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It was cold. Dark and grime in the corners of what was once her, their room.
Jinx doesn’t keep track of time, she never does. Because if she did, would she remember gradually and unwillingly, but she knew it had been so long – overdue – since the last time she ever did set a foot in this place.
The dust has settled itself far too comfortably on wooden furnitures, the beds unmade with its sheets still lying discarded almost as if this place was meant to return to even after barely half a decade has passed, metal scraps graced a familiar bottom bunk and its ideas were written on spared paper plastered onto walls with its innocent yet purposed crayons remains, a chest full of spare parts that would purpose its use in the near future (it never arrived), a makeshift table in the middle of the worn-out couches, and finally a gramophone sitting on a barrel beside one of the single couches.
Her foot took a step (hesitant, but not because of fear that endangers lives), the oaken woods brittled as it creaked, and widened the door enough for more than one person to enter. The stairs leading down the common ground looked like it had enough as the decay infected its fiber, but Jinx knew it was ample for at least two sets of feet back and forth.
Boots echoed in the eerie silence, and it should have bothered Jinx, usually. She wanted to hear any kind of noise, anything that would divert her conscience from noticing the voices filling up her head or how memories began seeping into her mind as she takes it all in again: the chairs surrounding a huge box that serves as a table and atop of it where a broken lamp is, its couches positioned around its area, the familiar bunk bed, the chest she previously owns that settles beside, and –
“Jinx?”
There was a soft voice, a temporary severance with her sense of reality, Jinx supposes. She blinks, carefully, slowly, lethargic, and tries to blink out her tunneling vision at her bed under the dim light cracked through the window.
It was hard to direct her vision elsewhere other than the past which she neglected. Her stomach churned inadvertently, a nagging rises from the back of her vault as it rattles. Its noise was comparable to one of the first inventions she wanted to perfect, the monkey . Cymbals held under gears and ticks, crashing against each other, causing Jinx to flinch by instinct and search for where the source was coming from.
Gears. Crash. Crash. Reel. Click. Repeat.
Jinx’s nape let out a flex before pulling out her hextech charged pistol and calculatingly held out three specific angles on standby, forefinger already on the trigger the instant she wielded it.
Her breathing labored, and her pulse quickens at the cymbals grating and colliding in symphony, creating more bedlam within her fragile mind.
One. Two. Three. Here I march. One step, two steps.
“Stop marching,” Jinx grits her teeth, her voice losing volume and only she can hear her own mind, “Don’t take another step forward.”
I’ll explode.
Her pistol began whirring in her grasp, eyes dilating where she decided her aim.
A single press was all it would take.
If she were to take a shot.
“Jinx, is everything okay?” The voice knew that as well.
Jinx didn’t take the shot, but the voice did. Took her own shot using a touch so gentle.
A chilling yet also a warming hand settled on Jinx’s shoulder, sending shivers on her skin. Then she was back in the present, drawn away from inside her head.
Jinx turns, brows furrowed until sick magenta eyes have caught solace.
The solace responsible for her redemption, a change of heart in her self-demise and destruction. She was everything that Jinx could never be: brave, strong-willed, beautiful, pure, golden, and not a speck of flaw present nor would it ever tarnish.
“L-Lux…” Jinx could only let out a tiny whimper. Her teeth immediately biting down on her gums hard enough it bled, before profusely apologizing.
“It’s okay, Jinx. No need to apologize,” Lux's demeanor shifted to worry at the use of her name than the usual 'Blondie' or 'Sunshine' but kept her composure, knowing her Jinx would need. She lifted the corners of her lips, a gesture overwhelming still to Jinx’s inner wells of her ribs, and caressed pale bony cheek to ease the turmoil.
You don't deserve her.
Jinx earns another bloody bite to her gums from her own.
Lux notices the redoing and reaches out, pads down the quivering lip to halt the penance, and chases them.
The blue-haired Zaunite relaxes into the kiss, her edges smothered for it to be abated at least, and releases the tension she held on her gun. Her storm calmed, temporarily.
