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“Why the fuck are we here again?” Caitlyn snaps, yanking the wheel of her car violently to the right.
Jayce beams that giant grin of his. Thankfully, Caitlyn’s facing the road, so she isn’t hit with the full force of its megawatt glare. “For lunch, obviously!”
Caitlyn pulls into the McDonald’s drive-thru, coming to a stop behind a line of what seems like twenty cars. Seems like everyone had the same ‘lunch’ idea as them.
“Don’t give me that bullshit, Jayce. You’re up to something, and I know it.”
“No, Cait, I’m serious this time,” Jayce implores, looking the exact opposite of serious with a dorky smile threatening to worm its way onto his face. “I just wanted to grab a meal with you, since it’s been a long time since we caught up. That’s all! Nothing else. No ulterior motives.”
Caitlyn stays silent. In her peripherals, she sees a bead of sweat drip down Jayce’s temple.
“Okay, fine, they released a new burger and I wanted to analyze it!”
“I fucking knew it. Goddamnit, Jayce, I have work to do! You cannot just drag me out on side quests for these whims of yours.” Caitlyn groans, taking her hand off the wheel to massage her temple. “Why couldn’t you have just taken your own car?”
“I know, I know. But- Cait. Caitie. Caitiepoo.”
Caitlyn gives Jayce her best what-the-fuck-did-you-just-say expression. Jayce sweats nervously, changing his tack.
“Oh, Caitlyn, my dearest friend, practically like a sister to me at this point to be honest. I would trust no one else with as crucial a task as this one-”
“Heimerdinger confiscated your car because you tried to make those stupid modifications, didn’t he?”
“...Yeah.”
Caitlyn takes a moment to deeply reflect upon her life and the bad choices she made in her past that brought her to this exact point in time.
“At least I presume you have your order ready?” she implores as she pulls up to the order window, desperate for any positive news.
“Yeah, I’m gonna get the Impossible Burger. Although, I should probably get a drink to go with it… what do you think? Sprite? Fanta? Ooh, maybe Coke…”
Caitlyn fights the urge to violently scream into the receiver. “Fucking ORDER, Jayce!”
“Oh! Oh, yeah!”
Of course, instead of relaying his order to Caitlyn like a normal fucking person, he unbuckles his belt, gets up and leans over to speak into the receiver himself.
“Hi! I’d like an Impossible burger, and then for a drink, I’ll have… uh… what do you suggest?”
“Mmf,” Caitlyn mumbles, squashed under Jayce’s bulk.
“That’s not a drink, Caitlyn,” Jayce responds. Caitlyn fights the overwhelming urge to bite into his side.
“Well, since my travel companion seems to be completely unhelpful, what do you think, sir?” he asks into the receiver. Stupidly charming man. Caitlyn bets the poor hapless teenager on the other end is swooning just thanks to his voice .
It’s utterly incomprehensible to Caitlyn just how this man pulls people - and not just because she swings the other way. He’s just so… Jayce. She’s seen him eat dirt after quite literally tripping on air, go up to a man and confidently refer to him as ‘ma’am,’ down one too many drinks at a party and bawl into her arms about how one guy in his fifth grade class didn’t like him - the list goes on and on.
How? Are people really that desperate for a pretty face?
Caitlyn’s snapped out of her musings as Jayce shifts forward, despite the fact that the man on the other end of the receiver seems to be able to hear him just fine. His adjustment pushes her even further into her chair, although her mouth is freed from its fabric-y confines.
“What the fuck are you doing , Jayce? Stop shifting around,” she gripes. “Leaning in close to the receiver like that isn’t gonna get you a better deal on your burger, you know…”
The man on the other side of the receiver chuckles. Jayce’s face visibly warms.
“H-hey, I’m just trying to pick the right drink, okay?”
Caitlyn averts her eyes from his face, letting him work through his embarrassment on his own. In doing so, her eyes land on his backside.
Unbidden, the word voluptuous pops into her head. She hates herself for thinking it near-instantly.
Unfortunately, it’s not exactly easy to avoid his backside when it’s practically staring Caitlyn in the face with how strangely Jayce is positioned.
