Archive of Our Own

A battlefield rife with tattered corpses and encased in smoke—this is how it starts.

The concrete, or what remained of it, was stained a bloody crimson. The warehouse that stood meters away just moments before was little more than a mass of flame and shrapnel. It left the surrounding air filthier than it should have been—than it normally was.

They were in Zaun, Entresol level. It seemed too easy to have gotten as far as they did. Jayce was a little surprised they made it past the Promenade border, if he was to be honest, but like any doubt about Piltover's success (not that he had many; they would ultimately win even with hiccups like these), he kept it to himself.

Where the issue lay, then, was that they weren't alone. They had been expected. Which, with how well things had gone up until then, was inevitable.

What had greeted them, however, was not only some of Zaun's own forces—hardly a force in the conventional sense, nothing like what Piltover had, in any case—for that wouldn't have led them to the mess they were in. No, at most, there would only have been a few deaths.

Rather, the Machine Herald had made an appearance alongside them and slaughtered half of Jayce's men.

His very presence, towering and intimidating as he was (more machine than man, Jayce had heard whispered from soldiers in passing more times than he could count), casted an ominous shadow over any illusion of the easy infiltration mission they had been promised.

Though, Jayce supposed, there was no longer a building to infiltrate, anyway. Anyone who tried would catch the loving embrace of wild inferno before they could even really get through the door.

And, truthfully, he only volunteered himself to accompany on this job because if there was any chance at all that the Machine Herald would be there, regardless of how minimal, Jayce needed to be there too. Perhaps the change of events being an issue was just a matter of perspective, even for Piltover.

Jayce didn't doubt the capabilities of Piltover's enforcers. He had heard stories, however, of the destruction those mechanical hands have wrought (had seen some of that destruction for himself, been at the end of Viktor's metaphorical gun before), and he was plenty familiar with how the Machine Herald—how Viktor—operated when he set himself to something.

Jayce considered himself lucky that not all of Piltover's men were charred to a crisp.

Still, if he hadn't been reeling from the adrenaline of having seen the very man he pledged to protect humanity from—his most formidable foe—he imagined he could have ensured at least a few more were spared. As it sat, he had instead been too busy sprinting closer to the carnage—to Viktor's waiting hands—to check his priorities.

"Jayce," the Machine Herald said, his modulated voice crackling straight through Jayce's skull. There was a faint droning whirr to it spread just underneath, and his name was spit with a thick sort of malice; Jayce hadn't heard it otherwise since their days of collaboration.

Back then, Viktor would say his name like he was handling glass—a careful caress of the syllables, sweetened with respect and coated in admiration.

It didn't matter, though; he preferred this. The way Viktor said it now held so much more passion than any time he had said it before.

Unadulturated rage. A feeling Jayce was familiar with. The Machine Herald was within reach.

A swing of the Mercury Hammer, a swift parry with polished metal.

"What?" Jayce said back, teeth grit. "no Defender? we getting friendly again, Viktor?"

A scoff, followed by a retaliating strike. "Don't kid yourself."

He blocked, pushed back against the spindly knuckles of the Hexclaw—let the sound of their clashing fuel the fury in his chest.

The thought of an encounter like this used to sadden him. Viktor was, ages prior, the closest thing he'd had to a friend—the only one who wasn't put off or phased by Jayce's attitude and could easily match his intellect in kind.

They worked well then; Jayce couldn't deny that. Despite the ethical issues Viktor fell victim to and his increasing lack of a moral compass, they shared the same desire for the betterment of mankind. Two jagged, disgarded puzzle pieces from differing boxes who just happened to fit when forcefully snapped together.

It still saddened him a little—blame his innate human faculties for the ability to care. Except those faculties drew the line of differences between them, and Jayce would rather have them tucked in his ribcage for safekeeping than lose himself so thoroughly, not like Viktor had.

The Hexclaw retracted just far enough to initiate another sweep. When Jayce blocked that, too, it was pulled further back and above, standing tall like a snake in the midst of periscoping.

It only took a moment for Jayce to catch on to the implication of the crescendoing buzz that proceeded.

He dove to the right before the incoming and searing laser ignited more than the cloth of his shoulder. It followed his every motion in an incandescent frenzy, every dodge and turn drawing him only narrowly out of reach.

Jayce tried to strategize each evading move to end with him closer again to Viktor. The Hexclaw could easily incinerate him regardless of the distance or lack thereof between them, but the force of his hammer is amplified in close combat. On top of that, he would rather not risk the further unnecessary death that could come with unleashing a blast from the mercury cannon, so the closer the better.