Gloved hands thumb over both of her cheeks now, and Jinx can’t help but give in to its softness.
Breaths mingled when they split up.
“You should stop biting down on the gums of your lips too much,” Lux tells, whispering in a tone laced with concern but always welcoming to hear, as one of her thumbs stroke Jinx’s lips, “it’ll never heal if you keep on doing that.”
Jinx can’t help but indulge with the reason, “Force of habit, Blondie. Although, I don’t mind receiving all of your kisses if it meant stopping my ceaseless biting.”
She lets out a playful smirk, and even in the dark can she see the azure irises kindling in adoration, “I get the kisses, you receive reduced impulse biting. Benefits both of us, how about that?”
Lux rolls her eyes, her lips forming a smile yielding to the suggestion. She’d willingly agree just because she loves Jinx more than she could ever put words into, nor the magic flowing within her would be able to resist the overflowing charm and blanket of content she feels from Jinx. Irresistible, magnetic, loving, and what more can Lux ever ask for? Only Jinx, after all, can break through her barriers, and no amount of resistance can ever thwart this inevitable affection she fell into.
“Alright,” Lux chuckles.
Just when Jinx thought their short conversation was over before they were able to pull in the bags they brought with them, Lux stretched out once more and gently guided Jinx’s jaw towards where she stands a stair above near the entrance, which decreases the gap between them in mere seconds.
Their breaths once again fusing in the lack of heat from the room, eyes hooded in brewing lust – glistening blue locking into hazy crimson mauve – and the magnetic pull was impossible to negate.
Lux closed in, kissing Jinx again, further benign. Jinx doesn’t understand how Lux was able to manage to be kinder and gentler than the last (because she was already soft prior), but she can and will do it repeatedly if it is one way to embrace the trembles away. Jinx’s dead heart swells in beating at the notion.
Then Jinx hears them, the lullaby’s spell to conduct her heart in peace. The kind of peace that wasn’t ignorant or living in unknowing bliss, but the tender type. One impossible to find, yet with Lux, a miracle can understate the sentiment, for Jinx knows Lux was the answer to her solace. Heightened ears riveted to the sounds: Lux’s quiet breathing, Jinx’s sighs of rellief, and the thumps of her own heart in a calm rhythm.
What felt like hours, but was fast in their affection, they parted. But not quite apart.
Foreheads still against each other, Lux gazed into foggy-shimmered coalesced eyes of the taller, but given the fact Jinx was a step down, they met eye to eye, and spoke in hushes, “Don’t be afraid to tell me if something’s wrong, okay? I know I’ve been telling you this over and over, but remember that you don’t need to bear the burdens all to yourself.”
Jinx blinked away the stinging sensation at the back of her eyes and nodded.
“You have me. You will never be alone.”
“I know, Blondie.”
Jinx averts her focus to the familiarity of the room.
"It's just... a bit too much," Her tone scratched a bit, and it unnerves Jinx a lot because she never wanted to look vulnerable in front of Lux. She wanted to prove to the mage she can be more than just her flaws, and that someone as perfect as Lux can have less reasons to abandon her— abandon… no. No. Lux would not do that, right?
A flip of a coin caused her to stutter, not wanting to know the outcome of either sides. In the first place, such a thought will never cross. Jinx shouldn't think like that.
Flickering her trembling sights, sifting through the dark and fixate it on cool spring ones, she finds her grasps immediately interlocking with Lux's.
'Breathe. Breathe. Just like you and Blondie practiced,' Jinx repeats to herself.
She'll soon realize how much of a jinx you are. Mylo's distorted voice echoes in, as the memory begins to rack through where she sees the cracks. The door, the light of the lamp, Mylo's figure lying on the couch as his reasons spills to Vi, unaware of the fact Jinx sees, knows , and it chalks up a screeching sound on a board because she is already aware of her congenital bane at any given situation.
