Work Text:
The sun that burnt the sand in the desert of Shurima in the scorching midday, now was setting, leaving a bittersweet view in the deserted ghosttown of Icathia.
"Once I had a human. For my experiments..." Vel'koz gazed at the sun that was hiding in the sand dunes sceptically, and his powerful eye was lost in the colours.
Malzahar turned to him and lokked at him with curiosity. He didn't speak. For some reason the statement that the Voidborn made created an embarrassment in him.
"He was... Strange... Probably because he was the only one that I kept for more than three months... Admittedly, I know everything about humans. But there are things that I can't understand, even though I have tried to..."
The prophet shook his head with very little understanding. He was a human himself, but changed from the powers of the Void. There were moments that he couldn't understand none of his two natures, and that particular one was one of these distressful ones. And Vel'koz's confessions just made his scepticism worse.
"I have stored a lot of human memories... But I still can't understand, why do they laugh, why do they extract water from their eyes, why are they getting angry and fight each other?... I have heard it is because of the feelings. But what does that word mean, Malzahar?..."
"I don't... Remember..."
Vel'koz's big eye turned and looked at him surprised. "But you're a human, it's in your nature, how did you forget about it?!" His voice sounded more embarrassed and not as mysterious as usually.
"Duty smashed them like the waves smash sand castles that kids make in beaches, very far away from that miserable, dead place." His poetic comparison made Vel'koz look around him. Dunes, drought, no trace of organic life from earth. Only the Void Rift, but even that was too far away from their location. The middle of nowhere of Icathia. What more than nothing?
"The Void, Vel'koz. Your substance. Your goal. Our goal. The Void devours the feelings like the black hole. Absorbs the pain from our hearts, so that we will be prepared for the end. It desires a painless destruction. For those that have accepted it at least. The rest will be torn in pain and weeping, because they won't stand it, to lose what was most precious in their lives...."
"Precious? Is there anything more precious than knowledge?!"
"Yes, Vel'koz. There is. But we both know well that everything is going to happen correctly if we follow the right path, not the most precious, the one that brings true joy. No one deserves it. We all have already dirtied our hands with the pain of others. We deserve nothing precious."
"Right, Malzahar. You are right. The Void will bring the balance this world deserves. My fathers, the Watchers, were always saying that this planet here is utterly useless. Garbage full of pitiful, weak minds."
"That's how it is. A disappointment..."
"But right now I'd disagree, prophet... Not every mind I that I met is pitiful..." He gazed at him with honesty, and his sharp pupils seemed to grow large. It was something odd that he felt in him. Like a thousand stars exploding in him. That sensation shocked him...
He almost made a weird sound when he glanced at the prophet smiling at him a few seconds later, with a look in his eyes he never showed in anyone else, except his parents years ago, while they still lived...
However, they soon realised what were they at, and quickly looked elsewhere, troubled. For a while they didn't say a word.
It happened quite often. That there was silence after philosophical discussions about the future and their goals. But that hadn't occurred before.
It was like a spark that was trying to fade, so it wouldn't become a fire. Nevertheless, despite the efforts, it always failed.
"Malzahar..." One of Vel'koz's tentacles grabbed him hesitantly and gently by the waist, and got him closer to examine him. Maybe to admire him. He used to admire the human body more, but ge got bored. And it was more of curiosity than sincere admiration. But that time he was maybe excited to be looking at a human. He was not any human. He was the Void's Prophet. His prophet...
They know each other for years. But tgat was something new.
They payed careful attention on each other's characteristics, discovering unique beauty that probably no one else on useless Runeterra would acknowledge. Malzahar was unpleasantly surprised to have found his feelings once more. It seemed to have annoyed his ego.
Vel'koz on the other hand was trying to study his own self. How fascinating it was... A thousand of stars were dying inside him, creating magical supernova, the one single spark became a million of them, they became the galaxy.
His happiness increased as purple coloured energy was released, almost like a very lightweight fluid, from his eye. "Eureka, prophet... Eureka..."