[open] january/february catchall

[techmaturgy]

Who: Viktor and special guests and YOU
When: January through early February
Where: Cadens, the Horizon
What: open stuff, closed stuff, dangerous and illicit magical surgery, the usual
Warnings: the usual references to terminal illness including a steep decline and medical procedures/surgery. will list additional warnings as needed.

[open and closed starters in comments! This is also a general catch-all for Viktor’s do-or-die attempt to cure himself, and the events leading up to it, and his recovery (to come later). If you want a custom starter or something specific, just hit me up. full horizon details are here for any and all wildcarding needs. For everything else, I’m on plurk at whitticus and on discord at whitticus#8139.]

Comments

[preferscuffs]

Of course. I don't doubt that.

[Time. One of their biggest enemies. Always. It's getting a little old, but it's not like there's anything they could do about it. At least not this time, not right now. So, it's certainly better to be safe than sorry in this case. Because giving the hexcore to a government? Absolutely not.]

And you'll have the chance to do them and plenty of other things you haven't even thought about yet.

[Little miss optimist, that's her. Full of idealism and dreams still, despite everything.]

Is there anything I could help you with now?

[Sure, she's not as good as Jayce or an Actual Scientist. But she knows enough and is used to assisting. So it doesn't hurt to ask.]

[techmaturgy]

[Viktor nods, and sighs, an indication that he certainly has enough to think about, in that department. They just have to get through all this, first.

Unfortunately, there isn't much to do, practically, beyond reconfiguring the runic array and testing and adjusting and testing again, which is the fairly boring part of scientific progress. Still...]

Just company, if you have the time.

[She certainly doesn't have to stay--in fact, the fewer people in here, the better, probably, but Viktor is only human. He's spent too many nights working by himself in the lab to know how desperately lonely it can be.]

[preferscuffs]

[Luckily, Caitlyn has had to translate a fair amount of sighs in her life. So she can figure out more or less what this one means.

Seems fortunate, that there's only tying things together, doing checks left. If they had much more to do that would have been... difficult considering.]

I have time.

[Even if she hadn't, she would have made some for this. Especially with him outright asking for it. How could she turn him down? Easy answer, Caitlyn couldn't.

Besides, it's not exactly odd for Caitlyn to spend time around here. Not entirely odd anyway.]

Is this a conversational companionship or would you prefer I just sit here for now. I'm fine either way. I've done both for Jayce before.

[techmaturgy]

Thank you.

[Viktor swallows hard and nods, perhaps slightly embarrassed by even that tiny moment of weakness. He doesn’t need conversation, really, but having another body in the room could prove to be comforting. All of that, however, feels a bit too personal to admit, so he deflects.]

You don’t—we don’t need to talk, if you’d rather not.

[Or, at least, she shouldn’t feel obligated.]

Jayce will be back soon.

[preferscuffs]

It's my pleasure.

[Oh Viktor... that's not weakness, that's just called being human. Luckily for him, Caitlyn's been aware of his status as a living person for quite some time now. So it's not a new or surprising revelation.]

I wouldn't want to be a distraction. [A pause] But it does seem like an opportune time to get to know each other better.

[It goes unspoken that considering their importance to Jayce, it seems logical that their relationship should be worked on considering. It's only sensible since they'll be in each other's lives for the foreseeable]

Of course.