The recollection flooded her senses, and her pupils dazed at the heavy pressure that weighs on her.
'She made a mistake .' Rings the voice.
'Name one time she hasn't.'
The sound of a ball hits the metal pipes as Mylo throws it in frustration. Catching it as it bounces back.
Jinx feels her lids accumulate tears, the disappointment drowning her as she recalls. She was small, mind in hikes to reach a new foundation to prove to everyone even someone as young as her can be of help. But all of that were debunked by realizing she will never be enough. No matter how much she swims above the surface of recognition, she'll always be anchored down by reality. And peering through that crack, verity made itself known.
'You were twice the person at half her age.'
CLANG. Another hit towards the pipes.
"I-I'm…" Jinx uncontrollably tightens her hand around Lux's. She doesn't even realize she subconsciously searched for Lux's hand, as if by instinct her body knows how it recovers the second she comes in contact with her cordial.
But Jinx's tract was already narrowing. She can't breathe.
She can't. She can't .
"I'm a jinx," She mumbles, head shaking in vigorous movement, "I only bring trouble. I will never be enough."
Jinx can feel her legs become wobbly, the strength and bearing she carries crumbles out in a fleeting moment.
"I'm not needed… I can't even hold out my existence for long without everyone telling me I'm bound by death," She was blabbering. Her mind in statics, blocking out her senses.
An exasperated chuckle leaves her lungs, as if punctured, maybe it had, "I even died at one point. Who the fuck am I even kidding— oof."
If Jinx were to retell how one can get the air filling their lungs gets punched out, she could describe it as this; however, differing from literal death.
This one was frail, sensitive. Sometimes scaring Jinx because if she tries breathing its epitome, it might shatter to dust and leave colloids to linger in nostalgia. And Jinx hates any form of reminisce, but in solace would she toss all risks and odds.
Because it was Lux who shone through her darkness, and ventured out to find her.
Limbs attached around Jinx's shoulder, the hug was suffocating, but for Jinx, it was an embrace filled to the brim with tender. A throe tied in a manner of diminishing it, if only Lux can entirely. With her presence though, Jinx thinks it'll wont enough that it can.
"Don't you ever say that Jinx. Not to me, and especially not to you," Lux's composure wavers, her voice fragmenting. Fibers holding onto thin threads of the embrace and chasing away the doubts.
"Because you are everything to me. Never let your past tell you otherwise," Lux breathes in Jinx's scent: metallic, foggy, and candlelight; dwindling the rising agitation.
Jinx founds herself in all forms of aches and regret, and exhales a strained breath.
"I-I'm sorry, Sunshine. I-I did tell you that I was wired enough to let you in one of my abodes… but I guess touching what was once a part of me still spirals me out of control."
Lux feels her heart rift itself at the honesty.
She tauts her arms protectively around Jinx's head, enveloping Jinx and uses her affection with every might, "No. Don't be. You are the most courageous and honest person I've ever known… and I should be entirely thankful you are willing to brave through your fears with me. For that," Lux produces a gap, eyes skirmishes through the bleak and dying lights, "I am the luckiest person to have been ever graced by you."
"Y-You think I'm lucky ?"
Jinx cracks a smile too wide to fight the voices. It's quite funny too because Lux would never be able to see it clearly under the lack of light while Jinx can roam her sights on Lux’s expression in every detail with her vision under the influence of the shimmer acting like a chronic drug enhancer, but seeing all of that near and vivid eases Jinx. An up for the purple shit, she supposes. Suddenly, having gone through a vibe check with god— or death — was not so bad of a reminder.
God, she's lucky to have Lux.
Jinx returns the hug, healing in desperation.
" I love you ." Jinx mutters shyly, head in an entropy-butterfly kind. She still sucks at showing affection, but with Lux, it becomes entirely natural. Although, she gets altogether frightened too, scared she might lose all of this once she stirs from a distant waking morning.
Lux chuckles at the abashment, "I love you too. So much that i would burn every country to the ground."
