Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Jinx is twelve when Silco brings his daughter home.

The only problem is that this daughter isn’t her.

She’d wanted to ask him all kinds of questions about it: where had he just, like, randomly found a toddler? How’d he know it was even his? Kid didn’t look like him, really—not with her weird yellow eyes and light brown hair—and…and…

And nothing, really. She just wants to complain about something—anything—because these things that keep yelling at her every waking moment of every single day just keep getting louder and louder and louder and now she’s gonna have to share her kinda-sorta-dad with his questionably related kid that is practically still a baby and that means she’ll be alone even more than she already is—

Oh. She hadn’t thought about that, actually.

When he’d walked in last night, looking even paler than the guy already looked, this weird haunted look in his eyes as soon as the door to their apartment shut behind him, neither of them really spoke for a long, long moment. The only thing he’d said, after she’d finally asked, was that this ratty-lookin’ thing in his arms was his daughter and that she’d be staying with them now.

He’s never called Jinx his daughter.

Back…back when Mylo was still alive, he used to tell her that the only reason Vander’d let her stay there even though she was such a jinx was that Vi was there, too. But Vi isn’t here anymore. Vi’d left her. Now, the only thing she’s got saving her sorry skin are her stupid bombs that still almost never work and the fact that she’s sorta the boss’ kid—but if…if he already has a kid, his real kid…

Well, who would keep a jinx around then?

He’s going to leave you!

“No…no, he—he wouldn’t—”

Jinx!

“Stop, stop. You’re…you’re not real!”

Maybe I would be if you hadn’t KILLED US, JINX!

She curls further in on herself as he gets louder, her nails wrapping around the shells of her ears as she closes her palm around them in an attempt to drown them out. When that doesn’t work, she tucks her chin between her legs and squeezes her eyes shut, shaking her head as they go on and on and on.

You might as well pack your bags: your replacement’s already here.

“Shut up.”

Wouldn’t want a useless piece of trash like you getting in the way of something actually useful.

She grinds her teeth, hoping the tension in her jaw will help lock them out.

It doesn’t work—

Of course it didn’t—nothing you do ever works because you’re a jinx—

“SHUT UP!”

She takes a breath as they laugh, that scratching, burning noise that comes with it grating on her ears that are doing their job on the wrong side of her body—why don’t they make earlpugs for the hearing in your head?!—and she lets it out at the same time she locks eyes with it.

Silco had to run some stupid errand or something and he must have thought she wouldn’t be Jinx enough to mess up a baby within the couple hours he’d been gone, so he’d left it—and her—exactly where he’d left them when he’d walked out. It’s still lying on a blanket on the couch, staring at her with its stupid wide, yellow eyes and it’s even stupider frown.

Like, what could a baby even have to be sad about?

It’s not even old enough to ruin things for everyone else.

You would know, wouldn’t you?

She growls at him, throwing the pillow next to her at the wall and through his stupid fat head—

Still nicer than what you actually did to us though, huh?

“I told you, I’m sorry!”

Oh, you’re sorry? He scoffs, the sound like acid in her mouth, like bile up her throat, Sorry doesn’t fix this. You can’t fix this—but fixing things was never your strong suit anyways, huh?

She bites her lip, but her mouth opens anyways, her words jinxing even herself.

“Vi said—”

What, that you could fix anything?

That laughter sounds again and it forces her back to her knees, leaving her gasping for air that just won’t come even as the it on the couch just stares at her like the stupid little asshole that it is.

She obviously didn’t believe that—if she had, she wouldn’t have left you, would she have?

There’s tears stinging in the corners of her eyes again, but they don’t actually come—she’s cried too much since last night for that. Instead, it just burns, and she feels the fight leave her as she lets her face sag against the floor.

This is all that thing’s fault, the other voice—the quieter, more nervous one—starts up, the boy himself nowhere to be found even as she hears him pace the creaky wooden floor of the living room.

She props her chin up then, eyeing her replacement from where it’s still sprawled about the couch.

Always staring.

If you can—I mean, if she’s not here, he can’t replace you, right?

She sniffles, her nose as dry as her eyes, as her mouth was becoming.

That…that sounded right. That sounded right! Silco didn’t have to leave her, not if this—this thing got lost. Then it’d just be her and him again, like it was always meant to be.

Then he won’t leave her like Vi did. She doesn’t have to be a jinx to him, too.

The thing blinks at her and she scowls.

What the heck is she supposed to do with it, though? She can’t just, like, throw it away or something. She could sell it, maybe? Vander used to say to stay away from some places—like where she and Vi used to live—‘cuz people liked to do really bad things to kids there before he…before…

What, monkey bomb got your tongue?

Ugh! She glares at where he’s been flickering in and out of her vision, upset that he won’t just leave her alone already.

Screw this, she’ll just…just take care of it all herself. It’ll be easy.

Jinx rushes to the bedroom, grabbing her jacket before she moves to the couch, hoping this stupid baby wasn’t gonna be heavier than her old craft box used to be. She won’t jinx Silco, and she won’t be replaced, and no one would leave her ever again.

Well, unless you decide to kill them like—

“STOP!”

A noise from below gets her attention, and she sees the stupid replacement clapping its stupid hands at her like it’s trying to get her attention—like it even needed more attention than it’d stolen from her new dad!

Is he your dad? He doesn’t call you his daughter…that’s just something people say.

The thought sends a pang of sadness through her—He…he is her dad now, right?

That clapping starts again and she glares down at it with a sneer. Damn thing won’t shush already and let her think.

What’s there to think about? Go dump the damn thing and be done with it.

She bites her lip, uncertainty filling her head like he did when he got too loud. She doesn’t know how to get there, though…

Are you kidding me? How are you still this much of a baby?!

She tugs at her hair and it starts clapping again and she balls her hands up at her sides before deciding he’s right—she had to do this, she didn’t have any other options except to suck it up and go.

She reaches down to pick it up under the arms—and it’s real awkward because she’s never had to do this before, she’s always been the youngest—but the second she pulls it towards her like she’d seen Silco do, it wraps its stupid, grubby little arms around her and lets its head fall onto her shoulder.

“H-Hey, get offa me,” she says, trying to sound intimidating. She curses herself as soon as she hears her own voice—it shakes too much to be scary to anything, and now it’s clinging to her and she doesn’t know what to do because it’s cold and she should probably wrap it up so it doesn’t get cold but then she’d have to pry its hands off her and—

And this is the first time anyone had hugged her since Silco had that night she’d ruined everything.

For some reason, that makes her feel sick, and since she’s gonna get rid of the kid anyways, she…she might as well hug it back, right? Since no one’s around to see.

You’re pathetic.

It’s quieter than he was, though, and that gives her a chance to think. She’s pretty tired, and the couch is free again since the kid wasn’t on it…and that blanket’s still there…

He…he wouldn’t be back anytime soon. Surely she had time for a nap…she hasn’t slept since this stupid thing came back with her new father.

She sits, letting her arms stay wrapped around the kid. It’s so small—like, it’s not a baby baby, and it had teeth and could walk and stuff, but it also didn’t talk or anything like that, so she’d thought maybe it wasn’t too old.

“How old are you?”

She doesn’t really mean to ask: like, it didn’t matter, the people would probably rip her off for the same price no matter what the answer really was, but she’s sleepy and the words just sorta slipped out and—

And now it’s pulled back enough to look at her, its tint fists balled in the fabric of her jacket to give it some leverage.

It blinks at her, tilting its head a little like a puppy might.

She huffs at it (it’s definitely not a laugh, because there’s nothing funny about having a replacement) and it huffs back, smiling at her when it’s finished.

Jinx holds out a hand and pokes at its nose, and the kid blinks as she huffs again—and even though it’s still silent, she can tell the kid found it funny—

And then its hand comes up and smacks into her nose and that makes both of them laugh and she’s struck with the weirdest thought.