‘Vi would love to see this,’ she thinks to herself. Vi’s always been a bit more… vulgar than Caitlyn, at least when Caitlyn isn’t around Jayce and consequently cursing in every other sentence. She’d definitely appreciate the butt jokes at least a little.
Caitlyn wriggles her phone out of her pocket, holding it up so that its camera captures her exasperated face but keeps Jayce’s assets front and center. Satisfied, she snaps a picture.
“Done!” Jayce exclaims, sliding back into the car.
Caitlyn quickly slips her phone back into her pocket, lest Jayce see the picture and get the wrong idea . Heaven forbid.
She’ll add a teensy tiny little caption and send the photo to Vi later. Give her a laugh in the middle of her boxing class. Yeah, that sounds like a good plan.
Caitlyn shifts the car into gear. “What drink did you order, then?” she questions Jayce.
“Oh, just water,” Jayce answers cheerily.
Bun: crunchy on the outside, soft on the inside. Slightly overcooked. Uniform shape - circular, radius approximately 1.75 inches.
Jayce scribbles furiously in his notebook, hunched over his lab table. His burger, deconstructed to a nearly gruesome degree, sits in a heap on a plate to his side.
Patty - volume 2.25 in^3. Approximately 0.5lbs. Slightly charred, caramel-colored-
His musings are abruptly cut off by three sharp knocks at the door of his lab.
‘Who’s bothering me at this hour?’ Jayce mentally grumbles to himself, deftly disregarding the fact that it is all of 2:15pm. He levers himself out of his seat, striding to the door confidently and throwing it open.
Upon seeing the man standing outside, the first thought that pops into Jayce’s head is ‘twink.’ Slender and lanky, of average height yet sporting strategically placed beauty marks on a… quite pretty face. (Not as pretty as Jayce’s, though, if he does say so himself.) The leg brace and cane only add to the man’s overall ‘impeccable aesthetic,’ as the kids would put it.
“H-hello,” Jayce stammers.
“Hello,” the twink- err, stranger- responds. He promptly walks into Jayce’s lab, as confident as if he owned the place.
“Whoa, whoa, wait!” Jayce shouts, running after the man and grabbing his arm before he can reach Jayce’s burger setup. “That stuff’s fragile.”
“It’s a burger.”
“A very fragile burger.”
The man raises a delicate eyebrow, scrunching up his face. “You are Jayce, correct?” he questions in his lilting vaguely-Russian accent.
Jayce reels a little hearing his name come out of this veritable stranger’s mouth. He could be anyone! He could be an enemy, someone who came to take Jayce’s life, or worse, take his burger research.
“How do you know my-”
Suddenly, Jayce pauses, the man’s accent triggering a chain reaction in his brain.
“Wait. Wait! I know you! You’re the guy from the drive-through, aren’t you?”
“Astute observation,” he replies, looking thoroughly unimpressed.
Jayce pales slightly. “Wait- did you follow me here??”
The man scoffs. “As if I would resort to such ridiculous methods.”
“So how’d you find me, then… wait, what’s your name again?”
“I am Viktor.”
“Viktor,” Jayce repeats, testing it out.
“Indeed,” he responds dully.
Russian then. Probably? Jayce isn’t all that familiar with distinctions between names from different Slavic countries.
Not that it matters, given the pressing problem here isn’t Viktor’s ethnicity. Rather, it’s the fact that Viktor has hunted him down at his lab for some reason.
“Well, Viktor, care to tell me why exactly you’re stalking me?”
Viktor looks slightly disgruntled. “I am not stalking you. As I said earlier, I would never debase myself to such a level. I simply Googled your name. Jayce is quite an uncommon one in these parts, so it was not very difficult to identify you and your location.”
“W-wait,” Jayce stammers again. “So you stalked me online , and you somehow think that’s better than just following me in person??”
“Is it not?” Viktor looks genuinely confused. “I just accessed public information…”
Jayce makes a mental note to better assess his digital footprint when he gets the chance. This is genuinely worrying.
“Wait, ok, whatever, you found me,” he blurts out. “ Why? What do you want from me? If it’s money, I’m not exactly the richest-”
“I am not here for money,” Viktor answers calmly.