It was now Jinx's turn to snort out a laughter. The change in atmosphere felt like liberation against those that shackled her.
"I'd like to see that happen."
"Hopefully not soon," Lux titters, and buries her nose on Jinx's head with her arms not detaching yet, "Cause I'd hate to see you getting hurt because they fail to understand you."
Jinx stared a bit too long at Lux when she lifted her head to give herself a glance on calming clean lakes of her significant other. Water stilling, and damn does Jinx want to scoop up Lux right now and run out of The Last Drop — or a heap of wreckage, barely anyone can even tell how it was before now that it's all dump — and shout to the streets of Zaun and above to the jaundiced folks of Piltover that she was the luckiest woman alive whenever Lux pronounces her love for her.
She's Mine. Mine. Mine!
Jinx etched another rigid smile which seems impossibly wider.
However, that thought diffuses itself right after remembering why they were here. As much as she wanted to dawdle and memorize every feature Lux has in which Jinx gets enchanted by, it was time to settle down. They have wasted enough of their time just by the entrance because of Jinx’s past, rendering her preoccupied.
"Don't you ever worry, flashlight," Jinx places a tiny smooch in Lux's cheek, causing the blonde to flush innately, "I'm difficult to chase in the first place. No one can catch me even if they try."
The grin she exudes brings Lux to believe in those words. Jinx is indubitably tougher than everyone on this planet ought her to be.
"Yeah. I know," Lux returns the customary affection on Jinx's forehead.
“Do you want me to cast a light on us?” Lux offered, finally closing the door behind them as she did.
The lamps were broken, however, they did bring one themselves. It might not be enough for Lux though, Jinx figured.
“Sure, Flashlight,” Jinx went ahead, grabbed both of their duffels, and carried it with ease, “It’ll be nice too if you can get a better view around. We do want to stay cautious in any case someone's loitering here and made this as their turf. I mean, I already surveyed the area even way before we settled with this plan, but you never know, right?”
“Especially, the upstairs…” Jinx mumbled the last part, and it nearly wasn’t audible enough for Lux to get a whiff of if she lets herself get distracted.
Jinx’s hand lingered on Lux’s right forearm and fondled the fabric of her apparel, the contact seeping in; Jinx reminds, “Anyways, don’t burn yourself out much too, yeah?”
Lux decided to contain her curiosity and nods, returns the gesture, and directs a tiny smile. Jinx has already told her a lot. One step at a time. Lux was satisfied enough that Jinx trusts her a lot.
She sees in the moving darkness that Jinx went down with their things, signaling Lux to start garnering her focus on creating light which would sustain them throughout their stay.
Hands cupped, she channeled the energy within her.
Lux feels the light in her filtering through her fingertips, forming a very tiny yet a radiant and tangible illuminating source.
A little more chanting in her brain, and finally did her magic form her guide through the lacking candescence.
The light in her palms wasn't particularly blinding enough that the rays could be seen or reached outside. It was merely ample to illuminate the room they are going to be staying in during winter.
She and Jinx decided to spend time together throughout the remaining month of the season. Particularly it should have been only a week, but she and her family had another… argument, causing her to not set foot on her household, or to remain for that matter at any dripping minute longer.
As much as she doesn't want to also take out her frustration towards her brother, Lux can't help but feel the dejection when Garen barely defended her stance against the spite their parents had against mages. Their aunt already had an inkling about what she can do, and of course, Lux wasn't in the slightest surprised they ignored the truth willingly. It still did burn, a pang of sadness, to come in terms that because of this, her own kin becomes a reason to make her want to carry out her own exile herself; even if at the beginning, she was against it.
