Chapter Text
Jayce cursed under his breath as he smacked the head of another clicker off their shoulders. The disgusting mutated skull rolled across the rotten floor and landed into a pile of something that must've once been a human body, now so badly decomposed that it was barely recognizable. Resisting the urge to gag, he stepped over the mangled mass of flesh and swung his weapon over his shoulder again, ready to hit anything that attempted to jump him.
He reached the end of that particular hallway without further interruptions, but his joy was short-lived when the room at the end turned out to be a waste of time. A singular bullet was all he managed to scavenge, and he crashed out of the building through a window out of pure frustration. This had been one of the few buildings gone untouched by anyone on their patrolling route, and he'd really hoped spending the time to check them out would result in… something.
Jayce tossed the lone bullet to one of the two women waiting for him outside. Caitlyn caught it with a slight scowl. "That's it?" she asked, observing the object with distaste.
"Place had been swept clean," Jayce sighed and dropped his large hammer by his foot, stretching his tired arms. "Unless you need some rotting guts."
"No thank you," Caitlyn scrunched her nose and pocketed the bullet. "Well, I suppose one bullet is better than zero."
"There's one more place we haven't been to," Vi said, observing the dirty map in her hands. "Looks like… I don't know, a parking hall?"
Caitlyn looked at the map over her girlfriend's shoulder. "Those are prime bloater spots," she said. "Maybe it's better to leave it."
Jayce shook his head. "A parking hall means cars, and cars mean gas," he said, grabbing the hammer from the pavement.
Vi noticed the expression on Caitlyn's face and grabbed her hand to soothe her nerves. "Jayce can go check it and we'll return to the base," she suggested. "We've been out all day, it's gotta be gettin' dark soon."
"I'll be okay," Jayce echoed her sentiment, patting Caitlyn on the shoulder before grabbing the map from Vi. "If I run into a bloater I'm out of there. Promise."
It took some more convincing to get Caitlyn to let Jayce go by himself, but soon enough Jayce found himself walking along an overgrown street towards the underground parking hall. He didn't make it very far before getting distracted, though. There was a small corner store, or perhaps an old pharmacy, that wasn't visible on the map Vi'd given him. As he got a bit closer, it also looked surprisingly untouched. He'd never noticed this place before, passing by in a rush to get to the patrol spot, but it wasn't hard to miss. The door had practically grown shut and was only partly visible underneath the moss and vines, and it didn't have any windows. Only a partly crumpled down sign that wasn't readable after years and years of water damage.
Deciding this place was less likely to have a bloater — or anything else deadly, for that matter — inside than the parking hall, Jayce stuck the map into his backpack and rummaged through it to find a knife. It took a couple minutes for him to get rid of enough greenery to reach the doorknob, but when he did, the door practically swung open on its own.
Cautiously stepping inside the building, the first thing Jayce noticed was the smell. He covered his face with his hand to suppress a cough. It was the unmistakable stench of death; a mixture of dust, blood, rotting flesh and a lack of oxygen. It had been a while since the last time he smelled it so strongly, though he concluded it made sense. As he continued further into the little shop, he became fairly certain he was alone. It was completely quiet, almost unnaturally so — no footsteps apart from his own, no weird gurgling or moaning from the infected, no creaking floorboards of gusts of wind through broken windows.
The store appeared to have been some kind of a piercing parlor, or maybe a barber shop, judging by the dusty leather chairs and mirrors. The more notable aspect of the room was the ceiling, though; it had caved in completely, and below the massive hole was a pile of dead infected. Holding his breath, Jayce stepped closer and carefully poked the pile, half-expecting something to jump out of it. But no, the infected were just as dead as the atmosphere inside the store. He glanced upwards into the hole. It appeared that the bodies had fallen through multiple wood floors until they hit the cement foundation of the ground floor shop.
