Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

All But One Star

Part 1: Solaris

“Man has gone out to explore other worlds and other civilizations without having explored his own labyrinth of dark passages and secret chambers, and without finding what lies behind doorways that he himself has sealed.”

― Stanisław Lem, Solaris 

The warmth of the cigarette he’d nursed on his last break still clung to the space between his fingers. Hair twirling was a side habit, coffee milk an addiction greater even than the nicotine, LEDs the new sun. 

Right. The sun. 

The neon sprawl of the arcade floor was timeless, paused in decades come and gone, but each machine spelled the same name on the number 1 spot of every leaderboard: H3RALD. 

Viktor’s legacy was Pacman and a claw machine, Tekken and pinball, record-breaking ticket amalgamations... 

And also—of note—immortality. 

Against his will of course. But he’d long since resigned to his fate. 

He loved the man who gave it to him after all. 

.☼.

The year was 2008. The housing market crash left the rot of foreclosure and debt pungent in the atmosphere, punching open that growing hole in the ozone layer. The world was a different place, ideology and the landscape of society through the advent of the modern internet transforming, evolving, reshaping into something equal parts hopeful and despairing. Fun was more solitary, filled with blue light and the collapsing facade of America; doom in shades of red, white, and blue, the body of war, the ache of relentless crises and tenuous innovation billowing at half-mast. 

The fall semester began on a note of unrest, stringy techno beats and bass-boosted redundant choruses spilling into the ears of students shuffling down campus avenues in low rise jeans, wired earbuds, and iPod nanos clipped to their belts. 

An anomaly amidst a crowd of average achievers, Viktor Dvořák was going on the 6th year of his undergrad: a double-major nightmare of Astrophysics and Cosmology. 

“If he’s such a genius, why hasn’t he graduated?” 

“If we give you an extension, it wouldn’t be fair to the other students.” 

“If you’re that unwell, you should take a break and come back when you’re better.”

Well. Wouldn’t that be nice. Except he wasn’t going to get better. Funny how the human body works (or perhaps doesn’t). 

He was a few years his classmates’ senior, and connections were hard enough to make as it was, being the tokenized cane user in an era where most people were just becoming familiar with the presence of wheelchairs in public. Always the sick kid. Always the pity case. 

Pitiful—yes, that’s Viktor. 5’7” of pity. He’d turned it inwards to cope, made it his own as if it were reclamation. 

But the boy had not crawled through 6 years of an undergrad in the worst health of his life to amount to nothing. He’d dreamed of achievement, of freedom from mundanity and this aching loneliness that came with being visibly himself. It did not help that he was outspoken and proud. It did not help that he was simultaneously shy and insecure. The dualities that thrummed within Viktor Dvořák’s slender, crooked existence were oil in water, yet about as natural and innate as day turning into night. 

He stopped by a poster nailed to the announcement board outside the College of Physical Sciences Hall, thumbing over the name of the supervisory director of the Observatory and, thusly, tonight’s unique blood moon viewing event: Jayce Talis. 

He was going to do it. He was going to finally take the next step. And what better opportunity would he have than this? 

The line was excruciating, winding down the hall and crowding the old, too narrow building with sweat and forced proximity. Viktor adjusted the worn, crinkled print of his oversized hoodie, peeling with an image of the Big Dipper and the words “OUT TO LIVE” in sprawling lettering embroidered above. It wasn’t his nicest article of clothing really, just his favorite. He thought Jayce might be fond of it too—something to connect on maybe? Or maybe he was being stupid. Presumptive. Jumping to conclusions. 

His faded jeans, wide-legged and spilling over his newest pair of Vans and the brace clinging roughly to his right leg beneath, brushed against the arm of his cane, the metal weight of his handicap feeling heavier today than normal. He wore his favorite earrings: silver studs along the bottom lobe of one ear connected to each other with thin wire he’d wound himself in a shape that mimicked the form of the Pleiades, a silver industrial on his upper lobe, and small, thick hoop in the other. He’d tied up the back of his hair, half up half down, and washed it so thoroughly his scalp still burned. 

Just ask him. 

You already know he’ll say no. 

But at least then you’ll be able to move on.

But he didn’t want him to say no. He really, really didn’t want him to say no. 

The last thread of the crowd thinned until it was only him and a few stragglers. He was crouched now against the wall, letting things slow while keeping a watchful eye on the door just in case Jayce slipped out. But he wouldn’t. Jayce always stayed the whole night, every night. 

Viktor had spent practically the entire last semester in this very building scouting him out, looking for virtually any excuse wherever he could find one, and humiliating himself repeatedly in the process. He’d almost pissed himself once after walking halfway across campus just to use this bathroom instead of, you know, the one he was actually close to. 

Call him obsessed. He’d never deny it. 

The last of them shuffled on out. Only Viktor was left now. He rose up from the floor and scooted his way through the heavy double doors of the observatory, trying to play casual about looking around for his only reason, his one thing, his single motivation—

“Hi Viktor.” A whisper against his ear made him jump, a gap-toothed grin greeting him when he turned. “Here for the moon?” 

And though flustered, Viktor immediately smiled back. “Hi.” 

Jayce nodded over to the giant telescope in the center of the room. “I’ll assume that’s a yes.” His voice teased but his face was so inexplicably soft. In the dark hollows of the observatory, his eyes almost seemed to glow, brighter than Viktor had ever seen them. 

Viktor’s cheeks flared with heat as he clacked forward, following Jayce’s eyes like a single flame in the woods. There was something about him. The scar on his brow. The whites of his teeth. The bloom of a beard on his jaw. His short, perfectly trimmed hair. The oaken build of his body and the oaken flush of his skin. But also the way he spoke to Viktor. Like an equal. 

And also, still, the way he guided his evening lectures with such inscrutable passion, deconstructed and reconstructed theory as easily as taking apart a pen, meeting every question with a kindness and then another question of his own, forcing the mind to build on itself, denying monotony and disinterest, demanding greatness even from the most determinedly mediocre minds. He gave the brain butterflies as well as the stomach. Or at least Viktor’s brain anyway. 

Viktor hummed to settle his heart rate, though Jayce’s grin only seemed to grow the more he tried to calm down. He spoke to diffuse the man’s satisfaction. “Lunar eclipses happen every 2-3 years. Not exactly rare, per se, but always worth a look. I was here in this very room the last time the eclipse touched down in Piltover. But it wasn’t at totality like it is tonight. Who knows; maybe I’ll catch the next one if I’m still trying to scrape together this damn BA two years from now.” Viktor shrugged at the self deprecation, but his expression was all bright corners, all warm edges. No bitterness in his heart with Jayce around. 

“I haven’t missed a single one in 20 years.” Jayce mused, adjusting the height of the stool in front of the scope. “I’m glad you don’t find them negligible like some.” 

Viktor hid his smile. “So,” He traced the black line of the optical tube. “Childhood fixation then?” 

Jayce bit his lip, suppressing a laugh as he tilted the lens at a more viable angle for Viktor’s back. “Sure. We can say that.” 

Viktor sat himself down, leaning his cane against his leg as he pressed his eye to the lens. “You could say the same for me, too, I guess. Childhood fixations with space and all, that is. I once wanted to be an astronaut, if you can believe it. Imagine my surprise when I learned that anti-gravity didn’t necessarily mean ‘easy on the body’.” 

Viktor always could share like this with him. Without fear of pity or disdain. The observatory’s supervisory director allowed him to talk about his body and the facts of his limited life like they were just that: facts. There was freedom in that. 

Just as he caught a slight glimpse of the gorged red of the eclipse, fidgeting in place to find the right angle, he felt a slight pressure slide onto his chin: the cup of Jayce’s palm. 

“Keep steady. Don’t overfocus your eye. Let it drift into view. And then hold gently.” His voice was close, smooth, the word ‘gently’ breathier than the rest. Viktor swallowed. 

“I know how to look through a telescope, Jayce.” Speaking like sharing secrets, not a single sound or touch wasted. 

Jayce’s thumb drew lightly beneath Viktor’s lip, almost accidental. The moon finally came into focus just as Jayce’s breath touched the crux of Viktor’s neck. “I know.” He said. Simple. Calm. 

Wanting. 

They stayed like that for a long while. Viktor in the warmth of Jayce’s palm, staring down an eclipse. Jayce leaning above Viktor like the sky leans over the Earth, feeling his pulse in ways Viktor couldn’t yet comprehend. 

His heart fluttered and leapt and landed right where Jayce wanted him. 

Until at last Viktor pulled away, rubbing his eyes to refocus them. He looked up, meeting the damning hazel of this other set of moons he’d recalled he meant to ask a single, very important question. 

“Do you want to go on a date with me?” 

✧*.

He’d asked it so dumbly. Sitting atop that stool dwarfed by a perspective that tilted the axis of his entire world, he could only ask as bluntly as possible, unable to fill the space with further tests and teasing. 

But he left that room with Jayce’s number and the pinkest cheeks of his entire life either way so... mission accomplished. 

He made his way home in a blur of emotion, giddy enough to drift in and out of focus, blowing a stop sign or two probably. And when his head hit his pillow, his shoes kicked off by his bedside, he became overwhelmed by the joy of it all, thrashing and tossing side to side. 

A text from Jayce pinged on his black Motorola. He flipped it open, the little sun charm on his phone tinkling against the metal.  

Jayce 2:00am: thank u for asking. i thought u never would. sweet dreams, little angel <3

Viktor held his screen lit with the message to his chest and beamed at the blank ceiling above him, sighing into the impossible perfection of something like his life’s greatest success. 

Viktor 2:05am: little angel? U r 2 sweet. 

V: but... thank u 4 saying yes :-)

V: and goodnight to u 2, Jayce <3

But how could he possibly sleep? 

✧*.

Viktor was in the observatory almost every night now. Jayce would wait for the light tap of his fist on the door, and like he could sense him, would swing it open a little too fast. 

“Viktor! You’re here!” 

“Do you wait by the door or something?” Viktor laughed, drawing Jayce closer. 

“What if I do?” 

“...Do you?” 

But Jayce wouldn’t satisfy him with a response, just backed up over to the telescope, braced leg catching the light of the astronomy lab entryway, his eyes scanning Viktor in a way that made the smaller man feel like he was somehow far too covered up. Like he ought to be... exposed. Like it was wrong for him to be more than an inch away from Jayce, wrong for his clothes to guard him from Jayce’s gaze. He wanted to be considered. And Jayce was very much considering him. 

And then came a sort of... voice.

‘From the very beginning, I’ve noticed you.’

Viktor felt a soothing chill trickle through him in the form of words. 

‘The boy loves the stars does he?’