Like, that didn’t hurt her. The kid hit her and it didn’t hurt—nothing this brat could do would ever actually be able to hurt her, probably, because it’s so tiny that it can’t do anything by itself.

It’s pathetic, just like she used to be…

Oh.

“You’re kinda like me, huh?”

That’s what Silco said about Jinx, once, when they first met. He’d said something else to, and he’d explained it later. Vander’d left him, just like he’d left Jinx (except that time wasn’t really his fault) and just like Vi’d left her, too.

Oh boy.

“I can’t leave you, can I?” It’s a sudden realization—one that happens even as the kid pokes and pulls at her bangs, even as Jinx has to pull her braid away so it doesn’t put it in its mouth. “Then I’d be just like her.”

The kid bops her nose again and she laughs even though it makes her raw, reddened face hurt, her eyes itchy and scratchy from all the crying. But maybe she didn’t have to be the useless crying one anymore—maybe Silco wouldn’t have to leave her because he’d realize how useful she was by comparison.

Maybe that’s why Vander’d always liked Vi the most—anybody would, with such a pathetic thing to compare her to.

That makes her frown. She…hadn’t liked being pathetic, of everyone reminding her and comparing her to her perfect older sister, of having to be the worst one of them all always and forever…at least, ‘til she was the only one left, anyways. Jinx bites her lip, confusing the kid in front of her as its hand travels to clumsily pull at her mouth.

Could she make this kid do the same thing as she had to? That…that doesn’t feel very good to Jinx—like someone’s tightening a vice around her heart, squeezing the last bits of pathetic in herself out in the form of pity and hurt. But if she didn’t do that, Silco would leave.

She jumps when the front door opens behind her—

“Jinx, what are you…doing?”

Silco seems confused when he walks around the couch, his alarmed face morphing into one of surprise as he takes the two of them in, the kid still poking at her lip before turning to watch him.

“I…”

She swallows—could he tell that easily? She’s so stupid, she should have just taken it and ran when she ha the chance, now it’s too late and he’s going to leave her—

Silco hums, watching her, and it makes her throat close up as they wait in silence. He sighs, moving to sit next to her.

This is it, she thinks, now he’ll take it and tell you to get lost.

“I’m sorry, Jinx.”

She knew it! She knew it and still blew her only chance at fixing things because she’s a jinx!

“I hadn’t meant to leave the two of you alone—it…she slipped my mind when I got that message from Sevika…but it seems you handled it rather admirably, no?”

She turns to face him, his words not matching with the ones she’d pre-made in her head.

He notices—he always does—and he continues. “You’re dehydrated. I thought I left a pitcher in the kitchen,” he moves to stand but her arm grabs him by its own and he frowns at her, blinking. “Whatever is the matter, child?”

“Are you going to leave me now?”

She hates how weak she sounds, like the stupid baby she used to be before Powder kicked the bucket at the cannery with the rest of her old family.

“Of course not,” he says easily, though there’s a note of alarm in his voice that makes her arms curl tighter around the kid in her lap because Silco never panics. “Why would I do that?”

“You—you have her now, you don’t need—why’d you hafta bring her here?!”

There’s a flash of understanding behind his mismatched eyes and he shifts closer to her as he places one hand on her head. “Child, if one of you were to go, it certainly wouldn’t be you.”

Her jaw slackens in shock. “But I thought you said she was your’s?”

His eyes flicker to the girl in her lap and she finds herself shocked to realize that that weird, haunted look wasn’t as weird as she’d thought it’d been—it’s, it’s like he’d tasted something bad or something.

“She was a mistake, child. You,” he smiles at her, patting her head, “you, I chose—and if her being here will cause you that much distress, I’ll find someone else to take care of—”

“No!”

He raises an eyebrow at her and she abruptly realizes how loud she just was, turning a little more red than her scratchy face probably already is.

“I mean—I…,” she falters when the kid smooshes her nose again, making her smile. The girl mirrors it, huffing at her just like she had before, back when Jinx was going to throw her away just like Vi had done to her. “Can we keep her? I…I like her. I don’t want to be like…”

He looks like he gets it again, and he nods.

“Good. That was my first option, anyways,” he eyes the girl for a moment before turning back to her, “I must ask, though: what changed your mind?”

She jumps at that—how had he known?

He hums, raising an eyebrow at her like she’d been caught doing something really dumb. “You haven’t stopped crying since I brought her here, Jinx.”

Oh. That’s true.

“I…,” she looks at the kid again and lets herself smile, “I guess she did.”

Silco doesn’t answer her for a while, and when she turns to see why, she finds him facing out the window ahead of him like he’s not really looking outside, but rather somewhere else.

“You won’t end up like she did, Jinx—you’re too intelligent for that,” he huffs a laugh and the girl in her lap follows suit. “By the looks of it, you’re already better at being an older sister than she ever was.”

Jinx blinks. “Wait—I’m your daughter?”

He turns to her then, his expression blank. “Did you not want to be?”

She waves her hands even though the whole thing’s clumsy since they’re behind the kid’s back. “That’s not what I meant! I just…I didn’t know.”

He has the gall to laugh at that and she glares at him until he wraps an arm around her shoulders, pulling her closer. “Do you think I would tolerate anyone sharing my living space if they weren’t family?”

If she had any tears left in her, they would have spilled over her cheeks then. Mylo calls her a baby. Maybe he’s right, right now, but she doesn’t care. He knows he can’t get as loud around Silco, anyways—it’s part of the reason she never wanted to leave. She presses her head into his side and he lets her, his warmth reminding her of just how tired she is.

“You’re not allowed to leave me,” she starts, her words slurring a little in her exhaustion. She feels him laugh under her head and she grumbles. “And we’re—we can’t leave her, either. Not like they did. We’re better than that.”

“Hmph. Well said,” he replies, his voice calm and smooth and his. “You know you have to drink something before I let you fall asleep, right?”

She groans, hating the idea of getting up from her warm little nest. The kid in her arms snorts, pressing away from her—apparently, she’s not as fun to be around when her face isn’t close enough to poke.

Hands lift the girl from her lap and she nearly curls in on herself in protest before she hears him speak, his voice even softer than it had been just moments before.

“Don’t you want to be healthy enough to show her around tomorrow?”

Huh?

She turns to look up at him, his eyes not on the wiggling kid in his lap, but on Jinx as he continues. “You’re the oldest, now.”

Like…like Vi had been?

Her eyes widen at the implications of that—Vi had to do a lot to keep them all out of trouble, back when she saw something in Jinx worth sticking around for. She’d made sure they washed their clothes and had enough to eat and helped her when she was sick. She got super strong so she could beat anyone up stupid enough to mess with Vander’s kids, with her siblings.

Could…could a screw-up like her really do all of that?

“I told you once already, Jinx,” he starts back up, one hand held out to her as he stands, the other around the girl. “You’re not like Vi—you’re something greater.”

She looks at his hand and then at the girl again, who claps her hands a couple of times once she notices Jinx’s eyes on her.

He’s right—she’s not like Vi—but she doesn’t mean that in the way he does. She’s not better: she never has been...but…

Maybe…maybe for this kid, she could at least try to be.

“What’s her name, anyways?” She asks, taking his hand and pushing herself off the couch as he helps her up.

“Isha,” he looks at her knowingly, rolling his eyes at the look on her face, “I know: I didn’t pick it.”

She snorts at him. “Well change it then—it sounds dumb.”

Silco shakes his head, sounding tired as he starts towards the kitchen. “That’s not how that works, Jinx.”

“That’s how it worked for me.”

He sighs, and the kid peaks at her from over his shoulder. “Perhaps if she wants to change it when she’s older, I’ll be more amenable to the suggestion,” he says, pouring her a cup from the pitcher.

