Vers' Multimuse Blog

"People can change, right?"

Roleplay Blog of Luis Serra from Resident Evil 4, mostly Remake based

That eased only when Jayce promised to come running, naked, mid-stream, mid-mhm, if Viktor called for him, he would come. Thank Janna that never happened.

In kind, Jayce tried to support Viktor's independence. The first sponge bath was an understandable necessity. Still too much in his system with a sedating effect, it wasn't ideal to encourage him into a wet and slippery situation. But after that, especially when Viktor scrunched his face unhappily? Fuck that. They would re-do the dressings.

There was a type of truce between them. It was a thin line.

On that third day, it shattered.

Jayce raised his hands up, open-palmed and surrendering. He looked wide eyed and surprised. "I had no idea!" he insisted. Truly! Honestly! He didn't know how these things worked. He thought that it would be all on paper.

Jayce’s own stir served to fire Viktor’s up. The Zaunite glared at the other and felt his anger rise like bile.

“I want to go home!”, he demanded like a petulant child, yelling it with a hoarse voice. He really wanted to go back home. To Zaun. Where he could simply dive under in the poor masses, where no one paid him any mind, where he could exist without being prodded and looked at. Where there was nothing of Piltover… nothing but Jayce, who haunted the Lanes like a speck of sunlight.

“I want to go home…”, he declared again, curling his body in; legs drawn in, knees tugged beneath his arms as he hugged himself, fingers digging into his clothes and skin beneath. He could feel the pain. Of his lopsided, bad leg, with the paralysed foot. Of his twisted spine. Of his healing ribcage. Why was he so fucking broken…?

If he wasn’t so broken, they would not have all these problems.

They would not be here. Jayce would not sound so desperate…

“Ridiculous…”, Viktor breathed out then, shakily. It wasn’t clear in the first moment, but then he repeated himself, as if he was scolding – himself.

“Ridiculous.”, this time his voice was calmer again, defiant, the same way he unfurled and wiped an arm across his face to chase away any lingering tears.

“We will not be using the funds for our research for such frivolous luxuries. The research goes above all else. It matters the most. It is money that needs to go to Hextech, to our dream. To better the lives of others. Not to me.”

Jayce’s nervous suggestion was shot down – but it had also been the key to extinguish Viktor’s upset at the current events. Only Jayce could have found that. Only he could show Viktor his own mirror image – even unknowingly. The Zaunite sat there, with his shoulders slumped a little, staring at his uneven legs.

That uttered "perfect" immediately made Jayce smile. He was happy, relieved... and entirely surprised when Viktor enveloped him into a hug. He didn't freeze up at all. His own arms lifted, carefully wrapping around his partner in kind, and his head turned to press just that little closer.

He didn't dare to do more than that. He was loving and careful in equal measure. Viktor had been hurt enough. He didn't need such carelessness from his partner when he already faced quite the recovery.

"I promise. I won't leave, Viktor." Jayce shifted to glance up. "Don't give up on me just yet, baby. You need to heal. You need to rest. After all of that, when your wound care is all finished up and you don't have to deal with appointments or hospitals... then we can have a big talk. First I want to be here for you, please."

Still, with the coming days, each day Jayce left the room, even if just to go shower in the adjacent bathroom, Viktor listened closely, counted down every second his partner was gone. Felt his skin crawl at the thought of anyone of the nurses or doctors coming when Jayce wasn’t at his side.

Luckily that did not happen. Any suggestion of Jayce leaving the room for an examination or bandage change was shot down by Viktor immediately. It didn’t matter whether it was him hacking up a disgusting mix of clotted blood and ichor of slowly healing wounds or fluid the color of piss drained from his ribcage. Jayce would have to suffer through witnessing this. He wouldn’t even ask Jayce permission. Neither had he in the first place, right?

Viktor tried to be patient. Understanding. He tried to go with it. It was for his own good. For the good of Zaun?

But on the third day, he felt these walls crawling in on him. Enough for him to have chased a poor nurse and the doctor out of the room with eloquent and calm but very direct words of leaving him alone. Because what the doctor had just brought to him, was insane.

Viktor’s eyes were full of wound up anger and a threat of just jumping out of the next window.

“They want to present me? Like a damn show? To others from the Academy?”, he hissed, each word dripping with vitriol and absolute hatred of the idea. Not only was it people, as in several others. But it were academics. Those who had kicked him out years ago, as if he was beneath them. And now they wanted to oogle at his misery?