He felt drawn by a sort of thread. A call in his veins, throbbing to the tune of his pulse, like his pulse was being read, squeezed out of him, blood pressure monitor tightening but over every individual artery— 

“You shouldn’t drink coffee at night, you know.” A real voice now. Viktor shook his head, clearing the sensations that still tingled, but had dulled. 

“It doesn’t keep me up.” He said perhaps a tad too flatly. Jayce raised an eyebrow. 

“Everything alright?” He poured the coffee slowly from the kitchenette in the astronomy lab. When had they gotten over here from the observatory-? 

“I-I’m good. Just... worn out I think. Rough semester.” He blinked and the mug was in his hands. He hadn’t remembered picking it up. 

“Anything I can help with?” Jayce had one now too, sipping lightly as he offered Viktor a much softer gaze, the colors of his eyes settling like a pond. 

Viktor sighed and leaned against the counter. “I want to blame the university, but I can only blame myself, maybe. I can do the work, I can, but I’m just...” 

‘You’re alright.’ 

A voice that was sweeter than any cream. 

Viktor paused at the return of that peculiar noise in his head he couldn’t quite discern as reality, and then crumbled at its reassurance. “I’m tired, Jayce.” He confessed. “So tired.” He let his head drop into his hand, rubbing his temple, scrunching his eyes closed. 

But when he opened them, he was sitting in a chair, the lights somehow dimmer. Jayce was beside him, the door to the observatory open and the hatch of the dome fully ajar, a canvas of stars spreading through. All the world was a warm drink and dark nights, hazel eyes and his own body with all its feelings therein. 

Jayce let their arms brush as he spoke. “When I broke my leg, so much about my life changed. I was meant to be an astronaut, just like you’d said you’d wanted to be too. And just like you, my body didn’t exactly meet standards in the end. Zero-gravity, no contingencies, all that.” 

Jayce paused and allowed the back of his hand to graze the side of Viktor’s brace. “My leg wasn’t salvageable. And neither was my back that had gone with it. I’d tried every avenue, gone down roads I never imagined I’d find myself seeking, but all for nothing. So I guess I just settled in the end. I had to accept it: this new life. Else I’d go insane, maybe.” Viktor watched Jayce trace circles into his small knee, shivers rushing up his spine at the firmness of his touch. The man glanced up as if to ask ‘is this alright?’ and the boy nodded back. It most certainly was. “But accepting it doesn’t suddenly make it okay. Nothing about a limited life is ever really okay.” 

Viktor let Jayce’s hand drag up to his thigh, rubbing lightly, before he replied in the quiet. “I think if I weren’t broken, I’d have a chance at all the dreams people far less skilled than me achieve so easily. It’s just the workload and making it to class that’s hard. The subject matter is easy. I... I love it. But I can’t keep up. I’m not even physically running, and yet somehow I’m still losing a race because of this body. Because I’m me. And they’re them. I am everything they are not. Good and bad.” 

Jayce’s head was on his shoulder now, his hand wound up with Viktor’s. “Don’t call yourself broken, Viktor. That’s not a word I think could ever describe you.” 

Viktor prickled, but only half-heartedly. “I’m disabled, Jayce. By nature I’m broken.” 

Jayce pointed up at the sky, the lights completely out now, leaving only the night to illuminate the pair of them. “Maybe in the sense that you struggle or that your body isn’t doing what it’s supposed to do but... try to see it like this: you aren’t broken. You are doing everything you can to survive. Even if your body splinters, even if your body breaks, you are not fundamentally broken. People like you, like us,” He knocked Viktor’s braced leg with his own. “-are necessary. Disability is inevitable. I’d even say it’s, uh, haha...” He paused and looked up at Viktor then, only centimeters apart, blurring all the colors of each others’ faces with damning proximity. “I’d even say it’s beautiful.” Jayce muttered. 

They sat suspended then, like time was all they had. Infinite, stretching, unbending time. Looped together by the metal bands of their legs. Believing, for a moment, that this was all there was to living. Programs and expectations and graduations were secondary to the colors that swam between them, their lips not yet meeting, but God if they’d like to. 

.☼.

Here’s the thing about Viktor: He thinks. A lot. 

And here’s the thing about Jayce: He hears pretty much all of it. 

‘Did I remember to brush my teeth?’ 

‘Why is this bag so fucking heavy?’ 

‘I wonder if they’re serving fries at the cafeteria today.’ 

‘pPolaris = 1/100 pProxima’ 

‘I think I actually like that Shake Shake whatever song. Kill me.’ 

‘Please stop clicking your pen. Mind blast! God, I'm embarrassing.’ 

‘The force of gravity between a celestial body and an object on the surface of that body depends on the mass of the celestial body, the mass of the object on the surface, and the distance from the center of the body to the center of the object- Crap did I pay my rent?’ 

Being permanently parked in the building where most of Viktor’s classes took place didn’t help. But to say Jayce minded would be a lie. For reasons unknown, Viktor’s thoughts were clearer. Not really louder or more robust, just clear: Glass wind chimes, spring air, Polaris—the star from the sweater Viktor’d worn the night the boy finally asked him out. 

Jayce had grown fond of him long before Viktor had even noticed he was there. Some nights he’d lean back in his office chair and just listen. 

‘I miss my mom.’ 

‘It would be nice to look at the fall colors with someone. Or maybe that’s dumb.’ 

‘This damn campus map make no sense.’ 

‘I hate everything about this guy’s hair- SHIT HE CAUGHT ME STARING—’

‘Fermions: matter particles, bosons: force-carrying particles, hadrons: two or more quarks held together by a strong nuclear force, quarks: an elementary particle and fundamental constituent of matter—’ 

‘Shake shake, shake shake, shake shake it-FUCK.’ 

But if someone ever asked Jayce exactly when he began to fall for Viktor, it could be summed up in one encounter. 

Viktor pulling his knees up to his chest, wiping away tears, staring at an exam he’d passed with flying colors, earning him a whopping 120/100, the words ‘phenomenal as always, Viktor’ marked with red pen across the top of the page, and then the following thought Jayce had caught from him: 

‘I really want to be an astronaut.’ 

Jayce felt an ache in his leg then at the sight of the end of Viktor’s brace peeking out of the bottom of his jeans. It didn’t matter how many competitions Viktor Dvořák had put to shame. It didn’t matter that every test was as easy for him as breathing. It didn’t matter that his hand was up for half of every class he attended. It wouldn’t even matter if he shook the very foundation of Astrophysics and Cosmology combined with some groundbreaking revelation. None of it changed the fact that the NASA Long-Duration Space Flight Physical was as good as a fate sealed. A boy with a body like his could never pass. 

Viktor Dvořák would never be an astronaut. 

But nor would Jayce Talis. 

He’d left the observatory door open that day, drawing Viktor in with the tiniest press of his voice saying, 

‘Look at the stars. Feel better. You’re still a part of it.’

And when the little 5’7” dreamer in baggy jeans with a puffy nose lumbered in, pressing his eye to the lens of the scope, they both bawled, Jayce just a wall away, mourning the loss of dreams together, neither of them alone, though neither of them knew it yet. 

He would understand. Jayce thought as he bit into his blood pack for the night, the walls of his house too oppressively familiar. Viktor would see me. He cried even then, lamenting beneath the light of the moon, swallowing the air until dawn. I know I see him. 

✧*.

Viktor’s pulse started changing. Jayce noticed the quirks of it from the very first time he’d gotten close to him, how it was related to the breath, how it flickered when he was in pain and drowned when he was overwhelmed. But its pace had shifted over time, perhaps before even Viktor himself had noticed it was failing him. 

Humans die, young and old. Jayce had family left—distant cousins, kids of kids, relatives so far removed they might not even know his name—but the looming fear of eternal loneliness was crushingly undoing nonetheless. Anyone and everyone he knew and loved would be gone someday. Most of them were gone already. That was his fate: forever, forever. 

The accident that stole his leg was a training injury: a slip from a rope bridge while carrying weights, his leg tangling in the jute, dooming his landing. And if the fall itself hadn’t decimated the limb enough, one of his metal dumbbells tipped off the bridge right along with him to collide with his shin, crushing the bone and flesh into paste. 

The pain split him in half, but it was the white of his tibia and fibula, splintered and gorging through a mess of skin and muscle that sobered him most. 

‘This can’t be happening.’ He’d thought. ‘I NEED my legs...’ 

Oh what a thing to take for granted: functionality. 

He’d sought out medical treatments all over the world. He had been a prime candidate for the Apollo 11 moon landing of 1969 until... until he wasn’t. He’d do anything to salvage that opportunity—anything. And that’s when he met Dr. Corrin Reveck. 

On his journey down every possible dastardly avenue, he’d eventually met with a doctor in Germany who touted ‘miracle cures’. What the hell, right? Worth a shot? 

Except when he awoke from the ‘surgery’ that was meant to save his leg, he found that the leg was exactly as it had been, but every other aspect of his body wasn’t. 

He hadn’t known that the ‘miracle cure’ was a cure for death itself—not for what had kept him from living. 

That fucker Dr. Reveck was thrilled with the results and had taken quite a hefty sampling of Jayce’s blood for his own purposes.

But Jayce… hadn’t even gotten to say goodbye to the sun. 

He doesn’t remember if he’d let the doctor live. 

Only his mother knew the truth. It had been 20 years since she’d passed on now. He couldn’t bring himself to turn her, a devout woman of God, into the makings of the Devil he’d become himself. That was his proverbial cross to bear. 

But... then there was Viktor. Beautiful Viktor. Sweet Viktor. Genius Viktor. 

As a queer man who’d survived the AIDS epidemic of the 80s on the Devil’s work alone, it was especially compelling to find himself falling in love for the first time in a world that saw the whole ‘queer’ thing quite differently than it had in his own time. Born in 1933, Jayce Talis was now living in 2008, shoulder to shoulder with 26 year old Viktor Dvořák. 

But the boy was slated to leave him too. 

That’s when the urges began. That slim, pale neck, pulsing with blood doomed to betray its host... Jayce could change that. He knew he could. 

But God could he ever live with himself if he did? Yet he needed to. He needed to save him. 

With his head on the boy’s small shoulder in the lab, he listened to his heart pound and pound and his thoughts race with worries and wonders and... he stopped time. He watched the stillness, sat in it, stole more moments, praying for eternity within the time he took in these paused minutes and sometimes even hours where he went almost dizzy staring at him and obsessing over his crooked smile and small hands, this perfect boy who was going to die...

Then came the day Viktor learned of his prognosis. 

Jayce could feel the fear the boy ached with from all the way across campus. He waited in the observatory, pulled Viktor to him with those same words he’d lured him with before, 

‘Look at the stars. Feel better.’