I’ll try not to mess this up, Isha, she thinks, downing a glass of water even while Silco tries to get her to slow down because it makes the kid laugh, I’ll try.

Chapter Text

Over the next couple of years, Isha gets bigger, but she never starts speaking.

Jinx is starting to think that trencher doctor Silco hired is a big fat phony, because she’d assured them all that little kids would start that for sure-sies by the time they were three. Now, she’s no baby expert or the whatnot, but she’s pretty sure Isha’s more than three by now, so there’s no way in heck that was true.

The lady’d also said there wasn’t anything wrong with her, uh, speaking tubes or whatever…but Silco said he didn’t think Isha ever would—and he hadn’t seemed happy about it, either.

Jinx didn’t really get the problem. Actually, to her, it’s not a problem: it’s a solution. For some reason, bein’ around a half-pint so quiet all the time made it easier to focus…maybe it’s ‘cuz she’s the older sister this time. It’s like…like she knows she has to protect the little squirt, and so she’s not allowed to be so crazy when she’s within shooting range. The boys seemed to know it, too, because try as they might, their words just didn’t seem to reach her as well as they could when she is all by her lonesome, so eventually, they kinda just stop trying.

It's…nice not to be left behind all the time.

Later, she finds out the only reason he’d only gotten all pissy ‘bout it because he was having a hard time tracking down a tutor for Isha—something Jinx thought was ultra stupid considering she’s taught her how to do pretty much everything she needed to know…’cept, when he explained it, she got a little less mad about it all.

After all, Jinx didn’t know how to teach her a whole ass language.

She ends up getting pretty good at teaching her, though, because he'd finally given up a few months after looking and had Jinx go on the most boring mission ever. She’d never actually been in a library ‘til the night she snuck in the closest one up topside, and they had plenty of books to choose from up there, and the first thing her twerp sister ends up saying with her new fancy hand-talking that isn’t just frustrated gibberish is ”Love you. Friend sister.”

The effect is a little ruined when the next thing is ”Feed I-S-H-A,” though. After that, she started lugging her around wherever she went. Teaching Silco is a whole lot harder, and Jinx got so irritated with it that she’d ended up throwing the book at him.

Ironically, it ends up sticking a heck of a lot better once he just reads the damn thing himself.

And if Jinx had grabbed something else she’d seen sitting on one of the library’s many tables, well, who’s to say, really?

Silco eventually stops trying to tell her not to take Isha with her when she goes out anymore—and she doesn’t just mean to Jericho’s, either. They go on all sortsa’ adventures together, first with Isha tucked under an arm, and as she kept gettin’ bigger, on her back or sittin’ on her shoulders. She’d figured out how to braid her hair like—like someone used to do for her back when she was too much of a dumb baby to function on her own—and she’s recently began splitting them into two instead of using just the one all the time. Dad said he liked it, and ever since then, she’s kept it like that, and now Isha likes to use ‘em like Piltie guardrails or handholds or whatever they’re called.

It takes until she’s sixteen before she manages to convince Dad to let her tattoo herself. She coulda did it without his permission, sure…but she knew if she wore him down enough that he caved, she’d get the materials—actually good materials—for free instead of having to scavenge for ‘em herself.

What she did not tell him, however, was that Isha would be getting them, too.

“Still don’t really see why you want ‘em,” she mumbles under her breath, positioning the girl on the crate with her arm propped up on their shared workbench. Isha kicks her legs, practically vibrating in excitement. She’d initially been scared of it all, but that’s only because she’d watched Jinx do it to herself about a week ago now, and now that she’d seen the design, she wanted to match. It’s pretty much the only thing she’d sign since then, actually, and she’s got such big old puppy dog eyes that she hadn’t had the heart to tell her no anymore.

God, she’s such a sucker.

You’re only just now realizing that?

She grits her teeth at the sound before tossing a stray bit of metal at the little effigy she’d made so he’d stop appearing wherever he wanted to in her workshop. At least now, she’d know exactly where he was…but trying to explain that to a six year old in a way that made sense is proving trickier than she’d thought it’d be.

And kinda embarrassing, for some reason—like it’s not something she’s supposed to just admit to someone. She knows they’re not real, but that didn’t make them sound or feel less real to her, and that just pissed her off even more now than it had when…when it’d first started. Back then, she’d just thought she was crazy—and don’t get her wrong here, she is (why else would everyone and their mothers feel the need to keep reminding her of it?)—but now that she knew, it just made her feel…powerless.

“Stupid brain,” Jinx growls, shaking her head to dispel the last of the laughter. Isha’s staring at her again, her previous excitement replaced by something more subdued. Jinx huffs, more than pleased to watch the six-year old mimic it just like she had as a toddler.

Isha’s hands flash at her as she cocks her head, those too-wide eyes taking her in like tiny little sunshines as she answers her not-exactly-a-question question with one of her own:

”Why YOU want?” the girl says, emphasizing the “you” with an exaggerated jab of her finger. It’s probably a bad habit of hers, the way she’d leave out the connecting words or whatever the hell you call ‘em, but it’s also kinda cute (like a little kid who couldn’t say their words quite right after losing their baby teeth)…plus, it irritated their father, so it’s a win-win in Jinx’s eyes.

“Me?” she glances down at the girl wiggling on the crate as she gets the ink ready—thankfully, Isha wanted hers to look exactly like her own, so she hadn’t had to go out and beg for different colors. That probably would have looked suspicious since hers were already done ‘n all…and she’d rather he get mad after she finished her work, not before. “It…it just reminds me of something, I guess. Something important.”

That’s an understatement.

She grinds her teeth again but doesn’t turn towards him this time—not even as his laughter grates on her ears.

Isha hums, sounding uncertain. ”What thing?”

Jinx hesitates, her hands faltering from where they roll the kid’s sleeve up. She hadn’t actually told her that whole story yet—of why Silco wasn’t her first father, of how everything had gone to shit, of the real significance behind the stupid blue clouds she’d permanently etched on her skin so she wouldn’t…

She sighs, shaking her head as she assembles tattoo gun-thing dad’d got her after she finishes moving the fabric out of her way. That’s not really a story she wanted to share…but if the kid was gonna stick around her like this, didn’t she deserve to know?

What, scared she’s gonna leave you just like your first sister?

Jinx closes her eyes for a moment, willing herself to relax before she flips the switch on the device in her hand, and the both of them look at it as it buzzes to life with a steady, calming hum. It’s not quite loud enough to drown out her words, though, and eventually, when she’s finished with the small outline around the first “cloud”, she finally caves.

It’s probably the kid’s stupid eyes.

By the time she’s done sharing the story—the real, full story and not the half-of-a-half truths she’s told her up until now—she’s putting the finishing touches on the last cloud of her arm, a focused frown stuck on her face like it’d been carved there.

Maybe it had, actually—maybe it’s always been there since that night at the cannery, a last, grim memorial to the useless girl she once was forever hidden just beneath the mask of Jinx.

The kid doesn’t move, doesn’t say anything, doesn’t hum or grunt or shift—she just watches Jinx in silent with this neutral expression on her face that Jinx can’t bring herself to look at for more than a few seconds at a time. If the kid chose not to stick around her after this, she wouldn’t blame her or anything—it’s probably the reasonable reaction (heck, it’s what…what her other one had done, too)—but it might crack open a wound that’d never fully healed again, and until she finishes up this one nice thing she’s trying to do, Jinx would rather not see the moment the girl chose to walk away from her.

When she finishes securing the kinda-bandage over the ink, Jinx clicks the tool back off, and when she turns back, she flinches when the kid barrels into her side, her small arms wrapping around her legs in a tight embrace. A pit forms in her stomach when the girl pulls back, convincing her that this would be the last time they really hung out, that this goodbye hug would soon come to hurt just as much as that punch had, and she braces herself as Isha’s hands come up in front of her—

But a goodbye isn’t what she signs:

”You asked why I wanted", her hands flicker through the words so quickly Silco probably wouldn’t have been able to follow the conversation, ”Reminds me of something, too.”

