly small gap for, something about compatibility, whatever Past Jayce was thinking, it was ridiculous, and Current Jayce wasn't having it. Why the fuck would he have made the one part he needed to access often and frequently, have a gap smaller than his pinkie finger.

It took him approximately 5 tries to apply the thermal paste, and then an additional 8 tries to place the chip onto the thermal paste, so that he could turn the stupid machine on again, and see if it blew right back up in his face.

For the wellness of everyone in Runeterra, the abhorred machine ran just as intended.

If Jayce got so excited he threw his book into the wall, accidentally knocking the fire alarm system in place, and sending cascades of cold water down onto his head, no one else was in the lab to bear witness to it. It didn’t happen.

—

Of course, he wasn’t always tinkering away in his lab, occasionally he would be trying (and failing) to seem even somewhat vaguely interested in what the higher class citizens of piltover deemed worthy of their time. It’s not prim nor proper to get blackout smashed at one of these parties, so Jayce had to pull his expression into what he called his “Condescending Cunt” face just to pass off as if he were one of them and also belonged here, in this too big fancy ballroom with small tiny foods he hated the tastes and textures of.

(Another lie, he keeps lying today, he fucking loves those little cocktail sausages)

He should have been paying attention more, because the woman he’s looking in the vague direction of at the moment seems to be waiting for his reply on something she said, and Jayce can’t even remember her bloody name, so why would he remember whatever random thing she had come up with to discuss with him (a thing he’s come to accept over the 10 plus years he’s been attending these things)

“Hm? What oh yes, right, hmm” is the best that Piltover's Sparkly Golden Man of Progress can come up with, but what does he care, really I mean he’s a scientist not a public speaker no matter what the council might think.

She doesn’t look pleased with this answer at all, and storms off before he can act like a respectable person and just ask her what she said. Oh well, it mustn't have been that important.

It’s another 3 hours before he finds it in him to just up and leave, these might’ve been bareable when he was 27, but he’s 43 now, his back hurts, and the lack of anyone interesting enough to talk to was enough to send him careening into the weak champagne they had stocked for the event.

Getting drunk at home was much more enjoyable
—

Being thrown into a concrete wall at Mach speeds isn’t fun. Well it is fun, but Jayce’s therapist told him that was bordering on “self harm” or whatever, so he had to remind himself that it wasn’t fun. Having a laser pointed at his face was not fun, and he didn’t enjoy it.

(Lie again. Really he had to stop, but his life had reached a breaking point about 4 years ago where he realized he had the most fun when he was getting the shit beat out of him by the metal shell of a man he used to care about, he hadn’t told his therapist about that one, he’s sure she’d have some choice words for him about that.)

After party fights were something that Jayce had somehow come to look forward to, it was like after party sex, but he didn’t have to think too hard about the fights like he did with sex. During sex he had to make sure the other person was having fun, that they enjoyed it, fighting Viktor meant he could turn off his brain and swing a massive weapon around without much care, and he didnt have to care if Viktor was enjoying this either, quite frankly he probably wasn’t having as much fun as Jayce was, but they were fighting what did it matter.

He should probably pick himself up off the ground, that would be a smart idea, and Jayce was a smart man. He doesn’t pick himself up off the floor, actually he thinks he’s lying there for a good 3 minutes before he can feel sharp metallic claws on his throat, his body being lifted like some discarded doll, and his back hitting the wall of whatever alleyway he and Viktor had met in this time. It takes him a few seconds to lift his eyes up off the ground where they were and oh isn't that a nice sight, at some point he must’ve swung his hammer hard enough to knock Viktor’s mask off.

Relatively speaking, it was the same face as it had always been. Well, no, Viktor’s eyes must have been replaced at some point, black sclera and Orange Iris’ staring back at him, and there was metal playing out his face where the hollows of his cheeks used to be, but the slight crooked angle of his nose was still the same, he still had a gap between his two front teeth, even if they were sharper now, and the moles on his face still stood out against the paleness of his skin.

Oh. Viktor was talking to him, or he might have been talking to him, his mouth was moving, why couldn’t he hear what Viktor was saying. It didn’t matter too much, because the edges of his vision had gotten all hazy, and his arms suddenly felt heavier than the stupid hammer he walked around with everywhere.

Falling into unconsciousness was like a blessed gift.