"Come on, Viktor, you can do better than that," he said, meeting the fist thrown his way with the hilt in his hands.

As rapidly as it had powered on, the Hexclaw's magic cut off with a static pulse, taking instead to strike at his side while Viktor's free hand went for his jaw. Jayce managed to pull back quick enough to avoid the second hit, but the sharpened fingers of the hexclaw pierced into his ribs all the same.

"Speak less, Defender. Words will not save you," the Machine Herald replied, ruthless in all that he could be.

Before Jayce could respond—because he would, even stumbling back in pain, his flesh in shreds where the metal had dug in and ripped. He would not allow Viktor the last word—something nearby had gone off, and he was forced to the ground by the impact.

Immediately, his head ached. His hammer was still in his grasp, he thought, could feel it when he tensed his fingers, but the heat that crawled up his back was new, and so was the deafening ringing that made home in his ears.

It didn't register what happened until he was choking on smoke and his vision was clouded with blood. The warehouse, unmercifully lit ablaze but stagnant enough just seconds prior, had detonated. It was not a large explosion (nowhere near what it could have been, what he had been subjected to before), but when he had been so close to it, well, things added up.

He should have paid more attention to the raging fire, and to where he was: of course whatever was in that building was volatile. That sort of blatant disregard for the severity of a situation was what got innocent people killed.

The pounding in his head wouldn't stop.

Everything was fuzzy, doubled—he couldn't exactly make out what he was seeing, if he was seeing anything at all.

Something had been above him, he noticed, was moving away, motions as sluggish as his sight, had shielded the worst of it. Maybe. He couldn't tell. He stopped trying to figure it out; the pounding in his head was too incessant.

When he had finally come to, the ringing still there but further away, he was alone. Or, alone, in that the Machine Herald had vanished, and there were only a few intact enforcers picking themselves up.

He hated that more than anything—that Viktor, in his evident escape, hadn't even done Jayce the privilege of finishing the job. He hadn't thought Jayce was a big enough threat to put an end to him then and there, where it surely would have been easy. Whatever damage Viktor took from the explosion would have been nothing compared to Jayce's own—it would have been quick and clean, a scalpel through a beating heart.

Viktor left him.

Jayce would make him regret it.

It had been several weeks since the attempted infiltration mission (six weeks, two days, thirteen hours, forty-four minutes, twenty-six, seven, eight seconds. Not that Jayce was counting), several weeks, and he couldn't find anything. Viktor had truly vanished this time, slipping from his fingers like the sand of an hourglass, his time cut miserably short.

Jayce kept note of every back-alley place in Zaun he had been to since—what was there, the location, if it looked to have been recently occupied—and if there was any sign Viktor could be around. He found himself, silly as it was, doing the same to the bars he frequented in Piltover. Anywhere that wasn't his apartment, really, demanded every miniscule detail be checked and filed for further investigation.

He always left empty-handed—not even a single, solitary string to map his mental evidence board with.

It was the worst game of cat and mouse in history, Jayce was sure, but he would keep at it. Years he had dedicated to Viktor, in one way or another; he wasn't going to let the bastard get away from him so easily.

Every day, he took to investigating somewhere new. He had started at places he knew Viktor had been before—had reason to suspect he might have been a repeat visitor of, if the hushed murmurs of patron folk were anything to go by—and then made his way around less familiar territory. When that didn't give him suitable (or any) results, he circled back in the hopes he had missed something along the way.

He never did. Rinse and repeat.

As the cycle would have it, Jayce found himself stood outside Viktor's laboratory again. He could swear he'd been in Viktor's lab more than his own, given how often he had ended up there recently. It, at least, he figured, would have to turn up with something eventually; his mouse wouldn't leave it unattended forever.

The laboratory had been in the exact same condition Jayce last left it in: a semi-organized disaster. The papers, spread across every feasible surface and then some, lay untouched; the apparatuses and the counters that held them were covered in a thin blanket of dust in their disuse. Not a single thing was out of place; the room frustratingly still.

Except when Jayce took a closer look, centered on the desk furthest from the door, he came upon a new piece of paper. Unlike those around it, this one was folded into a neat little square and was evidently only just placed. Maybe a few days old, but Jayce didn't care. It was something.

His fingers nearly trembled picking it up.

Piltover's dearest Defender, it read.

It is rather pathetic, really, that you insist on coming back here. It isn't because you are afraid of my work's progress; you haven't taken anything or tried to halt it, so what is the point?