Jinx shifts, watching her uneasily as Isha pauses as if she’s waiting for a reaction.

“What’s that, squirt?” She forces out, her voice uncertain even to her own ears.

”You,” the girl grins at her, her missing baby tooth making her look even younger than she actually is. Not sure how to take that, Jinx waits—and when Isha notices, she amends her statement: ”Not bad. Just you.”

Jinx snorts a laugh, and Isha mimics her like she always had, offering her a lopsided smile that makes the girl’s grin grow even wider.

”Not leaving you. Love you too much.”

Jinx’s lip wobbles a bit and she messes up the kid’s hair so she can’t see it, causing the girl to laugh up at her even as the world settles back down into something nicer around them.

”Want play?”

Jinx rolls her eyes, feigning reluctance as she starts to walk back to the workbench to clear a place for the board. “I guess…but no letting your arm rub up on the table or nothin’: I’m not in the mood to redo all ‘a that.”

Isha laughs and rushes back to her crate, and she’s apparently so excited that she isn’t paying much attention, because she ends up tripping as she reaches Jinx’s side and then Jinx barley catches her by the back of her too-big jacket and hauls her up to her face with one hand, raising an eyebrow at the sheepish look on her face. Jinx shakes her head, setting her down on her crate as she sets up the pieces, suppressing a laugh at the way her kid sister sets her chin on the workbench as she impatiently watches her do so.

It's called chess or checkers or something—don’t ask Jinx, it’s some Piltie game—and it’d been sitting on one of the library’s tables just begging to come home with her. She didn’t actually know how to play or anything until Silco’d found her stacking the pieces on top of each other and taught her, and so naturally she’d had to teach Isha, too, once she got old enough that she’d stopped trying to put everything in her mouth.

That’s why one of the horse lookin’ pieces had a little chew mark in it…and also why the blue pieces were always hers. They hadn’t always been blue, but she’s used them to practice painting details on things a year or so ago and now they were a few different shades of blue with bits of pink while the other’s colors were inverted.

It’s sorta become their thing now despite the fact that Isha didn’t really have the patience to sit through a whole game. She also hated losing, and Jinx has played Silco so much that she’s become half-decent at it herself, so she tries to take it easy on the kid—she does—but that doesn’t stop the way that, fifteen minutes later, she can’t stall things out anymore and she has to break the news to the kid.

Isha grumbles as she finishes explaining why she’s about to win, dropping her chin to the wooden surface below her head with a sigh. Jinx laughs.

“Better luck next time, pepperbox,” she says, moving to stat cleaning up the pieces. To her surprise, Isha’s hands come up in alarm, waving her away from them before she can touch anything. She cocks her head at the kid, a small frown on her face. “What’s up?”

”What if we go back one turn? You still win?"

Jinx blinks, her eyebrows furrowing in thought as she thinks about it.

“Do you remember where the pieces were?”

Isha moves them all back to where they were, and she nods at the board, thinking over what the girl could do to stop her from winning at this point.

“I…guess not?” She answers, pointing out what she could do to block her…uh, whatever the spiky piece is called from reaching her chem-baron. “Just move this one here…”

Isha listens, transfixed by the explanation, before she starts signing again, eyes alight in a child-like wonder. Jinx doesn’t remember the last time she’d been able to see the world like that.

Hopefully, Isha never stops.

”If you’re gonna win too quick, can we repeat?”

“Repeat? Repeat what?”

Isha huffs at her, her gaze flattening almost comically as her knees hit the side of the workbench. ”Like this—go back one."

Jinx watches her, ready to explain that that’s not really how the game’s supposed to work…but then she thinks about the day after Silco’d taken her in, about the way she’d cried and begged for Vi to come back even in her dreams, wanting more than anything to be able to take back the mistake she’d made, to not have messed everything up like she had.

To not be left alone, Vander’s body still and unmoving beside her as the fire raged all around.

“Yeah,” she says instead, watching her sister smile up at her as she starts her turn, oblivious to the way it had just helped fix something still broken inside Jinx’s messed-up head. “Repeats are ok.”

Chapter Text

When Jinx is seventeen, Isha makes a friend.

It’d started out innocently enough—she just describes the boy to her as some street kid that was curious about seeing her talk with her hands—and since Jinx hadn’t been around at the time and Isha still had all her insides, she’d shot her a smile and listened as Isha described their tiny escapades together.

They hang out quite a bit after that, but Jinx always just seems to miss him—seemed the kid always had to run off just before she got back, and also that he was only around when Jinx was not.

That shoulda been her first clue something was up, but she's admittedly too caught up in the way Isha’s face lit up every time she talked about her pal to focus on anything else.

Dad had asked her to go pick up some things one day, and though she’d tried to find Isha to bring her along, she’d eventually given up and gone by herself. Had dad been worried about it, it woulda been a different story, but he’d only said that she’d gone out with Sevika (blech, poor kid) earlier, so that had been that.

After she’s grabbed what he’d asked for (and finished doing some, uh, shopping in one of the markets), she turns to start heading home, and she gets about halfway there before she runs into an outta breath Sevika, who explains that—somehow—she’d lost track of a seven year old at some point in the recent past and that’s all Jinx bothered listening come out of the ogre’s mouth before she takes off in the direction the woman’d just came from, the girl’s name already on her lips.

When she finds one of their oil crayons on the ground in the next neighborhood over, her stomach turns.

She’d been about ready to tear the place apart after her considerable efforts to find her turned up diddly squat, but then she’d spotted this kid—not the one she’s looking for, mind you.

It’s a Firelight brat, complete with the mask and all.

Here’s the thing: Jinx isn’t really a fan of the Firelights. Like, at all. Some of it’s because they always got in the way of whatever she’s doing—that’s why Sevika and Silco hated them, after all.

But for Jinx? It’s mostly because of their leader.

Back when they still hung out a couple of years back, he’d just always seemed to know where she would be, popping up with his legs dangling over a crumbling cement wall with that hoverboard she’d helped him design hanging across his back…

And they’d just…talk.

She’d been so happy that first time he’d shown up, too—Janna, she must have been, what? Thirteen? Seeing him again, alive and well…it was like…like maybe not everything she remembered from her old, shitty life had to be that bad. He’d tried to get her to come with him, to join his gang he’d named after the bugs that only ever seemed to pop up in the undercity. She couldn’t just leave though—and she’d tried to tell him that, but he wasn’t having any of it then. He’d called her names that would have gotten him grounded for like three years had Benzo still been kickin’ before he’d left her just like everyone else.

Maybe that’s why she hadn’t been expecting it when he’d come back.

He’d apologized, tried explaining why Silco was a scumbag (which, yeah, he is, but so is Jinx…and unlike everyone else down here, he did what he did for a reason), gave her the whole definitely-not-rehearsed spiel he’d cooked up before giving her the third degree.

Or so he’d tried. Jinx isn’t a huge fan of spillin’ state secrets unless she’s really bored, but since Silco discovered that, he’d done his damndest to keep her busy. To her surprise, the night ended with him asking to go hang out at their old arcade…which was still in pretty bad shape from that enforcer attack back before everything’d gone to shit, so they didn’t end up hanging out so much as fixing the place up. But it’d been fun, and when he’d asked if she wanted to come back in a few weeks, she’d agreed.

And thus they’d began semi-regularly meeting up.

Jinx never went and sought him out. She thinks he used to be hurt by that, but she’d never bothered to ask so she knew for sure.

She’d also never bothered telling him why that is: though she could be as slippery as an eel, her skulking off on her own without telling Silco what she was up to all the time was just asking for him to have someone tail her, and if they found out who she’d been spending all this time with…

Well. It wouldn’t have been great—and she doesn’t mean for her.