Not wanting to stick around to see if the rest of the ceiling would collapse on him, Jayce quickly went through all the counters and drawers he could find. A couple rags and alcohol bottles later he set his sights on the employees only -room at the back of the shop. Once he reached it, he tried to get through the door but it would not budge. Still, it wasn't locked; hell, there wasn't even a keyhole in the door. Someone or something was blocking it. Screw it , he thought as he decided to brute force his way inside and lifted his heavy weapon. He swung the hammer back, but stopped the movement when a sound rang from inside the room. Someone was inside; whether that was an infected or a survivor, he didn't know.
"Hello?" he said carefully. If it was an infected, at least he would know not to go in. But if it was a survivor… "Is someone there?"
It was quiet for a while, and Jayce was starting to think he had imagined the whole thing, when a muffled voice finally came from the other side of the door. "Go away."
"Are you hurt?" Jayce asked, ignoring the other's request. "Bit?"
"Leave me alone," they said. Jayce could pick up a slight accent from the voice, but it was too muffled to make out any details. He guessed it was a man, however.
"I can't do that," Jayce shook his head, knowing full-well the other man couldn't see him. "Listen, you can either open the door or I'm gonna go through it. Your choice."
Silence. Then, "I'll take my chances."
Jayce furrowed his brows and shook the door handle again, as if it would magically let him inside this time around. He debated his next step for a while. On the one hand, this person wanted to be left alone, and probably had a reason for it; maybe they were infected, or badly hurt, or resisting the urge to murder someone. On the other, though, Jayce had made a promise to himself a long time ago. A promise to never let a survivor go off alone, to wither away like that, if he had the smallest chance of helping.
"Step back. I'm coming through," he announced and lifted his hammer again. He didn't give the other man time to rethink his position before smashing the weapon into the wood with a deafening crash. The old, already fragile wood easily gave in to the metal, and practically flew off its hinges into the back room in tandem with the wooden beam pushed against it to keep the door shut.
Slightly surprised by how easily the door gave in, Jayce dropped his hammer by his side and stepped into the room to assess the damage. The back room had a window, unlike the main store, though it was small and dirty, barely letting in any daylight. The room was rather tiny, and didn't look like it had any supplies left, but that wasn't why he'd come in to begin with. At last, Jayce moved his gaze to the other man in the room, who was standing as far away from him as possible.
He was small and frail-looking, sickly pale and skinny with aggressive dark circles under his eyes and messy, somewhat greasy hair stuck to his sweaty forehead. Jayce took a step closer, but was immediately beckoned back to the doorway when the man tightened the grip of his crutch and pointed it at him. "Don't come closer," he muttered, voice hoarse like he hadn't talked in many days.
"Hey, okay," Jayce raised his arms in a mock surrender. "I don't want any harm."
"You broke the door," the man said incredulously.
"You didn't give me a choice."
"There was a choice," the brunet scowled, eyebrows furrowing so close together they could've been mistaken for a single line. "I said you should leave."
Jayce was going to reply, but gasped when the man suddenly clutched his leg and stumbled forward. Jayce leapt towards him and managed to catch the other before he bashed his whole body to the ground peppered with sharp wood chips. "Woah, woah, woah," Jayce steadied the man and helped him slide on the floor and sit against the wall. "What's wrong? Talk to me."
"Pain attack," the man winced, shakily rubbing his knee. "It… happens. Sometimes."
Jayce frowned and looked at the man's leg more closely. It had a makeshift brace attached to it, though not one that could ever offer the necessary amount of support and care. If anything, Jayce thought, it probably made things worse in the long run. "Are you injured? Your leg?" he asked, gently placing a hand on the man's calf.
He instantly slapped the hand away and retreated further against the wall. "No," he said, opening his eyes with a wince. "It's always been like that."
Jayce nodded slowly, having a hard time to keep his hands to himself when the other looked like he was ready to collapse at any moment. "What about any other injuries? Bullets, cuts, bites?"
" No ," the man insisted, sounding more exasperated by the minute. "Now go away, please."
"I'm not going to leave you here," Jayce said, trying to sound firm and gentle at the same time. He didn't want arguments about this. "Do you have any water, or food, or medicine?"