Viktor’s voice dropped to a hiss.

I Will Cross The Line For You

Based on the official poster for the Chinese immersive theatre production of Arcane

No, he froze when Viktor moved. It was the kind of siren call that usually ended up in a rumpled bed. Surely his partner didn't mean for his movements to be a mimicry of all those times of seduction? Not that it mattered much at all to Jayce's brain. He swallowed thickly and gave a short nod.

Bindings. Bandages. Right. Right, on it.

Jayce looked to the pile of recent-removed gauze and bandages. He frowned a little. Good thing he spent so much time in this room, contemplating the same objects. He twisted and reached for a small table at their side. Sealed packets had been left there. Gauze. He supposed they anticipated the likelihood of Viktor needing a bandage change, even so soon after an operation, and it didn't right with him to reapply gauze that was already bloodied. He freed a fresh square and gently held it up.

"...oh, fuck..." Jayce quietly swore under his breath. Holding the gauze in place while he attempted to align a bandage to bind it? With only two hands? And with Viktor staring him down so calmly and with no offer to lend a hand?? He lifted his eyes and flashed a small smile. Alright. Challenge accepted.

In the end, Jayce gently held the corner of the gauze to Viktor, and with that same hand he pressed the beginning of the bandage. With his free hand he worked at completing the first bind around his partner. It was too loose, he had to adjust it a little firmer. He frowned a little the more he focused. He tried to mimic how Viktor's chest had been bandaged before, and with zero prior experience or skill.

Of course he noticed how… focused Jayce was. How he reacted to him.

It was a calculated act. Maybe he was too cruel to Jayce, maybe he was too paranoid. But the fear in Viktor still fed his anger. That was it… he was so deeply scared that this all was just an act to keep him calm and tame, so Piltover could do whatever they pleased to him.

But Jayce wouldn’t do that…?

Looking down onto this man’s face, Viktor just saw innocent glinting in those golden eyes. Hopeful and genuine. Could Jayce even lie? Had he ever?

Viktor’s hands finally came up from Jayce’s shoulders, slowly encasing Jayce’s face, his jaw, where soft short stubble would grow so quickly. His thumbs caressed over Jayce’s cheek, along his jaw, over the small cut on the tip of his eyebrow.

How soft he was. How sweet. How naïve. Someone like that wasn’t meant for something Zaunite.

“Perfect.”

That was how it was. How he was.

Viktor moved again, this time his arms encircled Jayce’s whole shoulders and head, cupping the back of it and pressing him close, fingers threading through tousled dark strands.

Jayce understood this was likely the medication still lingering. Not only was his partner vulnerable in his physical state, but his mental state too. He looked to Viktor's hand. He hadn't pulled away... maybe..? There might be some hope for them...

When Viktor addressed him, his eyes leapt back to his face. "About a week. There isn't an exact timeframe, it depends on how fast your body begins to heal. You're.. um. Draining. Risk of infection, like, insane risk. Even when you can go home... there's follow up care too..." Hopefully he would agree to attend this hospital too. In Piltover. But that was a decision that belonged entirely to Viktor, and he felt too much guilt in his heart to push back.

Then it hit him. We. Viktor had asked how long we would stay here.

Jayce didn’t want to imprison him… he hadn’t abducted him to Piltover. He simply had wanted to help… hadn’t he?

Those golden eyes that looked at him as if they were asking for permission to even be close to him, they could not possibly have dragged him here full of malice and possessive behaviour… right?

The knife-joke gained a disapproving snarl from Viktor. As if he would. What did Jayce even mean by that…? Did his guilt run so deep? Or was he so careless with his own actions?

Viktor moved slowly, but with purpose. His hand slipping away from beneath Jayce’s, instead he turned his whole body and slipped to sit in Jayce’s lap, facing his partner right on. His pale battered chest with the gnarly cuts right in front of Jayce’s eyes, as Viktor simply draped his hands on the other man’s shoulders. It was akin to the poses Viktor had used when he had seduced Jayce. When he wanted to make him melt under his touch.  Now he tested him again. But it was a trial of composure and trying to find the genuine purpose behind Jayce’s actions.

Looking down on the other, Viktor looked unsettlingly calm and serene.

Somehow that made it worse again, maybe also because now Viktor saw the cuts and a lot of the numbing effects of anaesthesia had worn off by now. To imagine that they had put him under and rolled away. He had been unconscious when some stranger Pilties had cut him open…

„How….“, he uttered a trailing off question. 