One time, two weeks before her fifteenth birthday, she fucks up while they’re upgrading the shooting range in the arcade (it’s much too slow for either of them by this point). He’d been oddly more insistent about his usual recruitment speech than he normally was, and when he actually stops working on the targets completely and comes to stand in front of her, crossing his arms and raising his voice, asking that same question he always did…

It just. It got under her skin too far to ignore.

“I know you said you don’t want to leave or whatever—but Silco’s not a good guy,” he’d cut himself off before saying her name—her old one, the one she’d told him not to use anymore. “But there’s no reason to stay there—adults can’t be abandoned like kids can. You’d be doing nothing wrong—don’t you want to hang out like we do here all the time? There’s so much good someone like you could do for everybody down here. Come on,” he’d reached out to her then, trying to hide how hurt he'd become when she’d started shaking her head. He's taller than her now—that last growth spurt shooting him higher than Jinx’d ever get—and when he took a step forwards to spin her around by the shoulder when she’d started turning away, she’s got to look up at least a couple inches just to meet his eyes.

“I can’t, Ekko! I already told you—"

“Just because you keep saying that doesn’t mean it makes any sense! You’re working for the guy that killed Benzo, that flooded the streets with Shimmer and turns a blind eye when his chem barons enslave kids to work in the mines! Him ‘saving’ you,” it’s clear by his tone what he’d thought about that, “by not murdering an eleven year old in cold blood doesn’t magically make him some kinda saint—and it doesn’t even begin to make up for the shit he’s done to the people down here! So why? Why won’t you just ditch that asshole already and—”

“I can’t! I won’t leave her like she left me!”

The second the words left her lips, she’d known exactly how she’d screwed up—because, by some fucking miracle, no one really knew Isha existed just yet—Jinx'd only just began taking her on longer trips out of the apartment and to her workshop, but she was still too young yet to bring on missions, and Jinx was capable of causing such a ruckus all by her lonesome that she drew most of the ire and attention alike to herself.

“’Her’?”

And she’d just gone and messed it all up just like she messed everything up—

“Woah, hey, it’s ok Pow—uh, shit, I mean, I didn’t mean to freak you out or nothin’—”

He’d kept going like that, for a while, but Jinx doesn’t remember a lot of it until after she’d figured out how to breathe again. It’s…probably the most awkward hug she’d ever been given, even now…but it was also just.

Nice.

Reminded her of old times again in a way that didn’t make her want to blow her brains out.

She ended up explaining what she’d meant (or rather, who she'd meant) that night, and he’d gotten this real complicated look on his face and he’d said that everything would be fine.

The next time they’d met up, he’d told her that she could bring Isha even knowing what that would mean: a group steadfastly opposed to Silco suddenly acquiring both of his daughters…it probably wouldn’t have ended well. Jinx told him no, of course—she’s not abandoning him, either, not after all he’d done for both her and her sister—and he’d asked her to think on it some more.

Then, a few days later, the Firelights strike one of the Shimmer plants, and since Jinx is close enough to respond…well…

A lotta them died—and most weren’t killed by the Shimmer-fueled guards, either.

She hadn’t seen him for a long time after that, and it’d been a little soul-crushing. Maybe she shoulda seen it coming—hell, maybe a part of her had—but their infrequent get-togethers had become something of a constant, a tie to a person Silco told her wasn’t her anymore and yet still wasn’t fully dead…and it’d hurt.

So when he’d appeared again whilst she’d walked back from one of her “watch this boring Piltie guy do boring Piltie things” missions, she’d been so happy to see him that she hadn’t thought about why he’d come to find her.

The interactions between the two of them since that night haven’t been the greatest—things tended to get that way when your old pal shows up for a chat…only to try an’ put one between your eyes.

Funny thing is, it hadn’t been her to do it.

You’d think with how crazy everyone keeps tellin’ her she is, she’d be the one to pull a stunt like that…but all she’d really wanted to do was talk, same as they always had.

They haven’t actually spoken since then, but more irritatingly, she’d noticed a new problem…and so had dad.

That’s why, when she sees the Firelight, she doesn’t think too much before she pins him to the wall. Kid or not, their interest in Isha in the last two years has been fraying on her nerves ever since it’d started, and whatever they wanted with her isn’t something Jinx wants to find out.

The kid grunts when he hits the wall, wriggling when she pins his arm behind his back with an effortless push. She tosses his little crystal gun to the ground before she starts to question him, but before she can even finish her sentence, she spots Isha.

“There you are! Gosh, do you have any idea how worried I was?!”

She follows her hand signals, quicker and more panicked than normal—before she glances into the girl’s eyes.

”Wait, stop! That’s friend!”

Her eyebrows shoot up into her hairline. That…can’t be right. That isn’t right—she can’t be friends with a Firelight, not with who she is. Who they are.

You’re one to talk.

Jinx grits her teeth, ignoring the flash of understanding that flickers across her sister’s face as she turns away. Now was not a good time for that.

“You…he’s your friend?”

Isha tenses at the strain in her voice, and Jinx bites her lip, hesitating only a moment longer before she releases him.

The boy spins around and presses himself into the brick wall behind him, and Jinx is at least grateful for his mask. She doesn’t really want to see the terror that’s probably in his eyes. She’s kinda like a boogeyman to a lotta the people down here, and sometimes when she had to do things like this to keep Isha safe or when dad asked her to, she gets reminded of it.

It's just…not something she really likes to think about.

“Shoo,” she says, eyeing Isha’s sad, tentative little wave to him as the boy bolts, not even stopping long enough to grab his gun.

They’re silent on the way back to the Last Drop, Isha guiltily wringing her hands a few times as they walk as Jinx thinks of a good way to explain why she couldn’t see her new friend anymore…

Nothing great comes to mind as they make their way up to dad’s office, and she lets an arm down to the girl when she stands on the desk as she reaches for her, their signal that she wanted to be wherever Jinx is at the time pulling her out of her thoughts long enough for her to pull Isha up into the rafters.

She snorts when she glances down at the two small boot prints on his paperwork, and Isha huffs, too, and she turns to loom at the girl now lying across her chest.

“You know you can’t keep that friend, right?”

Isha grumbles, turning away. Jinx sighs, one hand coming to brush some of the hair out of her eyes.

“They’re dangerous,” she tries.

Isha’s gaze flattens as she turns back to her. ”So are we.”

Jinx rolls her eyes, but she doesn’t miss the way the girl’s expression dropped and she chews on her lip for a moment as she thinks of what to say.

“Can’t you just make a different friend? Y’know, one who isn’t—”

The door opens before she can finish the thought.

“Jinx! There you are,” Silco says, stopping under the rafters as he runs into the room, sparing his dirty paperwork only a single glance. There’s the barest hint of relief on his face before he speaks—only when he does, Jinx isn’t quite sure how to answer him.

“What about her friend? You’ve met him? Is that why she went missing?” The thing is, dad knows about her friend, but the fact that he hasn’t so much as seen the kid very obviously made him nervous—and a nervous Silco usually meant someone ended up in a ditch somewhere close by.

Her eyes flicker to Isha’s face—the one that’s still turned away from her and full of all ‘a this hurt, and—

And somehow, the words she’s planning on saying aren’t what come outta her mouth.

“He’s just a bit too shy for my taste ‘s all.”

Isha’s face snaps back to hers in disbelief, and Jinx starts feeling really guilty about not telling dad…

“Hmph,” Silco chuckles, sounding amused, “not all of us have the same…energetic disposition as you do, Jinx.”

Apparently, her meeting and subsequently not killing her friend eased his mood considerably, because his shoulders relax below them as he dusts off his papers.

…when Isha flashes her a quick ”thank you,” some of that guilt dissipates, but it’s replaced by worry instead, and she decides that if she’s going to not kill Isha’s friend, then she’d have to sort this out without dad.