With that, a contra apprared to blow it all out of proportion, in specifics, she chose to prolong her self-wallowing when Jinx proposed a month together in Zaun. At first, Lux wasn't quite sure by the suggestion, her head was nonetheless aggravated because of how that dinner with her family went, but after a lot of consideration (bless Jinx's heart because at least someone cared for her and was gallant enough to tell who she thinks was at fault in this situation — Lux isn't one to abide but she wants to be sided with for once ( to which she was and that sparked a smugged grin on her lips ) — from an outsider's perspective) she thought it to be wise being away from home. The shelters at Demacia can withstand regardless if she's gone for a quite a long time, and probably because Lux thinks the mageseekers wouldn't be that diligent enough to scour the entire country during a bad winter season. Demacians hated a frigid climate.
Lux eases her worries by the thought, and descends slowly from the stair-entrance way.
Darting a quick regard, she sees Jinx crouched on a cranked-open ventilator lodged at the far wall near the bed, with a lamp hanged at the hook to shroud her surroundings with better vision and tools situated in a pointed arrangement beside, and is tinkering up the parts within the attached appliance. Lux gusses that's where the air filtering would occur — a sneeze was ejected from her involuntarily — and perhaps would be their heater as well. She rubs her shoulders with her gloved hands at the idea.
The little ball of beacon hovered in front of her, and Lux seaches where she could station it that should cover the entire area without the additional magic-infused light being a hindrance.
Recalling the broken lamp, Lux walked down the stairs and placed the floating light where shards of its remains were, producing an expedient version of the lamp.
Lux took the opportunity to survey the room. It was like a dinky basement, nearly described as an area where Jinx once told her they hid themselves from enforcers that were seeking them out when she was a little kid, unknowing of the consequences that'll sprout forth like firelights.
It deepens the line on Lux's forehead when she imagines how scared Jinx and her family must have been. Always hiding under these small rooms, scattered and crammed with pipes all over. Although it had hints of coziness because Jinx is here, some ambiances break when those in power bend the rules to their will. Just like those enforcers that are in no short of firearms raised towards those they discriminate. It boils Lux's blood to be knowing that.
Letting out a sigh, she sluggishly shed her armor and combat pieces one by one.
The world was cruel as it is, and thinking about it alone makes Lux's optimism flicker, mind wandering at countless of freights to be hurdled in.
Giving herself an interval of breath, she eyes Jinx's busy stature who was humming a tune, head bouncing in muted rhythm as Lux hears the shifts and clicks of the parts of the ventilator Jinx was modifying, and releases the breath she was unknowingly holding.
Jinx may not clearly understand if Lux tells, but Jinx gives Lux so much comfort, so much reassurance that silences her bedlam and calms her tides. And when the world eventually became too much, Lux resides in Jinx's arms as calloused fingertips are tracing her features and protective mauve irises that speaks to her in a thousand words by just a look, ' I trust you, Blondie. Like you trust me.'
The mutual credence they have for one another was stronger and unbreakable than any bonds that were to exist, begetting Lux to mollify her qualms. She should value the moment they have right now, and perhaps that was sufficient to finally get rid of her regular apparel to a more comfortable one. Since, even she herself, as a Demacian, hates the cold. The biting frost reminded her of the past that still haunts her till this very day, and even if she doesn't speak up about it, she distinguishes Jinx has a hunch of her own. Whether or not Lux unveils about coming undone, befalls when time beseeches it.
Jinx screws the lid of the filterer shut, and jumps from her position to finally reward her legs a breather.
"Whew! Now that's out of the way, I hope it becomes warmer now for you, Luxy!" Swiping off the building sweat on her forehead, Jinx then arches down to pick up her tools and shove them all in her duffel.
Lux didn't answer right away, as she grabbed one of Jinx's clothes and approached behind the taller, surprising her with a back hug before reaching overhead to put on the enormous black tee for Jinx.
"Thanks!" Lux gave a swift chaste after Jinx grumbles that it was too hot to put on a shirt under her top piece, "C'mon, let's head to bed now. I'm pretty sure both of us are sore after sorting our things out."
Jinx scratches her arm, inked with blue clouds reaching inside half her torso and down to her abdomen, and follows Lux to her bunkbed.
