#all these years of me not giving a fuck about jayce/viktor only to cave right at the end

[peineperdu]

alright then

arcane ending tomorrow...

[bringthekaos]

Post reconciliation Jayvik and Jayce has to do a speech "deeply condemning" the recent actions of the Evil Machine Herald :]

Ohhhhh and he gives it the ol’ “I Am Iron Man” treatment…

Like he starts out reading the script, saying what Piltover wants him to say. “The Machine Herald is a deeply disturbed individual, who has carved out his… his empathy, and no longer values humanity or co— collaboration…”

And he pauses, just like he did at the Progress Day speech all those years ago, and he looks down at the faces watching: councilors, profiteers, warmongers… cogs in the machine that made Viktor what he is. And he’s suddenly overcome with righteous anger, and he just goes off,

“You know what? It is morbidly ironic for me to stand up here and preach about inhumanity when it was this city’s inhumanity that created the Machine Herald in the first place. We were a constant barrier for him, even when all he ever wanted was to improve lives—both ours and the lives of Zaunites…”

They cut off the mic, but Jayce just starts yelling.

“…and I don’t blame him! We create our own enemies with policies that keep Zaunites crushed under our boot heels. We keep them in poverty, under threat of rampant crime and caving to the rule of violent drug lords, because what choice do they have?! None, we made sure of that!”

Luckily it’s Caitlyn that’s tasked with dragging him off the stage, and she’s gentle—whispers of “I know, Jayce, you’re right. You are. But they won’t hear it. Come on. Fight this fight another way…”

And Jayce is fuming, he can’t spend another second in Piltover. So he walks (stomps, more like—mumbling angrily to himself the whole way) down to Emberflit, to Viktor. And he’s not sure how, it just fucking happened, but Viktor already knows what happened.

And Viktor can’t help but offer up that crooked grin as he comes over to where Jayce has plopped down into his musty old recliner and slides down onto his lap.

“You know I don’t need you defending me; I don’t need it, and it will fall on deaf ears anyway. They aren’t ready to hear it, and will only use it as an excuse to cast you out too. But I appreciate the sentiment, moje lásko.”

He tips Jayce’s chin up and kisses him breathless, and all at once Jayce can’t remember what he was so angry about.