And sure as the moon orbits the Earth, Viktor came into his orbit too, half-stumbling through the observatory doors, his poor, sweet face sodden with the crushing weight of his own imminent doom. 

“Jayce...” He managed one whimpering word before his arms were held out for the heavier man to catch him. He’d known Jayce wouldn’t let him fall. It felt like Jayce was all he’d ever known these days. 

“I know, little angel.” Jayce cooed, combing his chestnut hair with his fingers as Viktor shook with sobs against his chest. “I know.” He tried not to let his own voice break as they both clung to each other, grip strength tightening with all the things they wanted to say, but for which there was no language more profound than touch. 

He locked all possible entryways into the observatory with his mind that night, each latch turning with a faint click, closing them into a sanctuary of the stars and ‘you’. He didn’t really care if Viktor noticed, for he’d begun crying too. 

✧*.

Viktor’s cherry red beater was a bit of a clown-mobile for 6’3” Jayce. Even the steering wheel looked like it belonged to a Barbie car and not a real vehicle when locked within Jayce’s grasp. 

A Linkin Park CD powered up the second the engine turned over, carving electronic notes incongruent with the mood through the speakers that boomed by their calves. The heating coughed and sputtered to life slowly to blow out the mid-autumn chill of late October, the smell of the engine thick and tarry through the vents. 

“-’m sorry ‘bout my car...” Viktor choked out, voice strained and eyes red as the paint of his 1994 Ford Tempo. 

Jayce reached over to draw soothing circles into his small thigh. “We’ll be alright.” 

Viktor huffed. “Maybe you, but not me.” 

Jayce said nothing, just kept drawing over Viktor’s leg muscles like molding clay. He turned up the music slightly and started to sing along to ‘Breaking the Habit’, line by line, word for word. Viktor closed his eyes and pressed his swollen cheek to the cold glass of the window, the rocky motions of the car jostling him and blending with Jayce’s clumsy voice to mute the smaller man’s disquietude. 

He could say anything and Jayce would hold the words in silence or in comforting affirmation or with a smile of solidarity like it was fine, like it wasn’t oppressive to hear so much about someone else’s misery all the time. It didn’t unnerve Jayce. It just was. Like Viktor had noted before: statement of fact. How things were. 

Jayce did not act like a victim to Viktor’s misery, just a witness, a friend, though they were more than that by a mile. 

.☼.

The facade of Viktor’s apartment peeled out from behind a tree line, his bumpy driveway rocking the suspension of his beater as they pulled to a stop and cut the engine. 

Jayce pressed the back of his hand to Viktor’s cheek. “Let’s go inside.” He said in the heavy quiet. “I’ll make you something to drink. Warm you up, hm?” 

Viktor nodded and bent into his touch. He only managed a hum before he was guided into the apartment like it was Jayce’s own. 

The place was decently clean, though a bit cluttered. Books and stacks of CDs, VCR tapes and DVDs, a behemoth of a television set atop a precarious TV stand, NASA themed coasters but with cup rings still left on the coffee table, a sweater or two thrown on a chair and a sink full of dishes he planned to get to eventually. And in every window a suncatcher, spinning slowly. 

“I have hot chocolate.” Viktor suggested shyly, trying not to ask for too much off the bat. “I-if you want some, that is. Box on the counter. Swiss Miss—the good kind.” He fumbled with his jacket before Jayce placed careful hands along his arms and dragged it off for him, hanging it up on one of the hooks by the front door. 

He rubbed his nose in Viktor’s hair and drew his thumb under the boy’s drooping eyes. “Sounds perfect, V. Why don’t you put something on the TV? I’ll be quick.” 

Viktor could only hum and nod again as he limped to his movie shelf. But when he stood before his collection, it hit him, then, that he actually had no idea what movies Jayce even liked. He ran through a list of what he knew Jayce favored otherwise: stars, telescopes, math, coffee, deep talks, science history, Viktor Dvořák for some reason—

God dammit. 

He pulled out two VHS cassettes. At least with options on hand he could make a dent in his interests. 

He walked into the kitchen and presented the tapes. “Wrath of Khan or a Nat Geo re-run on dark matter.” 

And to his surprise, Jayce picked the former, his face lighting up like a kid on Christmas as he took the tape into his hands. 

“I remember-!” But Jayce stopped himself with a swallow, like he was withholding. “...watching this as a kid with my dad! It’s one of my favorites.” 

Viktor grinned brightly. “You like Star Trek?” 

“I’m an adjunct professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics and the supervisory director of an observatory. I don’t think there’s very many people like me who don’t.” He handed the tape back to Viktor, returning to stirring their drinks with a spoon. It looked like he’d found the milk and the mugs okay on his own. 

Viktor tried to hide his excitement but did a poor job as he all but tripped himself on his scramble back to the living room to load up the VCR. The tape slipped into the slot, the satisfying clack of the hatch closing and the hum of the reel rolling, enhancing his anticipation. 

He set out two coasters on the table and slipped his shoes off the backs of his feet, sitting cross legged on the couch as Jayce walked in with their mugs. 

“I wanna ask you something.” Jayce started, his eyes lighting up at the paused opening sequence on the screen. 

Viktor scooted closer as Jayce took a seat beside him on the sofa. “What’s up?” He asked, masking his exhaustion. 

Jayce pulled at the pocket of his cargo pants, the tiniest bit of peach pink reaching his cheeks. “How... how are you with affection?” 

Viktor put his head on Jayce’s shoulder shyly. “You mean like this?” He suggested, his voice small. 

Jayce huffed a laugh. “I mean, uh, if that’s your limit.” 

Feeling like a boy again, he stalled, but then continued, sounding even smaller. “It’s not.” 

Jayce slipped a hand around Viktor’s waist, looking down at him. “Then... can I hold you?” 

Viktor nodded, letting Jayce’s massive arms scoop him onto the man’s lap, his lips meeting the top of Viktor’s head and his fingers sliding just so under the hem of his oversized t-shirt. “This okay?” He muttered. 

“Yes.” Viktor sighed, nuzzling into the heavy expanse of his maybe-lover’s chest. 

And his waterline began to sting. ‘You have no idea how badly I needed this.’ He thought, heaving a weighty breath at the unparalleled relief of receiving another person’s touch. 

Viktor was in the lowest moment of his life. Perhaps the last moments of his life, as the doctors had suggested. Touch was all there was to anchor a man kicked off the docks of survival into the deep sea of prognostically dying. 

“It’s been a long time since someone’s held you, hasn’t it?” Jayce mused sorrowfully, drawing his thumb over Viktor’s hip bone and cocooning him even tighter against his heart space. 

The pressure and the fawning touch made Viktor positively melt. “I can’t recall the last.” 

“I’m not sure I can either.” Jayce admitted back. 

The movie strung soft melodies of decades past through the living room. Between the two men was a shared sentimentality, whatever context they’d learned the film in not more than a drop in the ocean. Viktor felt it was different. But couldn’t place how. 

.☼.

The screen played out the final sequence with a rumble from the tape as it came to a close, the credits having run all the way through as they nested in a closeness as necessary as breathing. 

Jayce felt Viktor’s weak pulse flutter, only to peter out again; tap on, fizzle out, tap on, fizzle out—the rhythm of a dead man walking. He had to squeeze his eyes shut and bite the inside of his cheek to drown out the torment of hearing such a foreboding drum. 

“You know, I...” He swallowed thickly, his teeth grinding and his chest stuttering with held back remorse. “I’d like to spend more time with you like this. I love our lab, but I can’t touch you as freely there as I can here.” He offered a shaky kiss to his forehead—startling, but only for the half-second it took to realize he’d given it. 

With circumstances what they were, it was no longer frightening to confess wanting one another. There were scarier things than being in love. 

A second. A realization. And soon he committed to a deeper kiss against Viktor’s satin skin. 

Soon he was in a frenzy of tears and affection. 

He kissed along his hairline, into the shell of his ear, over each cheek, onto his nose, across the plane of his jaw and into the dip of his neck and down the column until he settled there, squeezing him close, breathing sobs into his flesh and searching, searching for his heartbeat like it might kill him not to find it. 

“I’m sorry.” He whispered. “I’m being so selfish. You must be in so much pain, I just... Why you? Why do I have to lose YOU.” He ran his hand up Viktor’s spine, lingering just below his back brace. 

Viktor gripped him in return, curling his fingers into Jayce’s hair and the collar of his shirt. “It’s cruel what I’ve gone and done to you, isn’t it.” He said against his neck. 

“What could you have possibly done to me?” Jayce sniffled, all breath, barely sound. 

Viktor shifted, tilting his head down as if to hide. “Made you fall for a doomed man.” 

Jayce scoffed, drifting his fingers over his ribs like he were counting them. “You didn’t make me do anything, Viktor.” So soft. So... determined. “I love you all on my own.” He breathed. 

They froze. 

What was that Jayce had just said? What was that Jayce had just said?

“Oh?” Viktor sucked in. 

“Yeah.” Jayce laughed. And then swallowed. 

Viktor licked his lips, hiding even more. “I haven’t even kissed you, Jayce. How do you know?” 

And oh, did Jayce ever want to hide too, his words meek and embarrassed. “To be honest, uh.” He wiped his eyes on Viktor’s shirt. “I loved you before you even asked me out, V.” 

The human paused, his throat tight. “How long?” 

“I-I don’t think that’s important-” 

“How long, Jayce?” He asserted, his touch soothing but firm in Jayce’s cropped hair. 

Jayce pulled back, pressing his forehead to Viktor’s before turning away. “I think... a year.” 

And Viktor audibly gasped. “A year?!”

The half-man half-other wouldn’t meet his eyes. Until... he did. 

“Yeah.” That’s all there was to say. 

He didn’t dizzy Viktor this time though. He didn’t reel him in. He wanted it to be earnest. He wanted whatever Viktor offered in reply to be more real than any moment they’d shared so far. He knew Viktor didn’t love him yet—he’d know if Viktor loved him. It would be like a chorus in Viktor’s head, right? Bells chiming, truth sounding, fighting to breach his lips and find Jayce and match their sincerities and become one. 

For a moment, Jayce thinks Viktor will recede. He always says too much. Does too much. Is too much. 

But. 

Viktor curled in on him instead, bunching his legs up closer and pushing his forehead to Jayce’s once more. 

“Hold me like you’ve loved me for a year then.” He asked. 

And while it wasn’t quite church bells like Jayce had wanted… well. Viktor loved him a little. 

And somehow, in that moment, that was perfectly enough. 

.☼.

Viktor dreamed of timelines. 

Analogue: wall clocks, paper organizers, the common pencil. 

The future: recycling, a president who set a precedent, the Dell laptop. 

