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“I did not think you would actually shoot me.”
No.
Jayce whirled around, leveling the hammer once again at Viktor, who was now approaching from outside the dome.
He couldn't do it, not again.
“Why are you doing this?” Jayce rasped out, gripping the handle tighter in a bid to keep his hands from trembling.
“If you are asking me why I have taken precautions against you hitting me with a rather large hammer, I will leave you to answer that one on your own.”
“You know what I mean!”
Jayce's chest heaved as he willed his breathing to slow, in stark contrast to Viktor, who had stopped at Jayce's words, and now remained impassively, uncannily still.
Gods, did he even need to breathe anymore?
Jayce exhaled with a shudder.
“You…” Viktor began slowly, “Will have to be more specific, Jayce.”
“You hated the Hexcore! You hated what I did to you! You hated-!” He snapped his jaw shut and looked away.
“... I could never hate you, Jayce.”
He flinched at the quietly muttered words.
“You hated it. And with good reason. And now you're-- augh!! ” Jayce's knees buckled, landing heavy on his bad leg, hammer slamming to the floor as his vision began to swim. There was death everywhere, empty eyes from visionless masks following him, claws reaching out for him, onto him, into him, it's inside him, it's inside him and he will never be able to get it back out, never, never again.
“Jayce!” Viktor stood before him now, hand extended towards him, claws reaching out for him .
“Don't touch me!” He snarled, trying to scramble back while simultaneously grasping for the hammer now just out of his reach.
Viktor froze, iridescent eyes locked onto his with a grieved expression.
“Jayce, you are hurting. Let me-”
“Don't. Touch. Me.”
“... As you wish.” Viktor sat on the ground just over an arm's length away.
And wasn't that some fantastic irony , Jayce thought in between pained gasps. That Viktor was able to respect his wishes to remain “untreated,” even whilst under whatever thrall Jayce inflicted upon him against his will.
He tried to ground himself by taking in his surroundings, but everywhere he looked was made of the same arcane webbing that ensnared his thoughts, that made him rip up his own skin trying to break free of bondage so painfully constricting that it surely could not exist only in his mind.
He tore his eyes away from the technicolor corruption creeping up Viktor’s robes, only to be confronted by his partner’s crumpled body still laying on the floor across the room. Surrounded by fire and rubble, the smoke choking him, stinging his eyes as he cried out Viktor’s name. No, no, no, no. He felt desperately for a pulse, despite the lack of breath, despite the broken spine, despite the gaping hole in the chest cavity that he put there himself.
“I’m right here, Jayce.”
He blinked in a daze, looking up to find Viktor beside him, standing over his own dead body and gripping his staff like it was the only thing keeping him together.
“What happened to you?” It was a hoarse whisper, quiet enough that Jayce wasn’t entirely sure if the question was meant for him to hear. Not that it mattered. He had no answers for Viktor anyway.
“Who was this?” He asked in lieu of any real response.
Viktor stared at him in stunned silence. “What?”
He clenched his hands into fists, staring resolutely at the corpse before him. “Who was this? Who did I kill?”
“‘Who’… Do you think I--?”
“I don’t know what I think anymore!” His hands tore at his hair, gripping sharply to try to force his mind to form coherent thoughts like he knew it used to. “I shot you, I killed you, I-- I killed you but you’re still here and you make them do things and I--”
“Jayce!” Viktor was crouching now, leaning forward, trying to meet his gaze. “Jayce, it’s a doll. I wouldn’t-- Why would you think I--”
Jayce let out a wounded noise as Viktor ran his hand over his double’s face, leaving behind smooth, featureless porcelain in its wake.
“... Please let me help you.”
Jayce shook his head numbly. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”
“Really? I have guided the sumps to live as a thriving, happy, and healthy community and your rebuttal is that I ‘don’t know what I’m doing’? This is what we have always wanted! Or at least… It’s what I always wanted.”
“No, it’s not-- you don’t--”
The air went unnaturally still. “Do not deign to tell me what I have or have not been dreaming of my whole life, Jayce.”
“No, please, I…” Jayce gripped his wrist where the rune was embedded into his skin. He couldn’t tell if the searing pain he felt was coming from his body or his heart. “I don’t want to kill you.”
“Then don’t.” The familiar click of Viktor’s staff as he walked away made Jayce dizzy; suddenly there was too much oxygen in his lungs, too much of something he knew he needed.
His already overtaxed heart pounded ever harder as Viktor approached the mutated hammer-- No, stop. I need that to save you kill you. Don’t touch it; it will poison you, it will twist you, it will change you, please-- But his partner merely stared down at the weapon, eyes glazing over as if his mind had gone somewhere his body could not follow. Somewhere Jayce could not follow. His eyes burned with tears he had long since run out of.
“Come back.” His feeble plea drew Viktor’s dreamlike gaze.
“Stay here.”
Jayce felt his aching heart rebel against the oath he swore. He couldn’t fail. He promised Viktor and by the gods, he was going to make good on a promise for once in his pathetic, miserable life . He couldn’t fail. He wouldn’t fail to… what was it again? To stop Viktor. Stop him? No, no, he was supposed to save him, he had to save everyone. From Viktor? But Viktor would never hurt anyone, that couldn’t be right.
Something wasn’t right. His mind was filled with fog. The clarity and resolve he’d had when speaking with Viktor in that ruined future was muddled now, like a reflection in a puddle of rippling water.
“As if it has been distorted by the worst of our human impulses,” Viktor muttered to himself as he gently prodded with his staff at the exposed core of the hammer.
Oh, was that what it was? Viktor was… Always so smart.
“Jayce?”
Viktor’s eyes were so beautiful, even when creased with concern. Why was he so far away?
“I think you need to lay down, Jayce.”
But that would make Viktor even farther away. Gods, it’d been so long since Jayce spoke with him, alive and awake. If only he could just reach…
“Please, just-- Huck, would you…”
Jayce couldn’t follow what Viktor was saying anymore. He just stared at thin lips moving, jerking violently when hands that didn’t belong to his partner tried to gently push him to the floor.
“No-- Vik-!”
Viktor backed away from Jayce’s reaching hands. Jayce’s heart shattered. Of course he wasn’t allowed to touch him after everything he’d done.
He acquiesced to the strange hands tugging at him, all but collapsing against the floor as his vision grew dark. He hoped he wouldn’t wake up again.