His fingers digging a little into his skin, tugging at the cut. It hurt, it was stupid. So his fingers quickly wandered to his sides, both hands, hugging himself. 

„I don‘t trust them… you know that. How can I be sure they did what they claim they did…?“

He knew Jayce was hurt. His eyes gave it away, looking at him like a beaten puppy. Jayce was so genuine in his feelings. He just wanted to help and Viktor believed him this easily. But Jayce was also oh so naive. 

„What if they cut away anything else?“

Organ harvesting even was a thing in the Lanes. 

„What if they… built in anything that shouldn‘t be there?“

He was sounding paranoid, wasn‘t he? But that was what he felt towards Piltover. They had made quite clear that he would never have a place among them as equal… so why should they treat him with care, now?

He didn't want to push his luck. But he didn't want to look like an uncaring asshole either. He didn't know what Viktor needed him to be in that moment, whether he needed an asshole to get angry at.

He searched Viktor's expression. He was hurting. He was pulling into himself like he was all alone. Fuck.

"They wouldn't." Jayce reasoned. It made no sense in his mind. Especially not when the surgeon herself had a medical study hinging on this success. "Vik... you and I, we know Piltover differently. Trust me on this one. That Doctor wouldn't fuck up here and now. You have to be her success, else all of her research goes down the drain for another decade. If not forever. The way things are done on my side of the river? Even if you were an enemy of hers, I guarantee you got better than the best in terms of care. I swear my family name on it."

Jayce‘s warm hand on his own was a clear argument against these thoughts.

Jayce was from Piltover, too… and he loved him…. he had saved him. Without Jayce, his corpse would now probably lie in that dark warehouse to rot until someone was annoyed enough by the stench to go investigate. 

Viktor screwed his eyes shut, as if that could calm his thoughts. He didn‘t know what to believe anymore. Or whom. Jayce wouldn‘t take this as opportunity. No… maybe he was a project for this doctor, but Jayce didn‘t just really saw him as investment. He was too sweet for that…

He looked to his partner again, mustered Jayce, as if he had to reassess his opinion of the other. 

Luckily Jayce oblieged and helped him with all his care. 

Viktor sat in silence, his head turned down so he could see past the mask still strapped to his face. 

He heard Jayce‘s soft voice, how he hovered so close to him, tried to read him. But he sounded so far away at the same time. 

Pale fingers felt over the cuts, sutured shut with stitches and…. staples. Little metal sprigs clamping his skin shut, making it bulge in small bits between. There was dried blood on some. And a few fresh droplets from having the gauze removed. 

Viktor could feel his heartbeat fasten, like his breath. The mask was fogging a little. 

No. No, don‘t panic. It‘s okay… it‘s okay… Jayce said it would be okay. He… he decided this. He…

Viktor‘s golden eyes sprung to Jayce with a burrowing expression, as if he wanted to nail his partner into place. 

„Were you there? When they cut me open? Were you there and watched?“

Probably because he couldn't fool himself, couldn't attribute this to a purely emotional surge.

He felt pinned by Viktor's sharp look. Like he drove a knife through his chest and kept him pinned. Slowly, he felt a rise of his own fear. His eyes answered before he opened his mouth.

Jayce shook his head. "That's not... we're not allowed to." He exhaled a sharp breath — it felt like a knife twisting. His eyes misted a little and he rapidly blinked. "I waited for you on the other side of the door. I... no. I didn't watch."

In his honesty, he realised he had underestimated his own betrayal. Not only had he taken a decision away from Viktor, but he had taken away strict terms. If it had been Viktor's voice, his own words, his own choice... it would have been different.

The fact of the matter was Jayce feared Viktor's death more than he feared his anger.

Somehow that made it worse again, maybe also because now Viktor saw the cuts and a lot of the numbing effects of anaesthesia had worn off by now. To imagine that they had put him under and rolled away. He had been unconscious when some stranger Pilties had cut him open…

„How….“, he uttered a trailing off question. 

His fingers digging a little into his skin, tugging at the cut. It hurt, it was stupid. So his fingers quickly wandered to his sides, both hands, hugging himself. 

„I don‘t trust them… you know that. How can I be sure they did what they claim they did…?“

He knew Jayce was hurt. His eyes gave it away, looking at him like a beaten puppy. Jayce was so genuine in his feelings. He just wanted to help and Viktor believed him this easily. But Jayce was also oh so naive. 