"Are you sure you want to be sleeping together in my bed? I could take the top bunk or the couch if you'd like," Jinx suggests, "Besides, if I had a hard time sleeping in that shithole back when I was barely ten, how do you think we can sleep in that?"
Lux releases a tiny chortle, pinching the end of Jinx's shirt and tugs it, "I-If you don't mind, I don't really like sleeping alone."
Jinx raises a concerning brow at the gesture and with Lux's words. She thinks Lux would be more comfortable if she were to have the bed all to herself, but she guesses wrong this time. Why though?
"Before you think of anything else, it's… it's also because I'm not fond of the cold," Lux halts, fingers venturing out for Jinx's hand instead of the shirt's edge, "Only if you're okay with that, of course."
Lux sends an auspiscious smile, but it doesn't reach her eyes fully, causing Jinx to pay attention. With awareness, she then proceeds.
"I don't mind," a shrug of her shoulders, "and if it's something you want, sure. Anything for you, Flashlight."
The vines of perturbation wrapped around Lux's ribs flushes out. Lux felt prickles of needles puncture the back of her eyeballs.
"Thanks, Jinx."
Lux squeezes the life out of Jinx's hand, noting her gratitude beyond words. It was enough for Jinx to know she did something right, inducing a smile to herself and an internal pat on her back.
Jinx lets Lux climb onto the mattress first. And when they did, Lux tilted her head to the side, eyeing Jinx's hair, before stretching forward to grab one of Jinx's braids. Jinx lets her untangle them, and ocean blue strands fell like waves of dominos. Lux carded through them, alleviating shudders and indulging with the mindless contact. Thankfully, Lux already dusted the mattress off while Jinx was operating the ventilator moments ago, and the cushion wasn't as bad as Jinx initially thought. Lux guided them down, their heads on loosen wools of pillows and, damn, Jinx totally forgot how this bed of hers used to feel. It wasn't the awful kind, Jinx has to admit, especially now with Lux by her side, brewing comfort in the tight spaces of her hearth. However, it did still feel odd to be returning here. The triggers of her psychotic mind were subdued by Lux, more of the reason she's fortunate she is here with her.
The howls of the wind outside picks up, telling Jinx that maybe a snowstorm could land anytime. The Last Drop should be able to handle it, Jinx reminds to herself, no worries.
Jinx can feel Lux adjust in their comforters uneasily. Lux doesn't say, but Jinx can see and notice the mere change in her demeanor; how Lux, when sleeping together, would not quake despite a gust of cold wind seeping in their sheets, or how she knows of Lux's grasps being taut but the desperation in her contact was… different — more frightened as if something could occur at any given minute — or even how Lux breathes a calm and serene rhythm of intervals, but now, she's catching her breaths as if impossible to pursuit.
Something was definitely wrong.
"Y'know…" Jinx shifts under the covers, swivels gently to face Lux — to bore her ill eyes and maybe it can heal just from staring — and pushes through the heaps of comforters they brought along and met each other's sights, "Me and my sister used to share a bed like this, or maybe not a bed as tiny as this, but we did a lot, once upon a time."
Lux feels appreciation wrap around her heart and nods, prompting Jinx to continue.
"We played a game where we pretended to be monsters… big ones," Jinx tries producing a figment of her imagination with her hands, forming vague shapes.
Lux's gloved hand pulls Jinx nearer to her side, wanting to feel more warmth other than her words containing already a portion.
"We would disguise ourselves in monsters we could think of. Monsters like slugs who oozes with venoms or a crab with razor spikes meant to eat slugs," Jinx chuckles at the memory, but her brows were furrowed in discomfort.
It nudged Lux to wonder what went all wrong.
"We got carried away with the monsters, and without meaning to, they became real," Jinx whispers, her voice becoming smaller and smaller by the second, invoking Lux to lay her arm above Jinx's torso covered by her huge shirt and tugging her close.
"And before any of us could fend them, the monsters got to us… and took my sister away."
Silence suffocated them.