The man sighed and leaned his head against the wall. "Food ran out… A while ago," he shrugged. "Water… yesterday. No medicine."
Jayce huffed in frustration and grabbed his backpack. "See? You cannot stay here," he said as he retrieved a bottle of water and handed it to the man. "Drink."
"I can't," said the other. "It's yours."
"I have a bunch," Jayce insisted and pushed the bottle away from himself when the man tried to offer it back. "You need to drink. You're dehydrated."
The brunet looked like he wanted to argue, but gave in under Jayce's persistent stare. He took a small sip of liquid, but as soon as the water hit his dry mouth, he downed half of the contents in one, continuous gulp. Gasping loudly at the end, he gave the bottle back and frowned in a mixture of relief and embarrassment. "I suppose you were right," he said and laughed weakly.
"Why are people always surprised by that?" Jayce chuckled, corking the bottle and putting it away. "Do you have any allergies?" he added, starting to look for something to snack on.
"I'm not picky at this point," the man said. "I could eat dirt."
"Well, hopefully this is a slight improvement from that," Jayce said with a hearty laugh and handed over an energy bar. The other man took it without a fuss, aggressively chomping it down in a matter of seconds.
"So," Jayce said, also sitting on the floor properly since balancing on his knees was beginning to hurt, "have you been here for long?"
"Um, I'm not sure…" the paler of the two said. "Kind of lost track of time at some point."
"Did you kill all those infected in the other room? Or… were they like that?"
The man bit his dirty nails. "Do I look like a killer?" he asked with an unjoyous smile.
"Not exactly," Jayce admitted.
"We, um, we came in through there," the man gestured towards the corner of the room. Jayce looked in the direction and spotted a bit of light coming through a hole in the wall, covered by a slate of wood. "Thought it would be safe. Nobody was here. The ceiling crashed on day three. We had to barricade the door."
"Hold on," Jayce interrupted him with a confused frown. "You keep saying 'we'. Is there someone else here?"
The man's eyes widened for a second, almost like he hadn't realized what Jayce had. He hastily looked away, towards the opposite corner from the hole in the wall. "She… she didn't make it. One of them got to her."
Jayce stretched his neck over his shoulder and nearly jumped. He'd been so preoccupied with the man's wellbeing that he hadn't really looked what was behind him this whole time. In the corner of the room, sprawled partly against the wall, laid the dead body of a young female. She was dark-skinned and had her hair on a tight bun, with some of it poking out stubbornly. The only thing indicating that she was in fact dead and not just sleeping was the huge gash right on her forehead. It looked like a blade had been smashed through it, all the way into her skull and brain. Jayce nearly wretched at the sight, quickly looking away.
"She didn't want to turn," the man's voice was even weaker now, and trembling slightly. "So she made me do it. I… didn't want to. She…" His broken sentences faded out into a tired sob.
Jayce didn't know what to say as the man began to cry. Hesitant to touch the other due to the earlier reaction, Jayce crawled to sit next to him and wordlessly offered the man a literal shoulder to cry on. Too exhausted to resist the temptation, the brunet fell against his warm shoulder and breathed shakily. Jayce wrapped his arm around the man, still horrified by how skinny and cold his body felt. The man was practically a walking corpse.
"I know this probably doesn't mean anything," Jayce said quietly, rubbing the man's bicep with his thumb, "but I'm sorry for your loss. I… kinda know what that feels like. Lost my dad when the world went to shit."
The man nodded silently against Jayce's shoulder, messy hair tickling his exposed neck. "Did you know each other for long?" Jayce asked, leaning his cheek to the top of the man's head.
"Our whole lives," the man said, hiccuping quietly. "Sky was my only friend."
"I'm so sorry."
"...Thank you." The silence stretched out longer this time. Jayce nearly assumed the man had fallen asleep in his arms when he spoke again. "Do you think it's possible… to bury her? Someplace nice?"