“’K, well, we’re off to the shop. Don’t call if you need me,” she says, making Isha laugh as her arm wraps around her waist and they swing down to the floor by the desk.

Silco waves her off, huffing another laugh as he straightens his paperwork. “I’ll keep that in mind.”

On the way out of the tavern, they pass by Sevika again, and Jinx is extremely humored by the way the lady first gapes, then looks pissed as she stalks towards them.

“You could have at least sent someone to let me know you found her!” the woman hisses under her breath, glaring at them as Jinx walks past, “you got any idea how many guys I got out searching right now?”

She shrugs easily, thoroughly enjoying the way it makes a vein pop out on the woman’s head.

“Careful, Sevika: you’ll go grey before you’re 80 if you keep stressin’ over every little kid like that,” she cheerfully responds, watching the woman’s eyebrow twitch as the door swings shut behind them.

Jinx doesn’t say anything until they get to the workshop, setting Isha down as she starts digging through her old boxes in the “absolutely don’t touch this shit, Isha” area near the likenesses of her old brothers. It’s only when she finds what she’s looking for that she says anything, crouching down by the girl as she speaks.

“So, listen. Your friend probably ain’t as much of a pal as he’s led ya to believe…but you like him still, right?”

Isha watches her warily before she nods, her eyes carefully trained on the object in Jinx’s hand.

“That’s what I thought you’d say,” she grumbles, rolling her neck as she thinks. “I…had a friend around the same age as me when back when I was a squirt, too.”

Isha blinks in surprise, waiting for her to continue with wide eyes. She can’t exactly blame the kid—she doesn’t really offer up tidbits about her past like this very often. She passes the thing in her hand to Isha, who takes it after some hesitation, listening as she turns it around in her hands.

“That’s a flare,” Jinx continues, not relishing the fact that she’d kept it even after all these years because it’s yet another sign of weakness, a sign Powder’s not quite as dead as she’d like her to be. “I don’t know what the heck the Firelights want with you, but I’d bet a whole lotta chemtech motors that they’re usin’ that kid to try an’ get to you, somehow. So if you’re gonna keep hangin’ around him, there’s some ground rules you hafta follow, understand?”

Isha nods at her, but she doesn’t turn up from the flare.

“First: do not follow him anywhere—especially if it’s further away from the Lanes than dad’d normally let you go. Second, no playing after dark. Third, if you see any other Firelights or you hear their hoverboards coming, you run like hell—stick to narrow alleys and try and get underground through the tunnels or busted pipes if you can; their boards don’t work so well in tight spaces like that. Lastly but not leastly: if you’re ever in a jam that you can’t get out of, you shoot that up into the sky and stay put—if the flare doesn’t scare ‘em off, I definitely will—but that’s a worst-case sorta option, ok?”

Isha nods once, looking determined. ”You really won’t tell dad?” The motions, while still understandable, look super awkward with the flare still in her hands.

“Nah.”

Jinx doesn’t have time to react before she shoots forwards, her arms wrapping around Jinx’s shoulders as she pulls her into a tight embrace.

“Yeah, yeah,” Jinx mumbles, patting her back with one hand, “It’s no big deal.”

Isha pulls back, raising her eyebrows at her in silent question. She sighs, thinking back to the arcade, to Vi’s high score and Mylo’s low one on her shooting range. Back to when Ekko’d helped her restore the power three years back after a gnarly storm hit the city, back to the screwdriver he’d leant her that she’d “forgotten” to give back and of the way it’s still in her toolbox, sitting there on the workbench.

Back to the way she’d had to jump out of the way of his shot, of how it’d grazed her arm, of how she’d gone over the scar tissue a year later with blue ink so even that bad memory got wrapped up in the clouds, that pain floating there like the blue smoke from that unnatural fire had all those years ago.

Of what happened after that shot rang out, and of where that’s led them both today.

“Oh, you know. I liked having friends, once,” she says wistfully, pretending not to notice the frown Isha shoots her as she stands. It’s true—but it’s not the whole truth. She didn’t have friends anymore, but there’s no reason that had to mean her sister couldn’t, either. She’s pretty sure he’d never hurt a kid, and if the worst case scenario is she’s gotta go kill some Firelights, well, she’s gotten pretty good at that over the years. “Friends are good.”

Chapter Text

Jinx is eighteen when she finally decides to bring Isha along on a real mission—and she really does mean she decides that, because neither of them shared this idea with dad.

Or Sevika…which is how she’s here now, banished to the basement of this airship they’re using to smuggle Shimmer up topside. The lady had been really unhappy that she’d brought the kid along, and naturally Jinx had really not cared, and so they got the totally un-fun, pointless job of guarding the cargo—as if something dangerous was magically gonna happen to the barrels of liquid secured below deck. She’d rolled her eyes at the lady as she went to begrudgingly follow orders, but she’d wiped that annoyed frown right off her face at the look of pure, unadulterated excitement on Isha’s. She can’t ruin it for the kid, after all.

So now, they’re chilling on a couple of crates to the side, idly painting the wall behind them while they wait for the ogre to finish the deal already so they can go home…

And then, things go to shit—and it’s not even her fault!

“Firelights!”

Jinx curses at the muffled sound of the old hag’s alarmed voice from the deck above them, removing a couple of her smaller bombs from her belt as she passes her pistol to Isha.

“Stay outta sight, use both hands like I showed you so you don’t break anything from the recoil, and if you’re spotted or someone gets too close, don’t stay in place for too long.”
Isha nods, but the wide eyes on her face are more due to the thrill and not the danger, she knows.

Jinx had been like that, once, back before she was a jinx.

She watches as the girl ducks behind the crate she’d just been on, wiping her paint-stained hands off on her pants as she gets in position, and Jinx moves to the opposite side of the room, waiting for the telltale sound of the hatch to unlatch before she fully springs her trap.

They don’t stand a chance, and she shows them about as much mercy as their precious leader’d shown her.

She might not be as good with a knife as she is with a pistol, but if you scared enough shit outta someone, you could probably beat them with a pillow and they’d still end up dying…and she’s pretty great at freakin’ people out.

By the time they’re both slumped over on the ground, she starts heading up to where the big shebang is playing out without her, swinging her nice, big gun out from over her shoulder as she flips open the hatch. She starts shooting lots after that, feeling a little less bad about hitting anyone on accident since they’d all gotten themselves glued to the walls with the fancy gem-guns the Firelights carried around with them. She takes out quite a few of ‘em, then, doing her best not to hit any of Silco’s fellas as she works, tossing one of those smaller bombs at a trio that gets too close to her—

—and then, she freezes, because pushing herself off the ground where the blast’d knocked her over as she looks around at the extra barrels with wide, focused eyes, stands—

“Vi?”

Jinx steps towards her and grabs her wrist, too tired of the tricks her mind’s played on her over the years to fuck with this kinda thing any longer—but to her shock, her hand doesn’t phase through her like it usually does, no strange noises or too-bright lights flicker and float in the air near her fingertips. It’s…it’s…

It's like time stops, everything in the background fading away to white noise and fuzz. She swallows, unsure of what to do or how to take this—Is this just a new level of her own crazy, some secret, extra thing her head made up since she’d gotten so much better at ignoring everything else?

In the end, it stops mattering. Vi(?) drops the flare in her hands and her face flickers as the flames lick up the barrels, smoking and bubbling and chewing their way through the drugs they were carting as everything starts catching fire—and for some reason, it’s only then that things click into place. It’s not Vi.

Of course it’s not Vi.

Vi was gone.

She realizes that she’d just messed everything up again by letting the Firelight start the fire, and while a part if her wants to start gunning them all down to make up for the way she’d have to look dad in the eye later today and explain all ‘a this, she doesn’t—not even when the stupid fuck in the owl mask yells at her for blowing a few dozen holes in the imposter before her.