A hum from the ventilator catalyzes their minds to measure the atmosphere. And they understood each other, by such a subconscious that neither the universe nor end can ever wedge in between.
"She never returned after that," Jinx flutters another knowing gaze towards Lux, catching the blonde to hold in a breath.
Touching the hand that settles on her chest, Jinx fumbles with the tight silk wrapped around flimsy fingers of the mage, and sucks in a diffident air.
"Is there something wrong, Blondie?"
Lux felt her guts churn.
Oh.
The fracture in that moment was sort of laughable. Only because Jinx has this fourth wall and just knows . Wearing down her walls by opening up, is one of the things Lux adores about Jinx. It gives her time to comprehend what it was that dawns her. Perhaps, it was a good thing Jinx possesses it, because Lux wouldn't be able to understand herself and her own cumbersome troubles.
"I'm…" Lux tries to find the right words for her thoughts, her discomfort, her uneasiness throughout, "I'm not as perfect as you think I am," she decides.
Jinx being the one who is silent was weird, weird in a different manner. It was out of place, but the condoling expression adorning her eyes tranquils the contortion.
"You always speak of how I am perfect," Lux reiterates, reaches for Jinx's hands and sites it on her cheek, "And it scares me… to let you down, because I am not nearly, considered as one."
"But you are," Jinx replies dumbly, thumbs caressing the trembles on Lux's features.
Lux shakes her head, "If you were to get a glimpse of what I further am, I don't know how to claim everything, what you've said to me, back ever again."
A bite on her lip, "I-I don't want — I can't risk losing you Jinx. Nothing that I ever want, would be to give you reasons to trust me less when I… trust you with everything I am."
There were creases lining up on Jinx's forehead, confusion coloring her, real confusion that begets answers.
Lux pushes herself up from her supine position, resulting Jinx to also do the same.
"When… I told you before that I had a hard time containing and controlling my magic, the degrees of it were more or less disastrous, not only to those who surrounded me but also… to me," Lux treads carefully around her words, and Jinx, bless her, was just listening.
It was still bizzare how the tables have turned this time.
"R-Remember how I told you about Sylas?" Lux witnesses the way Jinx's brows etch a sharp disturbance by the name, but wordlessly concurs, "He was the first one who taught me how to distribute the energy within me," A cold spike of her past strikes through her spine, sending shivers to her body as it recalls the past events. Jinx, on the other hand, has her grip on Lux's hand become firmer. Lux can discern Jinx holding back the expletives wanting to run free from her mouth, as the man who Lux referred to as her mentor, became the reason for Lux's distrust of anyone — until Jinx.
"Because, I wasn't able to get any other access to learning or harnessing my light without it combusting or destructing," Lux averted her pupils to Jinx's, and she was dreading the upcoming part of her revelation.
"As much as I do want to take pride in comprehending my abilities by my own grit, or just by possessing it, comes with a price that even I didn't know would have put me in a spot whether or not this ability that I have was a gift or a curse."
Jinx was about to open her mouth, wanting to both soothe Lux's worries and respond to the fidgets Lux had been consistently generating throughout her concession, when Lux peeled off her right glove and waved her hand in a fit movement. A flash, blinding, causing Jinx to squirm a bit. And when it died, something diluted rinsed her eyes… as if a shade of unveiling compliance.
When Jinx rubs the feeling away, vision comes swimming back.
As Lux finally revealed what she meant by her imperfection, the gasp from Jinx was, in a lack of words, peculiar. There were no hints of appalled tones, just pure shock.
Jinx traces the blemish decorating Lux's hand, it's flesh in a range of busted ebony and scarring red. Her eyes moved when Lux also pulled at the fabric of her three-fourth sleeve, and there lay the scalds on her forearm. The pain struck Jinx's mind, the marks embedding into her brain, taking everything in.
Lux didn't stop there and proceeded to reach for the hem of her shirt, raising it up, and her abdomen was flamed with marks that destroyed the skin's complexion. It ached Jinx's heart furthermore, seeing that her light was suffering from innate destruction and battling it out all on her own.