He wanted to be there to see who would win—the abstract of the future or the regressive past ever encroaching. Edison was a witch, the world was ending four years from now on December 21st, 2012, but digital watches were going to read heart rates if the ads were honest. 

Would he survive to see a cure? Would he be there when the rolodex was all but forgotten? The CD? The pager? Wired earbuds? 

As he slept, these dreams looked rather like a Dalí. All this ‘future’ melting... figments of his own educated imagination of what the world could be should he stay in it, melting, melting. His dreams, visions, dreams within dreams. 

His body unraveled like yarn as he stared out into the desert beneath a blazing sun, threads of himself whisking away into a cloudless sky, the heat unmerciful. He had always wanted to go past the atmosphere, though, hadn’t he? “To boldly go”. Jayce would agree. 

And there Jayce was. Just like he ought to be, no? In his dreams? Jayce was perfectly the same. No notes. Viktor waited for the world to tilt again, for that feeling to return. Surely he could recreate it. The sensation of being blurred was a sign of his own obsession with the older man, no? What he felt for Jayce was exactly what every movie and every romance novel described as normal. The pull towards your other half, meeting a soulmate, love at first sight. 

Love. 

Did he love him? He thinks he does. 

“Do I love you?” He asked the apparition. 

But this world was so... dull. Salvador Dalí was being put to shame by Viktor’s awake reality. Why were these splendid abstracts less spectacular than the sight of Jayce in the real world? Why wasn’t it happening? 

As his threads drifted up and up, through that hole in the ozone layer, right alongside the Cingular satellite that promised to keep “raising the bar”, Jayce stared at him, but the world did not alter itself further. Where was the feeling?

“I can’t feel you.” He told him. “Don’t I love you?” 

“Do you love me?” Jayce asked back. But the voice was different. 

It didn’t swim. It didn’t overwhelm him. Colors were the same, nothing visionary. Why was it different? 

“I can’t feel you, Jayce.” He reminded, the threads of his arms and legs entirely gone now. 

“Do you love me?” But that voice wasn’t... 

“Why is this different?” From his pelvis to his ribs, he dissolved. 

Jayce was perfectly himself. Perfectly. Viktor hadn’t left a single detail out. So why...? 

Why was Jayce just an ordinary man? 

“I must miss you.” Viktor queried. “Perhaps its your proximity that shifts the world for me. Knowing you’re nearby.” 

“Is that it?” Jayce asked. Teasing. Still himself. But not himself. 

“Before I go, Jayce, can you tilt the world for me?” The threads were leaving his chest now. “I want to feel it—what you do to me.” 

“Do you love me?” 

This was a dream. “Of course I do.” Why hesitate? 

“Say it.” 

Breathing. “I love you.” Eyes misting. 

“Do you feel me?” 

“I don’t.” 

“Do you know why?” 

“Because you’re not with me.” 

“Aren’t I?” 

“Are you?” 

“I am.” 

“Where?” 

“Wake up.” 

“But I’m dying.” 

“Open your eyes.” 

“Jayce, I’m dying.” 

“Be with me.” 

“I want to be. I’m trying to be.” 

“Then wake up.” 

“Tilt the world, Jayce.” 

“Only if you wake u-” 

But the last thread of his face flew away, leaving nothing but the void. 

✧*.

Viktor awoke slowly, curled up on the couch in the Physical Sciences building’s lounge. His body felt tight but warm, and something heavy was lain on top of him. He touched the surface closest to his face: fur lined, denim. Jayce. 

“I think it’s time for you to go home, little angel.” Jayce soothed. 

Viktor muttered something about allowing him to fall asleep in public, something something ‘in front of everyone?’ but with a rub of his eyes and a small yawn, he’d forgotten his grogginess. For there it was: that feeling, immediately charging through him like a drug. 

In his half-asleep stupor, it was completely overwhelming. 

“You were dreaming.” Jayce said astutely. 

Viktor tried to steady himself against the gravity of this... this... “What’s happening to me?” He muttered, slurred, almost delirious. 

And then it stopped. 

“What do you mean?” Jayce asked, but he was fidgeting. Viktor narrowed his eyes. 

“Do it again.” He whispered. 

The man paused, uncertain. “I-I don’t know what you mean, Viktor...” 

“Don’t you?” 

He caught it: Jayce gulping. 

“No...?” He said. Completely deprived of conviction. 

Viktor looked at the clock on the wall, recalling his dream. “Then why can’t I recreate it?” 

Jayce went quiet, running his palm along Viktor’s leg, and the boy slumped down again defeatedly, his cheek on his folded arm, pulling the jacket up to his nose. 

‘So I’m hallucinating.’

Jayce‘s grip tightened on his thigh. “You know what might be nice?” 

“Hm?” Viktor grumbled, still stewing. 

“Night drive. Top down. Slow speed, I promise.” 

Viktor met his eyes shyly. 

‘Come with me.’

There it was again—the world, axis, colors, spinning, God all of it-

And the boy said ‘yes’ like it was the only word he could recall knowing. 

.☼.

Top down. Slow speed. But the wind bit anyway. Such was autumn, though the day itself had been rather warm for the season. Global warming or something like that. 

Viktor’s hair billowed about him wildly, flickering, flickering like a little chestnut flame. His hand made dolphin motions in the night air out of the side of the Jeep, latching onto the roll cage with every turn before returning to swimming. Darkness drank the paleness of his flesh perfectly, the boy luminous as a mirror. Jayce stole many precious minutes to watch him, stilling time to capture Viktor in something like photographs. Paused and posed, he was memorialized in frozen seconds he hadn’t even known had passed. 

They drove until the road thinned out into dirt, the car cantankerous over every rock and bump, throwing Viktor around even as he tried fruitlessly to steady himself. And could anyone blame Jayce for laughing? 

The boy scowled, shouting over the wind and engine. “You laugh now, but when I go flying out of this car I hope you’ll at least find the courtesy to miss me!” 

Jayce clutched his chest, roaring with belly laughs. “Hold t-tight there, little guy! Y-you’re doing grea- haHA!” 

Viktor smacked him on the arm before bursting into fits of laughter himself as he fully lifted off the seat, the seatbelt putting in its work to keep the comedy from becoming tragedy.

“You’re an asshole!” He yelled, hanging onto the back of Jayce’s seat with one arm and the car door with the other. His smile was wide enough to hurt. 

As they pulled to a stop at last, Jayce snorted and covered his mouth at the unruly state of Viktor’s hair. It stuck out on all ends, some in his face, some just shooting straight up like a hedgehog’s quills. His cheeks were bright pink and speckled with red from the cold, his nose bright as a Christmas elf’s. 

The boy gave him an absolutely ridiculous grin as he settled with heavy breaths. 

Jayce scooped at his hair, combing through it one-handed. “Lungs doing okay?” 

Viktor beamed and nodded, but then tilted his chin towards his bag in the backseat as if to ask ‘just in case?’. Jayce swooped into the backseat for his inhaler, letting him take a few puffs before stowing it safely away. 

“Where are we?” The boy asked at last. 

Jayce grinned. Stepping out of the vehicle, he circled round to Viktor’s side, pulling open the door and grabbing under his armpits to guide him safely to the ground. 

“I can do it-” Viktor interjected, but his feet were already on the dirt. 

“It was quite the endeavor watching you get into my car. I’m not taking any risks on getting you out.” They stood in place for a moment, Jayce combing through Viktor’s absurd hair and planting a kiss atop his head. “Come on. I’ve got something to show you.” 

Viktor nodded once as Jayce reached behind him for a blanket, tucking it over Viktor’s shoulders snugly. 

All around them were tall, fluffy reeds the color of wheat. They bristled in the cold wind, rattling against each other with a schwa. The silence was so profound it made Viktor’s ears ring. 

A wide boardwalk cut through the marsh, the wood smooth and sturdy, every footfall offering a slight clunk to the quiet. 

Jayce stopped them when the car was out of sight, the reeds a bit lower, a view of the bay now visible in the distance. 

Schwa went the reeds. Jayce could swear he heard the same sound in Viktor’s veins. 

“Sit, love.” He pushed lightly on the boy’s shoulders, guiding him down, and then closed his eyes. “Listen.” 

Viktor followed suit, huddling up in the blanket’s warmth, thigh to thigh with Jayce with his legs bunched up to his chest. 

There was nothing for a moment, save for the reeds. Until the slight voices of the marsh came forward in the settling noiselessness. Water trickling. The boardwalk creaking. The lapping of waves against a parked boat in the far distance. Crickets chirping even this late in the year, but far away, perhaps back near the car where the tree-line started. 

‘Open your eyes.’

Viktor obeyed. 

The milky way sprawled above them like a great shroud or perhaps a river. Something sateen and long and comforting. 

“The boy likes the stars.” Jayce said softly, looking at Viktor like he’d hung the moon. 

But then Viktor whipped around. “What did you say?” 

Jayce furrowed his brow, half-smiling. “The boy likes the stars...?” 

“Yes. Right. ‘The boy likes the stars’.” His eyes narrowed. “I’ve only ever heard that in my head up until now. It’s so specific: ‘the boy likes the stars’. And it isn’t how I speak either so it has to be...” 

‘Me?’

Viktor nodded slowly. “You.” 

There was a pause, waiting, measuring outcomes. A comet crossed the night sky. Neither of them noticed. 

Viktor continued. “You...” He started up again. “There’s something about you, isn’t there?” 

Jayce shifted. “...There is.” 

“So... you admit it?” 

“Admit what?” 

“That you’re... you know...” 

Jayce laughed gently. “Gay?” 

And Viktor punched him. “Not gay, asshole. You know what I mean.” 

The vampire felt the boy’s pulse quicken. Could feel that current flipping around in that slight body like white water rapids. And so… he tilted him. 

The feeling was irresistible for Jayce just as much as it was pleasurable for Viktor. It was like every blood cell in Viktor’s body could almost be grasped and kissed individually, cupped in Jayce’s hands and read like a book that told all his secrets, words seeping out, his scent stronger, his skin alight with all its many tones and capillaries: primary colors, but bleeding into so many secondary shades. He could sense every moment of him, past and present, the future his to decide: take him, want him, make him yours, Jayce. 

Viktor was perfectly Jayce’s own in the tilt. 

He kissed lightly at Viktor’s angular brow, smoothing his thumb over his freckled cheek. His panting breaths while overcome by Jayce’s tilting made the vampire hungry for every drop of the boy’s oxygen. He wanted to steal him, every single one of his five or six senses, write his name on them, emblazoned with a ‘JT’, ruby red, Viktor gold. Want want want—

I’ll tell him. He thought. As much as I can. 

He planted a kiss on the boy’s pulse point, resting his mouth in the pooling heat of Viktor’s returned affection. “Do you hear it?” He muttered. 

‘Can you hear me?’

