Chapter Text
The sight of Viktor falling asleep at his desk was nothing new to Jayce. It happened so often he began to wonder if the man even had a proper bed to sleep in or if he had grown accustomed to discomfort of the desk.
Like any other morning Jayce had entered the lab quietly, cautious not to disturb a likely sleeping Viktor.
For a moment, Jayce was surprised to see no sign of Viktor's head resting on his crossed arms. A quick scan of the room revealed he was instead resting peacefully on the new couch that Jayce had insisted on adding to the lab.
It was an amusing sight to behold as Viktor had been against the idea of adding a couch to the room at first, claiming it would threaten the atmosphere of a work environment.
"I told you it would be useful" Jayce thought to himself, finding it difficult to not have a smile spread across his face.
It was the first time he'd seen Viktor look so peaceful, no furrowed brow or pained frown. He was half-convinced his face was permanently stuck in a sour expression, given it was all he ever looked like recently; the thought of which made him feel somewhat dejected.
Viktor's head was gently resting on his right arm acting as a pillow. His left arm holding up a thin blanket on the verge of slipping off the couch entirely, no doubt a testament to the tossing and turning it took to get comfortable.
His braced leg hung over the couch, still touching the floor.
Given it's most likely the best sleep Viktor has had recently, Jayce dismissed the idea of waking him up immediately. He knew he'd have an earful from his angry partner later but was fully prepared to pay that price.
A few moments passed before Jayce realized he was still staring at the sleeping Viktor while he contemplated what kinds of things he will say in his rant later.
He was completely infatuated by the small tufts of hair sticking out in all directions and the loose tie revealing his collar bones underneath his slightly unbuttoned shirt.
It was the most disheveled he'd seen him in a while. Well, perhaps disheveled isn't the right word. Some days Viktor would look particularly pale, darker eye bags and his hair more ragged than usual from particularly late nights. Perhaps that look was more fitting of the word, Jayce thought.
Currently though, he didn't look like that at all, not stressed or tired from overworking himself.
He looked... peaceful, happy...
cute.
cute?
It caught him off guard that it had he'd associate cute with his partner, but he didn't disagree.
He'd always thought Viktor was rather attractive in general.
In a platonic way of course- Jayce justified to no one but himself.
Though any attempt to compliment his physical appearance were opposed by the smaller man.
Jayce noticed that he never did well with being praised, even when it came to his science work. He often wondered why that was, but could frustratingly never get a proper answer out of him.
He wondered how Viktor felt generally, though he's been shut down or ignored enough times to take a hint. The guy doesn't like talking about his feelings.
"Let's just focus on the task at hand" or "On topic please Jayce" were always his default responses.
Sometimes he'd mix it up by repeating the question back to Jayce, which would catch him off guard and lead to an awkward chuckle as a response.
His heart sank a bit by the fact his partner couldn't trust him. Perhaps it was Viktor's reserved nature that made Jayce all the more curious.
Jayce was brought back to the present by the light sound of rustling. He had no idea how long his mind had wondered for.
He should probably get to work he thought, averting his gaze from Viktor as we approached his desk to clean up the mess from the last experiment he'd failed.
Viktor groaned as he nuzzled his head into his right arm.
"mm.." he mumbled something that sounded like remnants of words. Jayce's face perked up as he stopped in his tracks.
Thinking Viktor was waking up, he was ready to greet his tired partner with a giant grin and a 'good morning' but was stopped by further mumblings.
He was still very deeply asleep, too lost in comfort to even consider waking up at this moment.
"love... you.. too.." Viktor said more coherently than anything else, his face softening as his mumbling returned to quiet and non-sensical sounds.
"Love?" Jayce froze. Surely he couldn't have heard that right. That is the last word he'd expect to come out of Viktor's mouth, let alone paired with "you" or "too" even.
Was Viktor in love with someone?
Thoughts raced through his head before he shook them away.
Maybe this is just a misunderstanding, dreams rarely make sense after all.
It would be ridiculous to jump to conclusions, being a scientist more than taught him that.
Is love even something Viktor considers? Whatever it was he wanted to know. He wanted to understand his closest friend better.
The walls he kept putting up had made things difficult for the both of them, it felt like the closer he got to Viktor, the more he'd be pushed away.
Jayce mentally prepared himself for the day ahead for when Viktor wakes up, he felt like it's going to be a difficult one.