„What if they cut away anything else?“

Organ harvesting even was a thing in the Lanes. 

„What if they… built in anything that shouldn‘t be there?“

He was sounding paranoid, wasn‘t he? But that was what he felt towards Piltover. They had made quite clear that he would never have a place among them as equal… so why should they treat him with care, now?

Still… there was mistrust. She was a Piltie. And usually this meant nothing good at all. Then again… Viktor’s eyes briefly glanced to the silhouette of Jayce at his side. He trusted him, deeply. More than anyone else, if he was being honest. And Jayce had saved him, had he not… after dragging him here and putting him onto a table to be operated on without any kind of permission.

Had it been a pure act of love…?

The part of Viktor’s brain that was fuelled by cynism laughed at that.

But the other, bigger part…

“Then what are we waiting for?”

The questions and tests the doctor had for him were… mild. It was as if she was scared Viktor would pull back his agreement any moment. She was careful in her approaches. But became more direct when she noted Viktor’s own decisiveness.

Though after what felt like a little eternity, Viktor’s own voice got hoarse and it was harder to breathe. She packed the little instruments she had brought to listen to his lungs and draw some blood – and was gone. And Viktor’s whole frame sunk into himself a little, as he tried to breathe in deeper. He allowed himself to sink against Jayce, as if his partner was the only anchor for him in this world. In a way Jayce was… but this was a trial too him, too.

It was a matter of pride. To not be viewed as weak, despite probably being at his weakest all things considered. Not that he had any right to chastise and demand that he rest.

After all, Jayce wondered how Viktor still welcomed him in the same room.

He gave a concerned look at Viktor's request. "But—" He wanted to argue so much. That was too soon! The bandages were to stop any post-surgery leaking! Plus there was something about the risk of infection, but how could he argue, when Viktor gave him a sharp look.

Jayce sighed. No, in this he had no room to argue. So he helped. Carefully, meticulously, he worked at the impressively tight bound bandages that wrapped around his partner, pulling those free, and then carefully removing the thicker dressing pad that tried to cling on.

Luckily Jayce oblieged and helped him with all his care. 

Viktor sat in silence, his head turned down so he could see past the mask still strapped to his face. 

He heard Jayce‘s soft voice, how he hovered so close to him, tried to read him. But he sounded so far away at the same time. 

Pale fingers felt over the cuts, sutured shut with stitches and…. staples. Little metal sprigs clamping his skin shut, making it bulge in small bits between. There was dried blood on some. And a few fresh droplets from having the gauze removed. 

Viktor could feel his heartbeat fasten, like his breath. The mask was fogging a little. 

No. No, don‘t panic. It‘s okay… it‘s okay… Jayce said it would be okay. He… he decided this. He…

Viktor‘s golden eyes sprung to Jayce with a burrowing expression, as if he wanted to nail his partner into place. 

„Were you there? When they cut me open? Were you there and watched?“

"Viktor." she decisively addressed him. Best not to entertain the Talis heir. That would only serve to greaten the divide between her and the man that could change a whole city. "With all due respect, your lung condition is unique to Zaun. Whatever I learn from you will be for the benefit of Zaunite's. Everyone understands that the air quality in Zaun is unsafe even with the current ventilation system, moreover, I believe that the health problems it creates are unique to this... how do you call it, grey?"

Still… there was mistrust. She was a Piltie. And usually this meant nothing good at all. Then again… Viktor’s eyes briefly glanced to the silhouette of Jayce at his side. He trusted him, deeply. More than anyone else, if he was being honest. And Jayce had saved him, had he not… after dragging him here and putting him onto a table to be operated on without any kind of permission.

Had it been a pure act of love…?

The part of Viktor’s brain that was fuelled by cynism laughed at that.

But the other, bigger part…

“Then what are we waiting for?”

The questions and tests the doctor had for him were… mild. It was as if she was scared Viktor would pull back his agreement any moment. She was careful in her approaches. But became more direct when she noted Viktor’s own decisiveness.

Though after what felt like a little eternity, Viktor’s own voice got hoarse and it was harder to breathe. She packed the little instruments she had brought to listen to his lungs and draw some blood – and was gone. And Viktor’s whole frame sunk into himself a little, as he tried to breathe in deeper. He allowed himself to sink against Jayce, as if his partner was the only anchor for him in this world. In a way Jayce was… but this was a trial too him, too.