Jayce thought about it. "We have a graveyard for the community I live in. I don't think it's possible to transfer her body, but… maybe you could take something of hers? Something that she liked or that reminds you of her."
The man moved a little bit and reached into the breast pocket of his dirty jacket. With a shaky hand, he pulled out a pair of broken glasses. One of the lenses was cracked and the golden paint on the frames had chipped away partly. "Will these do?" he asked. "They were hers…"
"That's perfect," Jayce said, giving a small encouraging smile. "That's actually exactly what we buried in his place, too. My dad's, I mean. Although, they were sunglasses. He always said they were his 'lucky charm' or whatever."
The man nodded a bit and put the glasses back in his pocket. To Jayce's surprise, he leaned back against the bigger man and buried his face into his shoulder. "What's this community of yours about?" he asked with his eyes closed, clearly ready to move away from such a depressing topic.
"We're a group of survivors with similar ideals, I guess. Really, anyone who isn't infected or a vicious murderer is welcome."
"Hmm," the man hummed. "I've been to one of those, too. Except, I think the things you mentioned were precisely the criteria for taking people in."
"Don't tell me you're from Zaun," Jayce glanced at the man.
He opened his eyes at the assumption and gave Jayce a quick look through his brows. "And what if that is the case?"
"I just… I don't know. I mean, we do have a few ex-Zaunites in Piltover, but those are rare," Jayce shrugged. "I didn't know people were allowed to leave that place."
"They aren't. We ran off," the brunet said with an expression Jayce found difficult to read. "That place went to the dogs after the management switched."
"So I heard…" Jayce said thoughtfully. "My best friend's girlfriend is from there. She also ran away. Was close to the old leader… What was his name?"
The other came to the rescue before Jayce could wrack his brain trying to remember what Vi had told him about her past, "Vander."
"Right."
"He was a good man. Not a perfect leader, but… he really tried to make everyone safe and happy," the man pondered out loud.
"You know," Jayce mused, "it's funny that I know the name of your friend and the man that used to run your old safe haven, but you still haven't told me yours."
"It's Viktor," said the other. "You?"
"Jayce," he introduced himself. "I would say nice to meet you, but I think we're past that since we've been cuddling on the floor for the past half an hour."
Upon the mention of this, Viktor suddenly jolted up and left the comfort of Jayce's shoulder. "Right," he said, and Jayce could've sworn he saw a bit of a blush forming on the other man's cheeks. He decided to not mention it. "Well, Jayce, I'm sure you have somewhere to be."
"Correction, we have somewhere to be," Jayce said, straightening his back. "Like I said, you're coming home with me."
"It sounds like I don't have a choice," Viktor muttered.
"Nope. Consider this a friendly kidnapping," Jayce smiled and bounced up from the floor, offering a hand to his new accomplice. "How's the leg now?"
Viktor took his hand and forced himself up with a groan. "Better, but it's still shit."
"I could carry you?"
"Absolutely not," Viktor reached for his crutch and lifted it a bit, ready to slap the hell out of Jayce if he even attempted such an idea.
"Alright then," Jayce dropped the suggestion quickly this time. It was already a miracle that he'd managed to get Viktor willing to leave with him, and he wasn't testing his luck any further. "You have any supplies that need carrying, though? Bags, clothes?"
"You're looking at all my possessions," Viktor said, presenting himself with a sarcastic flourish. "Like I said, I'm not exactly overloaded with supplies."
"Okay, yeah," Jayce remembered as he picked up his own backpack and swung it on his shoulder. He made sure that Viktor would not immediately collapse back to the floor upon the first step and then sauntered out of the room, the limping man in tow. Jayce picked up his hammer on the way, a move that didn't go unnoticed by Viktor.
"That's quite an unique weapon," he said, curiously tilting his head.
"Yeah," Jayce chuckled, swinging it on his shoulder. "Made it myself."
"Fascinating." Jayce was surprised to not hear a twinge of taunting in his voice. He sounded genuinely interested, and to that Jayce smiled as they exited the building and began walking to the direction of their patrol base.