Viktor nodded slowly, closing his eyes, succumbing to the dizzying perfection.  

“Do you mind it?” Jayce asked. 

Viktor shook his head, his breath slowing, relaxing, though all the pistons of his heart were firing. 

‘Don’t be afraid.’

“I’m not.” Viktor replied, though perhaps too breathily. 

“Aren’t you?” 

‘Tell me no. Push me away.’ 

“Why would I do that?” 

“This is... okay then?” He slid his hand into Viktor’s hair, pulled back his head so gently, but like he was withholding strength. 

‘Or... tell me yes. Say yes. It’s all I want. You are all I want.’

“Really?” Viktor breathed, drifting and drifting. 

‘Really.’

“Honestly...” Viktor whispered. And then smiled. “Me too.” 

Jayce’s breath audibly fluttered.   

‘Do you want the truth, Viktor?’

“Give me three guesses.” The boy still had willpower enough to tease, it seemed. 

“Just three, then.” Jayce breathed, licking a stripe along his neck. 

“Mm... psychic. A powerful one. No gimmicks.” He managed a smirk for only a second, lip shivering at the caress of Jayce’s mouth pressing butterfly bruises into his collarbone. 

“Wrong answer.” Jayce rumbled, taking Viktor’s face into his hands and suckling on his jaw, rubbing his ear lobe between his two fingers. 

He felt Viktor shudder. “S-succubus, then?” 

Oh, if only. Jayce chuckled at such a suggestion, his teeth grazing his skin in a way the boy who’d never even been kissed could not handle. “Wrong again, little angel.” He moaned into the epithet, letting them both fall backwards until Viktor’s head rested in the crook of his arm against the boardwalk. 

Jayce dragged his fingertips over every feature he set his sights on, ‘tilting’ him enough to keep that delicious pulse right at the tip of his tongue. 

And when Viktor next spoke, he stared at Jayce, holding every star from the milky way above them in his eyes. “...Vampire.” 

Jayce stopped. 

“I got it, didn’t I?” The boy smiled, drawing his thumb over Jayce’s upper lip until he scooped beneath it, cataloguing his teeth. “Hm. Missing these, though?” 

Jayce paused but then let his fangs slip out slightly, the dagger edge pricking Viktor’s teasing thumb. But the boy did not pull back. 

“Pretty.” Viktor muttered, running the pad of that thumb over the shiny surface of Jayce’s unsheathed fang. “So fucking pretty.” 

And to the vampire’s surprise, Viktor—sweet, shy Viktor—kissed him. Hard. 

Like he wanted those daggers in him. 

Clever, clever boy. 

Jayce let himself get devoured, moaning with stuttered breaths, Viktor’s face pressed between Jayce’s arm and Jayce’s mouth that suckled and lapped up every millimeter of flesh he could get his teeth into—

Shit. 

“Hey, careful, Vik!” Jayce pulled back, retracting his fangs. 

But the boy whined, gripping the back of Jayce’s hair as tight as his meek fist could manage. “Out. Put them out again.” Diving right back in. 

“I’ll hurt you—mmph!” His warnings silenced. 

“Out.” Viktor pleaded, grabbing Jayce’s lips with his own, bullying them together gracelessly, desperate for this touch he’d been denied all his life and God, Jayce could feel it—the innocent, rampaging impression of a first time. 

So Jayce slowed him, correcting his pace, hushing him lightly. “Shhh. Only if you’re gentle.” He chided. “Watch your pretty tongue.” He swallowed. And let his fangs slip down once more. 

Viktor’s breath fluttered, biting his lip. “And to think you tried to hide these beautiful things from me tonight. Mind-reader. Hypnotist. Telepath. Blood-sucker. Fuck. I’m lucky.” 

Jayce smiled against their softly meeting lips, careful not to nick him but allowing the boy to try in earnest anyway. His chest was so full he began to wonder if Viktor had powers of his own. “My boy loves the stars and monsters, hm?” 

Viktor pulled at Jayce’s chin, kissing each fang once. “Not monsters.” He muttered, rubbing noses. “Just Jayce.” 

And Jayce could swear his name had never come closer to something beautiful. 

.☼.

So about that date. 

If daily visits to the observatory counted as ‘dates’, perhaps they’d been on several dozen. But hanging out at the university, unfortunately, was not the kind of romance Viktor was after. 

He’d made suggestions: coffee, library, museum, botanical garden, whale watching—activities where they could talk and spend real time together connecting on what they loved. Movie theaters were too impersonal and silent. Bars too loud and unwelcoming to people like Viktor who couldn’t even drink thanks to all the meds. And planetariums were a bit... redundant, to say the least. But Jayce—apologetically—turned down every one. 

Viktor was beginning to worry that the whole ‘dying’ thing was taking its toll. That and the, well, impromptu kiss under the stars. He’d kissed his fangs for Christ’s sake. 

Was it a step too far? He asked himself, and then flipped open his phone, the sun charm clinking against the metal backing. 

Viktor 5:00pm: r u getting cold feet? 

Jayce 5:03pm: no! no not at all. I just have a hard time w mornings 

V: oh shit 

V: well... cant blame u. 

J: u dont say? 

V: can it and pick a place wise guy

J: ok ok this might b a bit ridiculous but

J: arcade? 

J: how about it? 

V: man after my own heart 

V: last drop? 8pm? 

J: yes!!!!!!! YES!!!!! 

J: thank u <3

V: dont thank me yet dork. ur done for 

J: thats what u think ;-)

V: prepare to be disappointed <3

J: thats cute <3

Viktor wasn’t sure what he’d expected upon arriving, but the world tilting on its axis was becoming far too common an experience for him in Jayce’s presence. 

Jayce Talis was like a dose of Dilaudid; rippling, numbing, dizzying opium curling from a pipe in plumes of smoke, a tire swing spinning too fast, and then his feet were inches from him before he even remembered he had feet and Jayce Talis was all he could see, all he could hear and smell and feel and if he became addicted—well. He hoped he never got better. 

“Aren’t you a pretty little thing.” Jayce’s voice resounded, blocks of neon from the arcade signage seeping into view and blending with the green and gold of his eyes that threw Viktor into circles, spinning and spinning— “Careful, Vik. Don’t get lost looking at me.” Lip-biting through his smirk like a real bastard. 

“How do you do that?” Viktor asked, dazed, his arms around Jayce’s neck. 

“Do what?” His eyes flickered like twin flames, his lips curling and God his teeth were white. 

Viktor slid his hand up to tease at the back of Jayce’s short hair, twirling to the same rhythm of his dizziness. “Make my entire body and mind go drunk on your proximity and then make me feel safe even as you steal me away.” He ran his thumb over Jayce’s supple lower lip. “You know... I’d never been kissed before that night. And now I feel so... empowered. All I’d have to do is lean in-” 

But Jayce’s hand grabbed his chin, restraining him. Like that didn’t just make matters even more unbearable. “Date first. Then we’ll uh...” He laughed breathily, like he couldn’t help it either, like Viktor made him feel just as drugged up. “Then we’ll... talk.” The wind of the consonant touched Viktor’s lips like a kiss, Viktor’s eyes fluttering closed—

He blinked and he was standing by the front counter, Jayce’s palm gripping his hip just a little too tightly to be normal. Viktor looked up and caught sight of his jaw tightening, his eyes focused too far forward as he smiled at the arcade employee a tad too brightly, a paper cup of bronze tokens in a hand that shook just that tiniest bit. 

When Viktor went to tuck his hair behind his ear, he noticed the front strand was no longer in front of his face like he’d left it, already set back for him. He’d ask, but he knew it was Jayce.  

He smiled. Seems like the human had gone and ‘tilted’ his vampire too. 

Viktor walked them over to Street Fighter, shockingly open though not likely for long, and sat himself down on the stool awkwardly as Jayce’s grip had not yet loosened. 

“Jayce.” He smiled, tugging on the man’s black zip-up hoodie. “Why don’t you sit down? We’ll play together?” 

Jayce’s eyes went blurry again, only this time, Viktor had the right defenses. Instead of unmoored, he felt powerful. Jayce’s slipping composure was because of a skinny 26 year old nerd in an oversized grey sweater vest and jeans held on with trust and a belt he’d had to punch a new hole into. How invigorating. 

Jayce pulled his hand away with a tremble as he took his seat beside Viktor. The game booted up, bulbs of blue and red flickering around the perimeter, the leaderboard blinking with the top ten in orange. Viktor jabbed his thumb towards the screen and smirked. 

“Guess which one is me?” 

Jayce raised an eyebrow. “You rank?” 

Viktor nodded. “On more than one machine.” 

“So... you come here often.” 

“All the time.” 

Jayce pinched his side. “Then what the hell was I waiting for?!” 

Viktor laughed and slapped his hand away, leaning forward and pulling him down onto the stool beside him. “I thought you already knew.” 

Jayce’s lips opened, melting into a look far too saccharine for the circumstances. 

‘You’re really not afraid of me, huh?’

Viktor only smiled in return. 

‘How could I be? It’s you.’

.☼.

Jayce was so damn happy he hardly recognized himself as the formidable immortal he was meant to be, rather resembling an average young man falling madly in love. 

“That’s not really how my… talent works… But I see your point.” He glanced at the screen, scanning the names, quieting the excitement that made his body buzz. “Mmm... my money is on 1st or 3rd place. The thrill of the bronze medal would be enough to satisfy you, but the disappointment of silver—one step away from gold—would drive you crazy. So which is it?” He pointed at 3rd place. “GATZBEE for the Bronze or...” He dragged his hand up to 1st. “H3RALD for the Gold?” 

Viktor snorted, his eyes crinkling. “Only the best for the land of the free.” 

Jayce beamed and nudged him once again, pumping his fist and whisper yelling, “USA! USA! USA!” Before they knocked each other back and forth enough into place at their respective controllers. 

“Ready to face the might of the H3RALD, Jayce Talis?” 

“Only if he’s ready to be usurped by silver medalist G0LD3N B0Y.” 

Viktor whipped around to gawk at Jayce with a playful look of shock. “Now look who’s keeping secrets!” 

“Today’s the day you finally lose that top spot.” He selected ‘two player’ with a definitive punch of the start button. “I play Vega. You?” 

Viktor smirked. “Chun-Li.” 

The battle was fierce and tense, but even with Jayce’s advanced senses, he couldn’t land a scratch on the kid. How a shrimpy nerd like Viktor was besting an actual vampire should be studied. Jayce thought of the title of the dissertation: ‘The nature and nurture of skill: A case study on innate talent versus learned experience.’

“You weren’t kidding, V. You’re kicking my ass.” Jayce half-laughed, hiding the blush of his humiliation under the dim arcade lighting. 