Instead, she ignores them all and heads back below deck, hauling Isha onto her back before she takes off with a very unhappy Sevika. She’s fully aware that he’s probably destroying the rest of their cargo while simultaneously cursing the day she was born, but she’d promised, once, a long time ago, that she’d try, and she can’t really do any better than the real Vi had if she abandons her kid sister in a fiery hellhole like this.

…honestly, the day’s shitty turn of events is a little too similar to that day for comfort. It’s starting to make her skin crawl, and by the way Isha keeps trying to get her attention, she ain’t hiding it very well, either.

When they get back to dad’s office (far before Sevika, of course, since the ogre’s slow as shit), he isn’t around, so after Jinx pulls her sister up into the rafters after her, they both lay back and wait, with Jinx ignoring the kid’s pester-y sorta questions about what had happened and all ‘a that. Eventually, Isha ends up taking a nap right where she’s laying on Jinx’s chest, her arm folded under her little head as she sleeps, oblivious to Jinx’s growing dread.

Dad doesn’t say anything—doesn’t even look at them—as he settles behind his desk, and she knows by the way he dusts the dried grime from Isha’s boots off of his papers that it ain’t because he doesn’t know they’re here, either.

Sevika comes in not too long after, pissed as she usually is after having to work with Jinx…’cept, then she sorta spills the beans about Isha bein’ there, and for some reason, that actually makes her less mad (she can hear it in the lady’s voice):

“Hell, the only reason she didn’t blow us all to kingdom fuck is because she dragged that fucking kid out there with her: it’s like she gave the few screws she had left to your other brat to hold on to, and she only remembers they exist when she’s close enough to hear them rattle around in the kid’s hand.”

Huh.

Silco’s pen stops from where he’s writing on some form or another below Jinx’s feet. “She brought Isha with her?”

Uh oh. He doesn’t sound real happy ‘bout that. Sevika snorts, taking another swig from the comically large bottle in her hand before answering.

“Yeah, figured she didn’t tell you,” she sighs, running a hand down her face. “Most of the boys want her head for this—’specially with the way she shot that tattooed fuck like she did. Had to leave him behind; guy was too injured to drag outta there with us.” Sevika pauses, turning to look at the wall before glancing back at Silco. “Weird as it’s gonna sound, I think you should let her keep your youngest with her whenever she goes on jobs like this. Actually did her some good—and we were still able to salvage some of the haul, even though it still went to shit in the end.”

Jinx makes a face. There’s no way Sevika and her just agreed about something for real…or that the lady wasn’t gunning for her head. She’s always trying to get Silco to get rid of her—or at least, that how it seemed.

“…Isha is only eight years old,” dad says, a subtle edge to his voice that Jinx knows isn’t really for Sevika at all.

Yeah, he’s pissed—maybe even worse than after the tattoos. Oops.

The ogre snorts, shaking her head. “Yeah, well some of us were younger than that—and it ain’t like she’s being forced into anything: kid was damn near as happy to get to the fighting as the rest of us were.”

Silco hums, sounding unamused. “I will sort out the matter later,” Jinx would rather he not, judging by his tone, “for now, keep the rest of the people that were present at the delivery off of the streets—there’s bound to be an investigation of some sort, though I suspect it won’t be long until it’s blown over.”

“Hmph. You gonna talk to your crazy-ass kid to make sure she doesn’t flip the fuck out and screw the next mission up?”

And there it is.

“Funny: I thought it was your job to make sure things went smoothly today.”

It’s not said as a question, and the steel in his voice makes Sevika tense from below her. Serves her right, probably…or at least, it would if she was wrong.

This sucks.

Sevika scoffs, pushing herself out of her chair. “The rest of ‘em are getting antsy about her coming with, now. Only reason I bothered bringing it up at all is because I don't know what that psycho bitch’ll do if one of ‘em pulls a knife on her or something.”

Silco waves her off without looking up from his work. “Let me worry about that. Go make sure the recovered cargo is secured with the Doctor—I don’t deal in damaged product, and the sooner we get it delivered, the better.”

Sevika only barely resists slamming the door behind her when she leaves his office, and Jinx knows when dad sighs and drops his pen that she’s in for a doozy.

“What happened?”

So she tells him—about not-Vi and the flare and the stupid Firelights hiding in the ship, about Isha and the guy she’d shot up and the gem-pistols. All the while, she strokes Isha’s curly hair, laughing a little when the girl unconsciously shifts closer to her touch. When she’s done with her side of it all, dad leans back in his chair, eyeing their prone forms in the rafters.

“Your sister is dead, Jinx,” he quietly says, sounding tired as he repeats the same thing he’s told her for years. “But Isha is not. This stunt today, it can’t happen again.”

“But Sevika said—”

He cuts her off with a hand, waiting for her teeth to click shut before he speaks. “Sevika doesn’t know what she’s talking about. You don’t need anyone to help balance you out, least of all an eight year old child. I’ve already told you: if you truly want to move past all of that unpleasantness with that old life of yours, then—”

“I ‘have to let Powder die’, I know,” she grumbles, irritated to hear that same thing again.

Silco huffs, sounding faintly amused.

“Then you can work on that with your time off.”

Her eyes snap to his. “Huh? What do you mean?”

“You were topside when the botched delivery occurred—that means you stay off of the streets. Go…work on your gadgetry. Take a break.”

She shakes her head, her sudden rigid posture stirring Isha awake on her chest. The girl rubs at her eyes, looking first at Jinx and then down at dad below them.

“I don’t need a break—”

“Take one anyways,” he answers, turning back to his work dismissively.

Jinx, seething, pulls Isha closer to her before swinging off the rafters down next to his desk, not bothering to turn to him as she stalks to the office door…but once she makes it there, with Isha still held like a baby in her arms (even though she’s getting too big for it, Jinx’d hold her like this if she was really sleepy and she was in a good enough mood to humor her), dad stops them with his words.

“Jinx. Listen to me: all it takes is one mistake for the two of you to go out but only one of you comes back. Think about that the next time you decide to make a game out of a mission.”

She glances down at Isha, suddenly unnerved. Her sister apparently doesn’t get the real meaning behind the statement, because she blinks up at her sleepily, humming in confusion at the complicated look on Jinx’s face.

She opens the door without another word, slipping out the front door before they’re seen by Sevika or anyone else who had a bone to pick with her before she starts off to their workshop. Isha falls back asleep on the way back, and Jinx bites her lip as she looks down at her, huffing a laugh at the bit of drool that dribbles down the side of her face pressed into Jinx’s torso.

“Things’re lookin’ kinda rough now, kiddo,” she whispers, glancing down an alleyway before deciding to take the longer path there. “But that’s OK. I’m sure we can fix it. Y’know why?”

To her surprise, Isha cracks an eye open at her, smiling as her hands come up from where they lay boneless in her lap as she answers her:

”We can fix anything.”

Chapter Text

Dad wasn’t kidding when he’d told them to lie low.

Over the next couple ‘a days, he won’t even let Sevika go out—and whenever Jinx happens to pass her by, the lady’s ugly mug lets her know exactly how unhappy that decision had made her.

Honestly, if it weren’t for dad bein’ super mad ‘n all, it’d have made her wanna do it again.

Still, Isha’s all in a tizzy about it. For some reason, she’s convinced the entire thing is her fault—and believe her, she’s tried explaining that she doesn’t have much to do with dad’s especially pissy attitude, but the kid won’t listen. She gets so worked up about it that she has an anxiety attack the likes of which Jinx hasn’t experienced since she was at least fifteen…

Ugh. The thought’s putting a bad taste in her mouth.