He takes a step towards Jayce’s lab setup. Jayce, without even thinking, lunges toward him, throwing himself between Viktor and his precious burger.
“NO!”
Viktor looks at him skeptically. He opens his mouth, then closes it again.
“I- Jayce- it is a burger. ”
“So why are you moving towards it?” Jayce challenges.
“It- I do not mean to… harm your burger in any way, Jayce. I simply wanted to take a look.” Viktor mumbles, holding his hands up in front of his chest.
Jayce glances back at the burger sitting on his table, carefully disassembled and sliced so he could understand its every intricacy. Slowly, he steps away, allowing Viktor a clear path, and asks the question that’s been plaguing him since Viktor arrived (so, not a very long time).
“Why do you care about the burger?”
Viktor turns to face Jayce, making full eye contact.
“I wish to join you in your quest to fulfill your dream.”
‘That’s hot,’ Jayce thinks, unbidden. He then mentally smacks his brain a few times, trying to say something interesting and witty.
“Wh- what dream?” is what comes out of his mouth instead.
“Your dream of innovating a better meatless burger. The one you mentioned six times within the 15 minutes you spent ordering in the drive-thru and holding up every car behind you?”
“That sounds like something Caitlyn would say.”
“Smart, that Caitlyn.”
Despite himself, Jayce chortles.
“Wait, but… why do you want to join me anyway? I’m chasing this crazy dream of making a better meatless burger. Most of the carnivores out there think it’s impossible.”
Viktor rises up to his full height, which honestly isn’t much taller than he is while hunched over his cane.
“Do you think it was my life’s ambition to be an assistant manager?”
Confused at how to respond, Jayce flounders a bit. “Uh… I wouldn’t really know, given I don’t know anything about you.”
Viktor sighs, rubbing the bridge of his nose again. “Oh, forget it. Do you want the McDonald’s burger patty recipe or not?”
On the other side of the city, Vi is chortling.
“Cait!! I didn’t know you did stuff like this!”
“What exactly did I do?” Caitlyn asks innocently, a practically cherubic expression taking up real estate space on her face.
Vi looks down at her phone, pulling up the nearly-viral meme that’s been circulating for the past hour or so.
No matter how much Caitlyn denies it, Vi knows the meme was her doing. After all, it features her face front-and-center, staring wearily at the screen as Jayce leans over her indecently.
“He wants to order,” she reads, looking flummoxed yet thoroughly entertained. “Why did Jayce- how did you even get this photo?”
“Do not question my methods,” Caitlyn says sagely.
“You know this thing has over ten thousand likes on Instagram, right?”
Caitlyn’s eyes practically boggle out of their sockets. “Wait, WHAT?”
“Two burgers, a Sprite and a water!” Jayce hollers towards the back kitchen.
Viktor has the order plated and delivered to the front before he can even finish his sentence.
Jayce grins. “You’re so efficient, even for something like this that you could have taken your time on. It’s cute.”
Viktor, caught off guard by the blatant attempt at sucking up to him, flounders a bit.
“How is my efficiency cute ?”
“I dunno, it just is. Especially when you have that focused look on your face…”
“What focused look?” Viktor snaps.
“That one. Right there!”
“Right where? ” Viktor complains, although there’s no real heart in it.
Jayce reaches out and quickly boops his nose. Viktor barely refrains from flinching.
“See?” he exclaims gleefully.
Viktor glares at him, stomping back to his post in the back of their shop.
He still can’t believe they have a shop at all, let alone that they got one so fast after establishing their partnership. Not that he’s too happy about it. All he really wants to do is get back to messing with their burger prototype, but alas funding does not come from nowhere.
At least Jayce was willing to handle most of the actual customer-focused aspects…
“Wait! Viktor! Do you wanna switch for a while so I can mess with the prototype?”
So much for avoiding customer interactions.
Viktor sighs for what must have been the sixth time that day, slinging off his apron in favor of the blue jacket they always wear when they’re working the counter. It’s incredibly loose on him, practically falling off his shoulders.
Just as he steps into the counter space, a gaggle of giggling college girls steps into their small shop. They promptly see Viktor and freeze.
“He’s not there,” one of them, a ginger, stage-whispers to her friend. Viktor hears her, because he’s not deaf.