But Viktor saw it anyway. “I did warn you.” He smirked. “Though I’m surprised your exceptional ego is so easily bruised, golden boy. We’ll do the punching game next: an easy win for you.” 

Jayce scoffed, his pride really wounded now. “Oh please, if I agreed to an easy win, I’d have to take back my claim on the trait of ‘competitive’. We’re playing as equals, and I will beat you.” 

Viktor guided him to the shooter next door to Street Fighter. “Well then. How about this? We’ll keep track of our wins: if I defeat you—the exceptional, the mysterious, the esteemed Jayce Talis—by midnight, then you will have to grant me one wish.” 

Jayce’s stomach fluttered as he heard it cross Viktor’s mind unrestrained: kiss me. 

He stifled the unrepentant joy fizzling through him, picking up the gun. “And if I win, the astounding, the gifted, the enchanting Viktor Dvořák will have to grant me one wish instead.” 

Viktor’s throat bobbed as he picked up the plastic rifle and loaded a coin into the slot. “Don’t go easy on me, mind-reader. I’m interested to know your wish, too.” 

Jayce licked at his fangs that peeked out. He wanted something a tier above. He did have a tendency to lose restraint in the face of temptation. The pump of adrenaline through Viktor’s veins wasn’t making it any easier on him. 

‘I want you.’ He squeezed his eyes shut. 

And opened them, slamming the ‘start’ button a little too roughly. 

He did not miss the flip in Viktor’s chest. 

✧*.

Tickets tallied, points counted, and Jayce’s disappointment was palpable. But only for a moment. 

The corners of his mouth lifted up teasingly. “So, what’s your wish, Viktor?” He held open the door, leading Viktor out into the chilly November air. 

“Don’t play cute like you don’t already know.” Viktor’s little heartbeat pounded Jayce’s hunger like a mallet. 

The vampire looped a finger into one of the boy’s belt loops, pulling him close. The neon of the signage flickered, casting Viktor in purple light, Jayce in red. “I want to hear it with your real voice.” He muttered. 

The boy’s breath hitched as he was tugged inward. “You’re insatiable.” 

Jayce dragged his teeth over Viktor’s jaw like trying to take a sample of the colors that painted his flesh. “Earth to Viktor, the genie of the lamp has wishes to grant.” A laugh left the back of his throat, breathy and low. 

Viktor’s hand pressed into Jayce’s lower abdomen, his firm belly tightening at the touch. The want was nearly painful as he met Jayce’s pretty eyes, thinking about his pretty lips. He almost smirked, but desire turned his smile into a brow-bending, slack-jawed view of a stone virgin, dying to be turned inside out by an experienced hand. 

“Kiss me.” Viktor purred, waist to waist. 

“Finally.” 

And Jayce lunged forward, taking Viktor’s small face into his massive palm right where it belonged, his other finger still hooked into that loop. 

Viktor’s whine was almost too much. His thin, wide lips were as honey sweet as Jayce remembered them being, curling perfectly into Jayce’s eager mouth, breath warm and wet, cursed with an abundance of sound that made Jayce’s eyes spin in his skull. He pushed into him harder, smooshing his slender frame into the wall outside the arcade so flush to the surface, smothered enough by Jayce’s stature, that it almost looked like Jayce were wrapped around nothing. His hips ground into him, his finger unlatching from that belt loop so that his palm could make purchase on Viktor’s little waist, slipping beneath his shirt to touch at his warm skin. 

Viktor’s hand grasped Jayce’s shirt just above his waistband, tugging on the fabric as he was crushed between a man and a wall. 

‘He tastes like a fire. He feels like a fucking fire. If I burned up like this, I’d die happy.’

Jayce hissed as Viktor’s thoughts came tumbling out, spilling into each other, messy and unrestrained. 

‘Taste me.’ 

‘Grab me.’ 

‘Crush me.’ 

‘Want me.’ 

‘Need you.’ 

‘Fucking need you.’ 

‘God I need need need—’

The vampire picked the boy up easily, hitching his thin legs over Jayce’s sturdy hips, bucking up once with a muttered apology, though he could feel the way Viktor’s mind and body craved it. 

Viktor’s pulse was moving so quickly in his meek veins, that Jayce could sense the sweet little thing beginning to feel faint, their lips mashing and moving ungracefully over the other’s, feeding on each other’s spit, breath, skin, and hapless moans. 

Jayce tugged at the back of Viktor’s hair, earning him a yelp as his teeth drew down Viktor’s neck. The pulse point was right there. That beautiful, throbbing pulse point... 

Jayce’s eyes glowed a dangerous gold-green like a pair of headlights, nipping at the tender flesh of his lover’s throat, laving over the freckle he’d found there and suckling on the skin around it, doing everything he could to mimic the feeling of a real drink without letting his fangs actually pierce into him. 

But then: 

‘Bite me.’

What? 

‘Bite me. You want to, don’t you? Take some. Take anything.’

And then his real voice: “Will it hurt?” Viktor hiccupped. 

Jayce swallowed, his fangs pulling out of his gums, his entire body trembling at just the idea. “Yes.” He groaned, more like a growl. 

Viktor’s eyelids fluttered. “Good.” 

‘Drink.’

Jayce held him close, keeping his chest pressed tightly to his own to feel his heartbeat, tracking its rhythm like a living EKG. He’d be careful. He would. He had to, he needed to, he needed to keep Viktor safe, surveilled, cocooned. 

And he wanted this. They both wanted this. 

His fangs sunk into Viktor’s neck. 

The boy gasped for only a second before his whole body went slack. “Oh.” He whined, dragging his hand into Jayce’s hair, tugging at his shirt below still as he relaxed into it. 

His blood was soft. How could it be soft? Rain. Pillows. Cashmere. Dew. Lavender. 

Jayce hadn’t drunk from a human in a very, very long time. 

He sipped slowly, drawing the warmth from his lover’s veins into his own, making Viktor a part of him by consuming what made the boy’s heart pound, what gave breath to his lungs, what pulsed through his organs and made him a living thing, Jayce’s living thing, Jayce’s Viktor. 

And when he pulled away at last, licking a bead of blood off his lips, he found the boy’s virginal eyes tinged with tears. Jayce wiped one from his cheek. “Are you alright, love?” His fangs began to retract, but not before Viktor’s eyelids fluttered open to catch sight of them. 

He wiped Jayce’s chin in turn where a red streak had mingled with the dark hair of his beard. “You’ll have to c-carry me home, Jayce. I’m afraid I c-can’t...” He swallowed, fighting the faintness clouding his vision. “-was exquisite. Again s-sometime...” And he collapsed into Jayce’s embrace, his legs going limp around his waist. 

Jayce rocked him in place, his own heart racing at an uncatchable speed, Viktor’s warm body soothingly lax like a doll’s. 

“Thank you.” Jayce whispered against his cheek, planting one final kiss before he shifted him into a proper hold, carrying him home. 

.☼.

When Viktor awoke, it was around 4 am, the muscles of his neck pulled taught from the strain of being drained. He felt hands in his hair, smoothing out his waves, petting him like he were a cat who’d done something worthy of praise. 

He recalled it all. 

The tug of his veins and muscles. The piercing breach of his flesh, somehow smoother than a needle. The dizzying, heart-throbbing suction that calmed his mind, subdued him, steadied his pulse and blood pressure into steady rhythms, lowered his temperature until he felt a slight chill, but also this coursing, irresistible warmth that felt more like a flower unfurling than the spreading flames he’d expected. It hurt. But in a way he didn’t know he’d needed until he’d felt it firsthand. 

“Jayce?” He muttered, turning over. 

And Jayce immediately met his lips. 

Licking into his mouth, he pushed his hips down onto Viktor’s, pinning him in place, wrapping him up in his arms lovingly, the kiss gentle and summer smooth now compared to the desperate devouring of a few hours prior. Viktor’s sleepy lips let Jayce climb around them, let him love him, let him take this holy thing called affection and make Viktor feel it in every sweep of his mouth, every tender grasp of his body, every languid grind and press into his mattress, so much more savory than a wall. 

“Don’t you have to leave?” The boy sighed. “The sun-” 

“I’ll stay here.” Jayce rumbled, suckling on Viktor’s lower lip. “Please. Let me stay.” 

“I-I don’t have many curtains, you’ll burn-” 

“I won’t.” He pulled away only just enough that their noses could still brush, their breaths still matching breezes from mouth to mouth. “I’ll be careful. I’ve been alive long enough to know how.” 

“Promise?” Viktor smoothed his hand over his lover’s cheek, cradling him with brows knitted in concern. 

“I promise.” He sighed, scooping Viktor into another enamored kiss. “God, I love you.” He breathed. 

When the sun came up, Jayce was fast asleep. 

Viktor petted him the way the man had done for him in Viktor’s own slumber, admiring every ridge of his face, the smooth edge of his jaw, the dark waves of his short hair peppered with a strand or two of gray. It set in stone one absolute fact, this shared moment, this knowledge that his body had been taken into another’s: 

He was in love with a vampire. 

He rose slowly so as not to disturb him, but—and pardon him for the pun—Jayce slept like the dead. Grabbing a thin sheet from his linen storage in the corner of his room, he draped it over the curtain rod, hoping it would suffice to keep out the light and any of its wandering beams. And then he just... watched him. 

Crossed-legged, hair mussed, wearing the same clothes as yesterday, Viktor leaned over and watched the man (monster? No. He wasn’t) sleep. It was so sound and so deep, it almost felt human. That world-tilting feeling was nowhere to be found as his beloved rested with the rising sun. He ran a finger down his nose and Jayce didn’t so much as stir, his breath leaving his deep pink lips gentler than a lake’s tide coming ashore. 

“I love you.” Viktor whispered, the words warm against Jayce’s sleeping face. 

.☼.

As the sun started to set, Jayce awoke to a distinct feeling of something... 

Wrong. 

He dragged his hand over his face, noticing the sheet Viktor had tucked over the window, and felt something shift against his chest. 

Viktor was shivering, curled up against him, sweat matting his waves against his cheeks and forehead. A cup of tea, gone cold, sat beside him on the nightstand along with his meds organizer, incompletely filled. 

And then he saw the purple bruising along the column of the boy’s perfect neck: right where Jayce had bitten him. 

Shit.

“Viktor- Viktor. Can you hear me? Baby, wake up-” He shook him lightly, smoothing back his hair, lifting his chin and feeling his pulse: fluttering, weak. Guilt-ridden, the vampire swallowed back tears. “V, please, come on, love, I need you to wake up, I need you to look at me.” 

The boy’s eyes opened just a crack, a soft whimper leaving his lips. “H-hurt...” He muttered, curling in closer to Jayce’s chest. 