Are you upset about our previous encounter? Perhaps you are thinking about a time that no longer exists; I thought we were past these sorts of sentimentalities.

Whatever the case, you are paving the path to your own demise. When we meet again, and trust that we will, I will seal your coffin for good.

Do not get in my way.

M.H.

When he eventually found Viktor (for it was inevitable; fate would not see them separated for long, it seemed), they were on Piltover's side of the border.

Notice of a shipment—a myriad of things Jayce hadn't found particularly noteworthy—headed for Zaun got out. Not a completely uncommon thing, and Jayce wouldn't have batted an eye at it if whoever sent it out had not tried their very best to keep its existence and travel quiet. Their very best, of course, not being good enough to get away unnoticed; Piltover's enforcers were pretty good at sniffing out suspicious activity.

Moreover, Jayce was getting restless. An excess amount of time had passed since he last did anything of real worth—between haunting the rooms of empty buildings and rereading the same bloodstained reports of old for leads that didn't exist, he wasn't defending Piltover like he should have been, from threats that weren't hiding.

So he went, with less hope of anything worthwhile happening and more of a need to do something.

He thought that maybe he knew somewhere deep down, somewhere attentive, obsessive, and hungry, that what was being sent out sounded awfully similar to the sorts of things Viktor filled his lab with, and like a dog tracking its owner, he went running after crumbs he wasn't fully aware of.

Finally, he had him.

Jayce couldn't suppress the morbid delight that lit in his chest when the Machine Herald confronted him with the Hexclaw once more. Like a match to a flame, his limbs were soon plagued with an uncontrolled buzz—something sharp and wild, something that left him dizzy and yet also feeling more alive than he had in a long while.

"Viktor," he said with as much hateful adoration he could seep into his voice. Let it sit there, each syllable; let it steep in his misery because he knew Viktor preferred it bitter.

"Jayce." He got back. Just like last time, Viktor dropped the title he insisted on calling Jayce when it wasn't just the two of them; when he wasn't certain Jayce would be the only one there to remember it when they parted. To pick apart the difference with a careful hand.

"You hid from me." Came next, and for it, he got a laugh.

"I did. Tired of seeing your face." Jayce could hear the smile. He didn't even have to strain for it.

"I bet. I think we're a little too destructive for these meetings anyway, Viktor." He grinned back. He was toeing the line of something new but familiar then. Let the hunger he knew was there surface just a bit.

Jayce was sure Viktor's eyes met his gaze with the following tilt of his head, even if he couldn't see them. "What are you saying?"

"That maybe we should go somewhere less populated—a little quieter, maybe," he said. The Hexclaw faultered, almost imperceptibly. But Jayce knew Viktor; this was hesitation.

"You do not think you can adequately protect your people? Or are you really just afraid for your own life this time?" The question quickly became a taunt. "How selfish you have grown."

"Maybe I'm just tired of chasing you, Viktor."

"Then stop chasing me. You're dreadful at it, anyway."

"Or," he began, "you could come with me instead."

Viktor seemed to stare that much harder at that. Jayce hadn't been totally sure what he had been offering himself—just that he couldn't let Viktor get away from him again, couldn't stomach another string of sleepless nights thinking about him.

Thinking about him. about Viktor. What the hell was wrong with him?

"What are you saying, jayce?" The exasperation in the Machine Herald's modulator had become increasingly evident. He seemed just about as out of his depth as Jayce felt. "I have a mission, a perogative to the less fortunate, and I will not be deterred any longer. Stand down, Defender; this is your final warning."

Jayce almost believed him, too, having watched the Hexclaw spin with that almost human-like irritation before, knowing what it signified.

Jayce almost believed him, but Viktor had had ample time to kill him while he talked, to at least initiate a strike. Viktor made it out of their last encounter unscathed and could have very well put Jayce down before he left.

Viktor, for all his threats and simulated annoyance, never hit Jayce with anything he couldn't recover from, and he never ran after Jayce with the intent of fulfilling his promises.

Maybe it was a stretch, but Jayce thought Viktor might not have been passed those sorts of sentimentalities either.

Hypocrit.

"If you wanted me dead, you would have done it already. But you don't really want that, either, do you?" It was a weak line he cast by bringing attention to it, but the excitement of having the longest conversation he'd had with Viktor since his Machine Herald gig started made him feel a little reckless. Impulsive, even.

A frayed line and an empty hook.

Viktor bit regardless.

"I was not lying when I said I would seal your coffin," he warned.

"I know." Jayce smiled, a soft, sad thing, fuelled with all the burried emotion that had resurfaced.