Lux felt herself shake in fear, and hasn't sought Jinx's face yet for the disgust she might have caused.
Letting her shirt fall from her grasp, Lux then tentatively outstretches, nudging an approval for her to touch Jinx. The other nodded, still mute from absorbing everything Lux was showing to her.
The mage carried Jinx's calloused hand and placed it on her neck, and following the direction, Jinx then sees Lux's neck, maimed with the burns that even though was healed, became a reminder of Lux's burdening past.
"I learned of this spell to cover up my mishaps. Not even the mageseekers were able to detect this as I came to harness it naturally," Lux solicits a pained chuckle, her damaged hand drifting downwards on Jinx's pale forearms tattered in scars, and maybe reacquainting herself that she can nonetheless feel despite impaired sense, "A trick of the light, they say. I never knew how much that has helped me throughout my life."
"Lux…" Jinx whispers, her voice tinted with pain (surprising Lux, because even if Jinx was covered in cuts and bruises, pain would be the least of Jinx's concern, nor would she even bother to pay notice of) as her forefingers gingerly, gently, warily touches the marks, afraid that any minor pressure can cause Lux to shatter under her.
A shudder ran through her skin, like ripples of recognition. Lux felt exposed. She has never opened up to anyone about the years she had been hiding under guises that not even her own bloodline knows – not even Garen. Though some might say it was a shame, Lux felt sufficient with the choice she committed. It will never be the same as her previous mistake. Trusting Jinx with everything she is, will not become a part of her regret.
Never again.
Lux steels herself once more. She wasn’t done.
Her fingers tremble across Jinx’s arm, pressing softly on faded wounds, “W-winter… It was winter when he… he– m-magic… It was cold. I remember it being cold. M-My brother – He…”
Her voice was losing its usual tenacity. God.
Another hand rose from her lap, anchoring on Jinx’s, hoping to gain some of her coherency. Nothing.
Lux can feel her mind crushing itself, the pain seering through her, a sense of deja vu just enters in like a cataclysm. Memories began rolling, a film where she knows how it all ended, and why it came to be.
Suddenly everything felt too dark, too glacial, too… much.
“Hey.”
Cord-staunch limbs envelop Lux in a warm embrace. Frigid, yet lukewarm. Dying, but then again, still alive.
Lux’s head was surrounded by calming waters that curtain her vision, removing the abrupt apprehension deftly like falls came crashing at rock bottom.
“You don’t need to tell me everything, Blondie,” Jinx utters, hands free from her fingerless gloves combing through golden locks, “Especially if it gets too much.”
An echo from one of their moments instantly sinks in by those words.
‘Just let me know if it gets too much, hm?’ Lux informs, after one of Jinx’s episodes.
That’s right.
Lux blinks the overflowing dams of her frontage, tears staining her face.
Jinx takes this as a signal and leads them back on the mattress, emotionally and physically spent.
The whirs of the outside was comforting, bathing them under an understanding silence after everything. Jinx has her inked arm swathed beneath Lux’s neck, while the other attends to Lux’s face; tracing blue eyes, cute nose, chapped lips, and marred neck. Lux was beautiful. And no scars can ever tell Jinx otherwise.
“You are perfect, Sunshine,” Jinx breathlessly admits, her index fingers still trailing.
Lux carefully shifts, facing Jinx, and indulging with irises speaking its truth. Her heart soars at the expression.
“I love you,” She whispers, cerulean sights glistening in pain and relieving.
Lux situates her blighted palm on Jinx’s cheek, thumbs over the arching bone, and leans in to capture her only remedy in this god-awful planet.
Jinx returns the sentiment just as passionate, her own sighs mending with Lux’s.
“I love you too, Blondie.”
She produces an interval, their vision treading waters while brewing distance.
“Don’t worry,” Jinx establishes a promise, diving in again to kiss Lux with a newly profound fervor.
“No monster’s gonna get you when I’m here.”