Jayce ran his thumb over the bruises on his neck. He’d never seen this before. Such a little drink wasn’t supposed to have these kinds of consequences. Weakness, maybe. Exhaustion, sure. Maybe the slightest purpling right at the sight. But this? What the hell was this?

He gently slid Viktor over so he could reach the nightstand, inspecting his bucket of medications to see what he might have taken, if there were side effects he wasn’t aware of— 

Oh. Blood-thinners. What was this kid thinking?

“Viktor, did you take blood-thinners?!” Jayce placed a firm hand on his shoulder, squeezing to prompt him to respond. 

Viktor whined and then, reluctantly, nodded. 

The man couldn’t stop the sigh that left him. “Baby, you... you lost blood last night. I-if you were in pain... if there was something wrong, you should have woken me up, o-or taken a different medication, or, or, I...” He whipped his face to the side, hiding his tears with the back of his hand pressed to his mouth. 

He felt a light touch against his palm. 

“Shhh.” Viktor soothed, looking up at him, eyes glazed. “Not y-your fault. F-flaring. This happens.” 

“But the bruises-” 

“Happens. Symptom. Shhh.” His hand fell weakly to Jayce’s thigh, rubbing at the muscle with a tenderness he could scarcely muster in his state. 

The vampire thought it over. Bruising usually meant blood disease, but a blood disease would have killed Jayce when he drank from him last night. So, circulatory. Heart? His pulses and pressure were always off, that much was true. But then he also thought of oxygen, how a lack of it makes bruising worse, how Viktor wheezed and how his lungs worked harder than they ought to... 

‘Pulmonary Fibrosis.’

He turned to Viktor, his face paling. 

“What?” 

‘It’s Pulmonary Fibrosis.’

Viktor’s lips crumpled into a sorry smile. 

“How long, Viktor?” Jayce croaked. How long do I have left with you? He meant. 

‘I shouldn’t say—’

But per the ways of the mind, it slipped out the moment he thought it. 

‘6 months.’

The sun dipped below the trees at last, dusk all that was left of today. And now Jayce was the one who couldn’t breathe. 

✧*.

As Viktor recovered in bed, Jayce rubbed camphor oil into the bruises to get some circulation back into the area. Viktor’s previous day’s clothes were replaced with pajamas and a hot water bottle was pressed against his chest to ease his breathing. With Viktor stable and sleeping, Jayce was now alone in Viktor’s house. 

6 months. 

Why was every joy in Jayce’s life so short-lived? 

The vampire was going to live forever. The memory of Viktor, Viktor, Viktor would be with him on every pillow he’d ever come to lay his head upon, every neon light he’d ever catch a glimpse of, every star he’d chart or spot through a telescope, every brick in the walls of the university, every rumble of an old car engine, every Linkin Park track on the radio, every suncatcher in a window, though he could not see the sun himself. 

He had 6 months left with him. Just... 6 months. 

In this infinity? 

He had panicked thoughts, then, of the day of Viktor’s funeral. It would be in daylight—all human funerals were held in the afternoon. What if Jayce were to… show up? Let his body scorch into ash and fall into his lover’s grave, scattering atop his casket like snow... Wouldn’t that be nice. To join someone at last instead of letting them go. Over and over he’d let them all... go. 

The 80s were not kind to a queer romantic. Immortality was not kind to a man who’d led a life defined by connection, by shared love. He’d lost enough. 

When this... thing with Viktor started, he had looked forward to watching him grow old, his hair peppering with gray, his skin wrinkling with every smile he offered Jayce until the day he’d close his eyes, peaceful, sighing into the end before the death sounds took him over. He knew Viktor was unwell. But 6 months... at only 26 years old... 

Moonlight dripped in through Viktor’s kitchen window, catching the sparkling length of the suncatcher he’d placed on its pane. It twinkled, a star all its own, catching the watery remorse of Jayce’s tear-filled eyes. 

The boy loves the stars enough to become part of them.

He sobbed harder than he ever had for anything in all his life. 

✧*.

Hours later, huddled on the floor and wracked with cries, his cheeks streaked with red, his chest worn and breathless, he could do nothing anymore but rock in place. 

“Jayce?” Came a small voice. He turned to find Viktor shakily standing in the doorway, a blanket wrapped around his slim shoulders, engulfing him entirely. 

Jayce wiped his nose and rose quickly to his side. “V, what are you doing up?” He pressed his palm to the back of his head, his shoulder, his cheek. Viktor leaned into his touch, looking up at him with amber, doe eyes. 

“Jayce...” His little fingers drifted over to touch delicately at the vampire’s stained face. “You’ve been crying. I... I’m so sorry, I didn’t think you’d... I should have known that you’d know...” 

But Jayce only swiped at the wetness gathering on Viktor’s waterline, kissing just below it. “You’re so warm.” He recalled his thoughts of turning to the fire of the sun when Viktor’s own light went out. “So warm.” He kissed away every urge to fall apart. “Come on, I’ll bring you back to bed-” 

“It’s almost daylight.” Viktor interrupted. 

“Viktor, I was fine yesterday, I’ll be fine again-” 

“But…” Viktor’s pulse quickened. “Don’t you need to... eat?” Shyly, he slipped the blanket off his shoulders to rest on his forearms, turning up his neck, swallowing. 

But the thought made Jayce’s stomach turn. Not another set of bruises. “I won’t.” He said quietly. “I refuse.” 

“Why?” Viktor’s voice went firm and scalding, taking Jayce somewhat... aback. “Am I too weak to be wanted?” 

“N-no- what? What are you even saying, Viktor? How could I take from you again? Look at your neck for Christ’s sake-” 

“That’s not because of you.” His eyes burned. 

“Well, I started it.”

“And now you’re pitying me.” 

Jayce scoffed defensively. “I’m not going to hurt you. You can’t force me to hurt you.” 

“But you need to eat.” 

“But it will hurt you-” 

“Then go home.” The boy said with finality, turning away. “I don’t want you here if you’re just going to harm yourself. Go home before the sun comes up, grab what you need, and come back la-” 

But the sun had already risen. 

“Fuck.” Viktor sighed. He dropped the blanket onto the floor, loosening the collar of his shirt and pulling it to the side. “No choice, then. Hurry up. You can’t be in the kitchen when it gets over the trees-” 

“I said NO.” Jayce shouted. Yet Viktor—frustratingly—barely flinched. “I was an idiot. I knew you were in no state to accept such an intrusion, I-I was impulsive, I was reckless, I hurt you, I drained the man I love like you even have anything to drain-” He stopped himself then, cursing his big mouth. “V, I’m sorry, I’m not trying to pity you, I just-” 

“But you do, don’t you? You... you pity me.” He bent clumsily to gather up the blanket, his eyes misting again. And then his voice dipped into a whisper. “You weren’t supposed to pity me. You’re... you’re different.” 

Jayce approached him slowly, one hand outstretched. “I don’t, I swear I don’t, I’m worried for you, I care about you, I don’t... I just don’t want to hurt you, love, I really don’t. But you’re asking me to hurt you. Why would you ask me something like that? Why would you make me into...” He closed his eyes. “I refuse to be the thing of someone else’s nightmares.” 

He felt pressure on his chest, sliding up, Viktor’s small hand shielding the back of his neck. Viktor sighed when he spoke again. “To tell you the truth, Jayce... I felt powerful when you bit me. I’ve never felt like that before. The feeling... It was... power.” He licked his thumb and started to work at the ruddy stains on Jayce’s cheeks. “Would you deny a dying man his desire to feel infinite?” 

Infinite...

Jayce had a thought. A horrible, selfish possibility. Alone forever. Or... alone together. 

“I can’t hurt you.” He defended weakly, one last time, even if just to say he tried. 

Viktor leaned up, lifting onto his tip-toes precariously to reach Jayce’s ear. “But I need you to.” And then pulled back, nipping at Jayce’s lip. “That surrender, that perfect pull, the rush—oh, you have no idea.” He gripped Jayce’s forearm, sliding it onto his waist, his mouth coming to rest on the vampire’s jugular. “If you don’t want me to hate you for pitying me, bite my fucking neck and drain me until I see stars in the sunrise.” 

Jayce’s fangs slipped down almost against his will at that, his fingers tightening on Viktor’s thin hip, skirting under the hem of his shirt where that warmth was waiting. 

“So... it’s not because I’m hungry?” He panted. 

“No.” Viktor sighed, bending his throat, letting his hair fall to the side. “It’s because I am.” 

There was absolutely nothing the immortal could do in the face of a statement like that. 

Jayce sunk into his flesh, eliciting an eager, fluttering gasp from his lover. Lavender. Rain. Cashmere. Pillows. Dew. Every perfect fucking drop sipped from the alabaster of the boy’s complexion, just a little to the left of his jugular. Euphoria. 

The vampire heard and felt everything:

Viktor trembled beneath him, his breath hitching, his mouth agape and drinking the air because he could finally fucking breathe, and he didn’t know why. Why? Why was everything finally safe in the presence of a being straight out of a horror movie? Why did it make bolts of dopamine caress his spine? Why did he feel dipped into a warm bath in a cool breeze, drugged up with this feeling of infinity in his veins, like there’d never been anything good he’d ever felt but this pinch on his neck that-that-oh no— 

“J-Jayce-!” He cried as his eyes rolled back, his pants soaking with release. 

Jayce released him with a kiss to the tenderness of the wound, dragging his thumb over the small punctures he’d left behind. “Did you...?” He whispered. 

Viktor swallowed thickly, hiding his face in the crook of Jayce’s shoulder, shaking like a leaf. “Uh-huh.” A tiny nod. Jayce tried to pull him away but Viktor wouldn’t budge. “Don’t look.” He pleaded. “Please.” 

“Baby,” Jayce soothed, pressing his nose into Viktor’s hair. “You say that like you’ve done something I wouldn’t want.” 

“You didn’t even touch me...” He whined. “I w-wasn’t even touched and... like a teenager-!”

The vampire grumbled and pressed him close in spite of Viktor’s protests. “Or... like someone who actually did want it, huh?” He hummed, kissing once more at the mark he’d left behind. “I should have believed you. But I guess now there’s proof.” 

The boy groaned and knocked his head once against Jayce’s thick shoulder. “Don’t laugh.” 

Jayce felt the heat of the sun start to pour through the window, crawling up his back. In one swift motion, he lifted Viktor off the ground and shifted into the hallway, quick as an apparition. The smaller man was pressed against the wall, his throat caught in Jayce’s grasp. He met his gaze, that gold-dappled green-gabled gaze, and fell into it, dizzied once more. 

“Wash up, my love.” Jayce asked sweetly, though his strength did not relent. “I’ll wait.” 