The ginger’s friend’s face visibly falls, as do the faces of a good four or five other girls in the group.
“Wanna just go to Burger King or something?” the ginger grumbles, immediately met with a chorus of ‘yes’s and nods from the others.
Right on cue, Jayce pokes his head out from the back. “Any orders yet, V?”
Like a switch has been flipped, the girls go from dejected and mopey to bright and perky.
“Hi, Jayce!” one of them says through giggles.
“Oh, uh, hey,” he mumbles, fidgeting with his apron. The girls tentatively draw closer, completely ignoring Viktor in favor of talking to Jayce.
“You’re looking quite dashing today,” one of them swoons, batting her eyelashes. Viktor scoffs. Dashing? Is that a word anyone still uses in this day and age?
Unfortunately, he isn’t very discreet about his scoff. The girl in question turns to him briefly, glaring at him as if he was something she found on the floor before returning the tractor beam of her attention to Jayce.
Viktor prides himself on his neutrality and rational nature. No matter what happens, he endeavors to keep his calm and not let pesky emotions get the best of him.
It’s situations like these, however, that really test his resolve. His hands clench into fists where they rest in his jacket pockets.
“Nice to- uh- see you, girls, but I have to go! Bye!” Jayce, awkward as ever, scrambles a bit before spinning around and marching back into their kitchen. The girls shamelessly ogle his behind as he makes his hasty retreat.
“It’s even better in person than it was in that picture,” he hears the simpering girl say. Her comment is met with a laugh.
At least Jayce doesn’t seem to reciprocate the attention, although Viktor knows he’s flattered by it in a way. Of course, with a working partnership so new, he can’t exactly say anything to Jayce about it, lest it be seen as overstepping.
The whole situation causes such an inexplicable reaction in him, though. His chest burns, his lungs tighten up, and his fists clench. Oftentimes, he feels like there’s a lump in his throat he can’t breathe around. It’s, beyond a doubt, jealousy of some kind.
But of who? Jayce? He knows that he’ll never have that kind of attention directed towards him, thanks to his general physicality, and he honestly prefers it that way. That kind of attention can… change a person.
But if he doesn’t want the girls’ regard, whose does he want?
Jayce’s?
Name: Sky Young
Age: 27
Job Title: Nutritionist
Sky clasps her hands together, fidgeting nervously with the pendant of her necklace.
She’d always been a science nerd, even since she was small. She and her friends would clamber up the rocks to the waterfall near the river, but while they frolicked in the small pool it formed, she’d start thinking about fluid dynamics.
However, it was later in her life that she realized her true passion laid in more of an intersection, one that combined STEM and helping people. That’s why she chose to become a nutritionist - it gave her an opportunity to explore the science of food while simultaneously helping people feel better and get the nutrients they need.
However, she never thought she’d end up here.
“Miss Young?”
(Of all places, a fast food joint. )
Sky grabs her resume and stands up quickly, nearly tripping over the hems of her fancy pants.
“Just Sky is fine,” she mumbles.
“...Alright. In that case, you may call me Viktor.”
Sky looks up… and the first thought that pops into her head is ‘twink.’ She… doesn’t get very far past that thought, to be completely honest.
Viktor arches a delicate eyebrow and mutters something that sounds like ‘Jayce’ and ‘social skills.’ Sky has no idea what that’s about.
Desperately trying to will the blush off her face, she follows Viktor into a side room that smells suspiciously like it used to be a broom closet before it was… ahem, converted . She takes a seat on one side of its small conference table and the interview begins.
Apparently, she’ll be working on a new burger prototype the two owners of the store have created, trying to make it more appealing while still maintaining its nutritional content. Nothing she hasn’t done before.
However, she’s never worked so closely with someone as seemingly eccentric as Viktor. On occasion, he’ll randomly pause their interview to go on tangents that Sky can barely follow about bun density or exact tomato slicing techniques or some other esoteric burger concept.
“So, Sky, what do you know about-”
“Oh, sorry, am I interrupting?”
Another man, who Sky presumes is the other owner of the store, abruptly enters the room, making it feel significantly more cramped.