Viktor might have asked where, but they both knew there was only one place Jayce could safely stay in his house: 

Viktor’s bedroom. 

“Okay.” The boy breathed. 

“Okay.” The vampire concurred. 

.☼.

The hot stream from the nozzle hit him with renewed clarity, his palms resting on his knees as he slumped in the shower chair. This was happening. They were happening. Viktor’s body... was going to be had. 

As if it hadn’t already been handed over twice already. Or perhaps dozens of times. God, who knew what even counted as ‘giving’ anymore. Who could ever know. 

He sighed and wondered if he were a new man. He’d never felt so brave in all his life. All of this was new and exciting, but also like a riptide he couldn’t help but follow, resigned to it, a thread of fate, red. 

He scrubbed himself until his skin was almost raw. He wanted this: new things. Fate. 

When Viktor stepped out of the shower, he tactfully left some parts of his exposed skin dewy, droplets trickling down his arms and back, his hair tousled just right. He adjusted a few strands over his face in the mirror. Brushed his teeth. Adjusted again. Wrapped himself in a towel from the chest down. And walked back to the bedroom. 

Jayce was perched on the edge of the bed, his leg bobbing in anticipation. 

“Hey.” Viktor smiled, unable to avert his eyes. 

“Hey.” Jayce seemed unable to do the same. 

The boy held up his towel, shielding his body from sight, leaning on his cane as Jayce rose from the bed, towering over him, his body heat warming the smaller man even without any sort of touch. The myth about vampires being cold certainly wasn’t true. 

“Can I...?” Jayce started to ask, lifting the towel corner. 

Viktor nodded quickly, trembling with nerves. And the towel fell off, exposing him to the cool air. “I-I’m not much to look at, I know, I-” 

But the vampire silenced him with another light bite of the neck, drowning his meal in euphoria. He pulled back, licking once at the trail of blood he’d left behind. “I’ve never seen a thing so beautiful in all my life.” 

And their lips met. As did everything else. 

✧*.

They lay in sheets rumpled around their bodies in the aftermath, something like a nest. 

Viktor glanced at the sun starting to leave, wondering how Jayce would look cast in its light. His bright, deep skin in the sun... he’d be unspeakably beautiful. 

“This life, Jayce...” He said softly, everything warm beyond belief. “You must be so lonely.” He kissed his lover’s forehead tenderly, Jayce’s cheek pressed against his chest. 

The vampire traced circles into the boy’s pale hip. “Not when I’m with you.” 

Viktor tried not to let that hurt: the disturbing fact of their short reality as ‘together’ before Viktor left him for the stars. But Jayce felt the sting in his pulse nonetheless. 

“My time with you is... disorienting.” Voice cotton soft. Fingertips drawing along bands of muscle and a few mysterious scars, probably from his human life. “Like something stopping and starting. It’s a feeling, but not emotional—physical. Like being hypnotized or... like something cold but it’s... not? A familiar pulse of cold but not quite. It’s the sensation of cold but my body says it’s actually warm and I... I don’t know what to call it.” 

“Why doesn’t it scare you?” Jayce asked tacitly. 

“Should it?” 

“Shouldn’t it?”

Viktor hummed in consideration. “No.” 

In this moment, he’d let Jayce keep him like a pet if he asked. 

‘As long as I’m with Jayce, everything is okay.’

‘As long as I’m with Jayce, I’m safe.’

And Jayce heard every word. 

.☼.

It made him consider... a lot. 

“Viktor...” He started, brushing his lips over the boy’s satiny, hearth-warming skin. “I need to ask you something.”  

“Mm?” Drawing and drawing on his back, slackening in the larger man’s embrace. 

Jayce’s throat bobbed, and then he coaxed Viktor’s chin up, rising to meet his eyes. “Do you... how do you feel about me?” 

Viktor stroked his lip, the dizziness subsiding as Jayce allowed him lucidity to decide his next words. “Didn’t you hear me the other morning?” 

“Vampires sleep pretty heavy, V.” He huffed with a laugh. 

The boy smiled, all sharp canines and crooked lips. He cocked his head to the side, capturing Jayce in his own sap-filled embrace of a stare. “I love you, of course.” 

And this lonely immortal, this eternally damned being of night and redness could only bite his lip with a boyish glee, a flutter in his ribs expanding until he thought he might just trap Viktor within himself, caged between his lungs where he could never leave, where he could... 

Never die. 

“Viktor.” The vampire asked, pressing his forehead to his lover’s, breathing his air. “Let me turn you.” 

Viktor stilled. 

“What?” 

He pulled the boy’s legs over his lap, soothed the skin of his naked thigh with his palm and breathed and breathed. “You don’t have to answer now, just... think about it. Please.” He pulled the blanket over him, tucking him into the crook of his arm and burying his face in his chestnut waves. “I can’t live without you.” He would not tell him just how much he meant that, though. 

Viktor was silent, unmoving, his thoughts a jumble of indiscernible sentences, burying each other just as Jayce grasped them, divining half meanings. 

‘Undead.’ 

‘Immortal?’ 

‘Sunlight-’ 

‘Blood-drinker Viktor...’ 

‘6 months.’ 

‘Jayce-!’ 

‘Forever...’ 

‘Lonely.’ 

‘Sunlight.’ 

He wriggled free, but not anxiously, more like he wanted Jayce to follow, his head turning over his shoulder as he planted his feet on the ground by his bedside. He slipped on a shirt from the floor and a new pair of pajama pants, latching onto his cane and nudging Jayce towards the door with his chin. 

The vampire got up as asked and followed, throwing on his same clothes from earlier, just in fewer layers. 

His lover guided him down the steps one by one by the hand, leading him through the hall and into the living room where a set of double-glass doors led out onto his cheap patio. He dropped Jayce’s hand and backed up towards the sun, opening the door and letting the wind rustle his hair. He turned towards it, morning cascading over his face, brightening every edge, lighting every freckle and mole like a beacon of starlight: a lucida. 

“I think I like being human.” Viktor hummed. “It’s hard but... there’s always the sun.” He peeked over his shoulder, the light catching that solid amber, a teasing, saccharine smile lifting the corners of his lips. “Not to rub it in.” 

If I could join you in the light, I would. Jayce thought. 

But if I can save you... maybe I won’t have to regret becoming *this* any longer. 

Maybe it was all just... for you. Fate. Or something like it. 

“Okay, Viktor.” He smiled back, stepping an inch closer, itching for his touch. “I understand.” 

‘Promise me.’

Viktor asked with his mind, his eyes severe. 

‘I promise.’

Jayce replied. And Viktor came back to him, resting against his heart space, right where he belonged. 

✧*.

Viktor didn’t show up at the observatory. 

It was nearing month 4 of 6. And his stance hadn’t changed. He would not let Jayce turn him. 

Can’t live without him. 

Jayce paced the lab like a madman, waiting and waiting for his lover to return just to feel his touch, just to know he was there and alive and with him. 

Can’t live without V. 

What was he going to do? What was he supposed to do? Let him die? Go without? For fuck’s sake. For fuck’s sake!

Can’t be alone again. 

He checked his phone: nothing. No calls, no texts. He sent another message, a quick: where r u? But no reply. ETA? No reply. V? Nothing. 

Can’t let you die. Can’t betray you.

Where was he? The night dragged on and on without a word, Jayce’s mind scrambling to find Viktor’s and noticing only complete, abject, sobering silence. He could reach him if he were nearby. But he wasn’t. 

Can’t live forever if we’re not together.

He grabbed his coat. 

Won’t live forever if we’re not together. 

Won’t live forever without you.

He sped to Viktor’s house, the rumble of his engine bolting past lights and stop signs thankfully only noticeable to alarmed passersby, but no cops. Not that they could stop him if they tried. 

Pulling up to Viktor’s driveway, he could feel only silence. He reached and reached but still, there was nothing. 

Is this how it’s going to feel?  He worried. Nothing?

He couldn’t make it up the steps fast enough. 

Tearing through the doorway, he shouted through Viktor’s house, calling his name, disregarding the pinch in his leg as he raced up the stairs, checking the bedroom first—nothing.  

Until he saw it: the glass door, wide open, Viktor’s pale little leg peeking into view. 

He found his fading pulse at last, let it drag him hopelessly over to his side, his own blood drumming with fear. 

Viktor’s chest was still. 

No, no, no... 

Collapsed on the patio, fading... fading... 

No.

Cheeks sunken, slack, lips dry and crooked, hair draped over his face, the chill of the night wind bristling its edges though it did not stir him in the slightest—why was he out here?

Jayce’s knees buckled. The boy loves the stars enough to join them. 

There were only flashes from then on. 

Chest compressions. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5...30, pinch his little nose, breathe. 

Still fading. 

No. 

Inhaler. Shake once. Line it up to his lips. Puff once. No inhale. 

Not taking. 

No.

Pulse dropping. Compressions. Another inhaler puff. Heart too fucking quiet— 

Slowing. Stalling. 

NO.

He took the boy’s meek body up into his wide arms, tears painting his face with stripes of vermillion until he could only see a pinprick light of Viktor’s face. 

He made a decision then. The only one he could make, perhaps. 

He’d never be forgiven for it. 

“I’m sorry.” He choked. 

I don’t have a choice.

And he sunk his fangs into his neck for the final time. 

“I’m sorry, I’m so so sorry, I’m sorry.” He sobbed, his voice muffled against his beloved’s neck as he sucked every drop he could from the boy’s still body. “I’m sorry.” He begged. But there was nothing but red. 

He tore open his own arm, letting his thick, vampiric blood trickle onto Viktor’s lips. The boy lunged upward in a half-dead stupor, sinking his teeth into Jayce’s tender flesh, the vampire’s vision blackening at the pull. 

“It’s okay. I’m sorry. It’s okay.” More to himself than to him. “It’s okay.” He soothed as Viktor pulled away and started to scream, his entire body tensing. “I’m sorry.” He pleaded. Viktor clawed at Jayce’s back, his body writhing and convulsing violently, torrents and storms, the heinous magic of man becoming beast. “I’m sorry.” Jayce cried. “I’m sorry, my love, I’m so sorry. Oh God, I’msosorry-” 

Viktor sobbed, ground his teeth, tightened his jaw and then flung it open to shriek as the fire of forever flooded his veins, scratched apart his muscles, clobbered his mind into figments of every moment he’d ever lived, flashing and flashing like strobes, bullying death out of and into his body over and over and over and then... 

Everything went still. 

Only when Viktor’s eyes flung open did Jayce relax, holding their foreheads together as the boy gasped and arched his back one final time before falling slack. 

“Jayce.” He rasped, finding his footing in the night world from within his beloved’s betraying embrace. “What am I?” 

“You’re alive.” Jayce sobbed. “You’re alive.”