The only words she can think of to describe this man are ‘not twink.’ He is, in fact, decidedly not twinky. Quite the opposite, in fact.
He strides his way over to Sky (not that it took many strides. Approximately two, in fact) and puts out his hand.
“Sky, I presume? Nice to meet you! I’m Jayce!” he booms with a sparkly grin.
Sky shakes his hand, more and more unsure of what exactly she has gotten herself into.
He scoots past her, not without difficulty, and approaches Viktor.
“Hey, V, I’m headed out to restock the lettuce. I’m closing shop until you two are done.”
“Sounds good,” Viktor murmurs. Jayce casually reaches out and puts a hand on the back of his neck, letting it slide across as he strolls back out.
Sky eyes the hand suspiciously.
She thinks about that hand. She thinks about Jayce, the man as a whole, and the fact that he went out of his way to come find Viktor in person to tell him he was heading out instead of just leaving a note like a normal person.
Sky sighs to herself, cursing her romantic luck. ‘Twink fumbled,’ she thinks.
Ekko really, really fucking hates Mel Medarda.
Okay, that’s not entirely true. She’s incredibly intelligent and politically savvy, not to mention gorgeous. So perfect it’s hard for anyone to hate her.
That is, until she throws you headfirst into the weirdest business you’ve ever heard of and tells you to fix all their problems.
Ekko KNEW he shouldn’t have gone into consulting. ‘Good at organizing’ this, ‘inspirational leader’ that. Leading a complex, multifaceted gang based in a treehouse doesn’t automatically bestow someone with amazing business skills, despite what Mel might think.
Ah, Mel. Ekko thinks back to their most recent conversation.
“Ekko, listen to me carefully. These two… they’re researchers, not business minds. They’ll be off doing their mad scientist… thing . It’s your job to put a stop to it and convince them that they need to prioritize profits, at least for a little bit.”
Ekko had groaned. “If they’re so obsessed with their science, why’d they hire a consultant in the first place??”
“Beats me,” Mel had said, shrugging. “Don’t think too hard about it. All you have to do is convince them to start raking in the cash, because…”
“...if they don’t, we don’t get paid,” Ekko had finished.
With that grim thought festering in his mind, Ekko walks into the establishment. He’s come way too far to not get paid now.
He’s immediately greeted by an excitable-looking man. “Are you Ekko? My name’s Jayce!”
Ekko immediately plasters on his best variation of the customer-service smile. “Hi, Jayce. I’m Ekko.”
Jayce grins back. Ekko grimaces on sheer instinct, but soon forces his face back into a smile.
“I’m here on behalf of the Medarda Consulting Firm,” he grits out. “I’d love to have a conversation with you, if you’re free now, to discuss some of your main concerns for your business.”
Jayce’s smile dims slightly at the mention of business. “Certainly. Let me show you to our meeting room!”
Ekko is promptly led to a room that smells like it used to be a broom closet before it was repurposed.
“Well, here we are! Isn’t it great?” Jayce asks gleefully.
Ekko sighs. He’s sure got a lot of work ahead of him.
“So, what’s been going on? Why did you decide to hire us?”
“Well, my partner and I- we’re scientists, not businesspeople. We want to bring our burgers to the world, but we don’t really know how to do that, so we thought we’d hire one of you guys to tell us exactly how we should deal with, like, marketing and stuff.”
Yup. A lot of work ahead of him.
“There’s one thing in particular. We’re… developing this burger that we think is going to revolutionize the future of the meatless burger industry!” Jayce pauses, presumably to leave space for the ‘ooh’s and ‘aah’s that usually accompany statements such as those. Ekko refuses to indulge him.
After an awkward silence, which Ekko does absolutely nothing to break, Jayce continues, a little stymied. “It’s not quite at the level we want it to be yet, but I think we should shelve our old burgers and start selling it anyway, to raise funds for more research and all that. Vity- ahem . My partner Viktor, on the other hand, thinks we should wait until it’s absolutely perfect . He has this weird obsession with perfection or something, I don’t know…”
Right on cue, another man who Ekko just knows in his bones is this mysterious Viktor enters the tiny ‘meeting room.’
“Jayce, what is going on here?” he questions, sporting an I’m-not-mad-just-disappointed tone that looks and sounds distinctly like it’s been directed at Jayce more frequently than not.
“I… hired… businesspeople?” Jayce says, managing to make it sound more like a question than the statement it is.
Viktor sighs.
Jayce’s eyes widen and he promptly starts rambling. “PleasedontbemadVitya Ithoughtitwouldhelpus-”
“Jayce.”
Jayce falls silent.
“You’re in luck today, because so did I.”
Before anyone can process this statement, the air suddenly goes distinctly… pink.
“WHAT’S UP, SUCKERS??”
Out from behind Viktor pops a blue-haired teenage menace.
“JINX?” Ekko yells, standing up suddenly and knocking back his chair..
“EKKO?” Jinx shrieks simultaneously.
Ekko blinks rapidly. “What. the. Fuck??”
Jinx squints at him, face drawn into a pout. Still cute, despite the circumstances, despite how much Ekko hates himself for thinking it.
“I didn’t know you consulted…”
“I didn’t even know you were still ALIVE!” Ekko screams.
Through the haze of his confusion, he sees Jayce and Viktor make eye contact and blink at each other entirely un-subtly.
“Maybe we should just leave,” Viktor mumbles.
Jayce stands mid-kitchen, a spatula in his hand and a wide smile on his face.
“We’ve done it! The sauce of a lifetime, engineered to wrap around your taste buds like a lover’s caress!”
Viktor visibly grimaces to his right. “Please never repeat those words again.”
Jayce definitely does not pout at all upon hearing that.
“B- but…”
Viktor reaches for his outstretched arm, pulling it back down and taking the spatula out of his hand. He immediately proceeds to lick it, sending thoughts that are decidedly inappropriate for work settings skittering through Jayce’s brain.
“Ugh, V,” Jayce scolds. “That stuff is so concentrated! There’s no way raw garlic sauce tastes good when it’s not on a burger…”
Viktor shrugs, tossing the spatula into the sink behind him. “It’s passable. I simply did not want to waste food.”
He looks at Jayce, and his expression visibly softens.
“We’re tantalizingly close to your burger dream, Jayce,” he murmurs, into the quiet of their 3am kitchen-lab.
Jayce will not stand for this. He takes a large step forward (well, more of a small step, given they were already standing quite close to each other) and puts his arm onto Viktor’s shoulder.
“It’s our burger dream.”
Viktor, blushing slightly, pulls away and moves toward the blender sitting on their countertop. Their sauce, scraped off the edges, sits unassumingly in the center of the container.
“The sauce is a tad bit… grainy. I would like to give it another whirl, simply to ensure it has the right consistency.”
“Whirl away!” Jayce encourages. “Although… I guess it’s not really you that’s whirling, is it? It’s the blender. What exactly are you doing to the dial? Cranking? I don’t-”
“Jayce.”
“Sorry, sorry. Continue.”
Viktor cranks the dial. The machine whirls to life, and-
Jayce realizes one millisecond too late.
“Viktor! I forgot to put on the li-”
SPLAT
(is the sound the blender makes as it sends sauce flying everywhere, including all over their burger samples.)
Miraculously, most of the carnage misses Viktor, who is left with only a small splotch of sauce on his cheek and a surprisingly calm attitude.
“Ah, well. I suppose I needed to take a shower anyway,” he muses, reaching to his cheek to wipe off the stain and somehow managing to smudge it further.
Jayce is suddenly, spontaneously overwhelmed with the urge to wipe the stain off his face.
So he does.
(Jayce has never been one to particularly control his impulses.)
He reaches out and cups Viktor’s jaw, stroking his thumb over his cheek slowly. Viktor, seemingly subconsciously, leans into his palm and moves slightly closer. So does Jayce.
Their lips meet. Viktor tastes like garlic sauce.
When the two of them pull apart, Jayce feels like he’s at the top of the world. He’s with the man of his dreams. Ekko and Jinx are probably fighting in their conference room (or kissing, or whatever, really) but those two are a problem they can safely put off for later.
Standing in their lab, even with the splashes of sauce covering all their equipment, Jayce knows, without a doubt, that their dream is going to become a reality.
Their Hexburger dream.