Point is, she knows firsthand how much those suck, so last night, after calming the kid down enough that she could sleep (in their little play-fort they’d made together in the workshop, not the apartment—she’d dealt with enough freaked-out Isha for one night, thanks), she starts brainstorming a plan to fix things. She was just gonna wait it out like dad had asked her to (even though it’s a stupid idea, in her opinion), but she can’t just let the kid suffer like this. It’s tugging so hard at her heartstrings that you could probably get a bow 'n play 'em.

Here’s the next thing: this whole thing would definitely go a lot better without having to worry about an eight-year old the whole time…but see, she’s been on the other side of that exchange, and it ain’t one that she’d wish on anyone else—‘specially not her kid sister…

So, dad’s just gonna have to shove it for tonight.

“Bombs?”

Isha shoots her a thumbs up, her eyes hidden behind those old welding goggles she’d borrowed from Clag.

He hadn’t been too happy ‘bout sharin’ ‘em, but even he had to admit the girl could pull them off better than he ever had.

The other brother’d made some kinda comment on it, too, but Jinx hadn’t been paying enough attention to the jerk to hear it.

“Pistol?”

Isha pats the holster hidden under her cloak (well, technically, it’s Jinx’s cloak, and it hung almost to the kid’s ankles, but if Isha wanted to keep it after this, she’d let her).

“Recorder?”

Jinx actually isn’t sure if that’s what this thing was called or not—it’s definitely what it did, but sometimes Pilties named their shit in the dumbest way possible, and she’d sorta “borrowed” it from a workshop just outside of the Fringes. Either way, Isha’s got it in her little plain-looking bag slung across her back, and she reaches back and shakes it for emphasis at Jinx’s question.

She shoots the kid a lopsided grin as she remembers recording the audio for the big show they were about to put on—and of the way Isha’d made her record over her first take. Now, apparently, there would be two little girls trapped in a burning building, caught in some horrible, definitely-not-made-up accident in a Progress Day celebration gone wrong. And Jinx would speak enough for the both of them.

When she’d pointed that out to Isha—that having her claim to be two people doesn’t actually make a lotta sense logistically speaking—Isha’d only huffed at her and shot her the flattest-looking stare she’d ever received from the kid:

”What, you want me to sign into the mic or something?”

That, of course, had left Jinx howling with laughter. She hadn’t bothered explaining what she’d actually meant after that—that the Pilties weren’t gonna care about the quantity of burning children in the building, instead opting just to humor the kid.

It wouldn’t matter, anyways: enforcers were pretty easy to trick, and the fire would be real enough to draw them to the building on its own. The recording’s just to make sure they go inside, and she could probably have had anything play to lure them in once they got near the place.

Then, robbing the Academy workshop would be a piece of cake.

Besides, she knows the kid only got all huffy ‘cuz she thought Jinx was gonna ditch her somewhere—normally, she wouldn’t have to reassure the kid about that, but the stress of her first real job gettin’ all screwed up coupled with Jinx’s own little freak-out was getting to the poor squirt, so she’d kinda just gone along with it.

“Alright, alright, I’ll quit fussing…after you put your hood up, I mean.”

Isha rolls her eyes, but complies, drawing the hood so far over her face she could probably only see her feet. She huffs a laugh at her, hoping her own anxiousness doesn’t bleed through too much. Dad’d been complaining lately about Piltover’s technological achievements leaving them in the dust, so Jinx figures that if she takes their stupid fancy rocks or whatever and turns them into, like, a really big gun, then he’ll be happier.

More importantly, if some part of dad really did blame Isha for this whole mess (not that that would make any sense, since Jinx is the one who'd dragged her there in the first place and he knew that, mind you), then after a stunt like what she’s about to pull, he won’t even remember the kid’s involvement to begin with.

Jinx loves Silco—he really is her dad, now—but if you really love someone, you can’t be blind to their flaws, you just sorta gotta love ‘em despite it all. Silco loved them both, but with Isha…

It’s complicated. Silco liked things that could do things for him. Jinx has been able to make bombs for as long as she’d known the guy, and they had a similar-y kinda backstory wherein a sibling was a total dillhole and betrayal and blah, blah, whatever…’cept, Isha sorta didn’t. She’s only just now gettin’ to the age where Jinx can show her the cooler exploding things she’s got, and she’s still pretty small yet, so fighting’s still a no-go…

Basically, Silco’s got this issue where he can’t look at the kid without seeing her mom—which is sorta a problem because, as he’d once put it to Jinx before Isha was old enough to even run, “the child’s mother was of no import—she was simply a foolish escort who though to make a game of blackmailing the Eye of Zaun by dangling his daughter’s life in front of him.”

She’d found out two things after that: first, what an “escort” was, and second, why Isha’s mom wasn’t in the picture—and why she never would be, either. Messin’ with Silco usually didn’t go well for anybody.

Jinx had ended that conversation by asking a whole boatload of questions, and Silco had basically just dumped her (and, by proxy, all of the stuff she’d asked) on Sevika. That’s how she got “the talk”—and honestly, ew.

Like, why the heck couldn’t either of them have said “you’re not gonna want to know, Jinx?” Instead of letting her ask her dad all ‘a that?!

Would she have listened to them? No. Would she have gone off to find out what the hell he’d meant on her own? Yeah, probably—

Huh. Ok, maybe that’s why he did that…

She grimaces, mind wandering back to her original point: he hadn’t liked Isha’s mom. She still doesn’t get the whole picture (and like fuck is she gonna ask about it and risk another awkward conversation with the ogre), but the kid wasn’t supposed to exist, and Silco might say he doesn’t resent her or whatever for it, but Jinx can tell it’s a lot more complicated than he lets on sometimes…and apparently, Isha can, too.

It's weird: he makes sure she stays alive, and he worries about her safety and makes sure Jinx teaches her stuff, and he’ll hug her goodnight if she asks or let her sleep in his lap sometimes…but Jinx has also sorta noticed he tends to do that more when Jinx herself is around, too ('least, according to Isha's stories, anyways). It feels strange. Like, he’d bothered learning that Piltie sign-language just to talk with her, but he also hadn’t been super happy about it, but he still did it…he made sure someone watched her when Jinx wasn’t around to do it for him, but they’re also not really people you’d normally wanna leave your kid with, either.

She can tell that he loves her, but…it’s like, she doesn’t know how much, or to what extent his love for his daughter is tied with his love for his adopted one.

She mighta been flattered, when she was younger. It certainly had felt good to hear when she was eleven that, if one of ‘em had to go, it wouldn’t be Jinx…

…but seeing that dejected look on her sister’s face now, she can’t say she feels the same. She wants to call him on it, but she also doesn’t want to make him mad, but she also doesn’t like seeing Isha get so worked up like this, but she also also saw him wig out one time the kid had gotten really sick after playing in those ventilation pipes (like seriously: Sevika is hands-down the worst babysitter ever)…

Is there anything she can even call him on, or is this all in her head?

Isha tugs on her pant leg and she looks down at her, snorting a laugh when she notices the kid’s raised eyebrow and crossed arms.

“Ok, ok, let’s go then.”

Isha pumps her fist in the air and they take off, leaving Jinx to hope that this would be enough of a spectacle to draw his ire from her sister…assuming that it was even there to begin with.

It all goes off without a hitch.

The science-y fucks had thought ahead enough to lock their labs, but not enough to make their stupid locking mechanisms bulletproof, so Zapper makes quick work of the door and no one even hears it ‘cuz of the big ol’ BOOM! outside.

Pilties are dumb like that.

She’s almost relieved that one of the enforcers that had charged into the building to “save them” is still conscious enough to see her burst from the building, because with the smile on her face and Zapper back in her hands (she’d let Isha do the honors at the door, of course), she’s like 90% sure they hadn’t seen the kiddo sneak outta the window on the other side of the building.

That meant that, with the signature way she’d tagged the inside of the building on the way to the Academy before they blew it all to hell, there’d be only one daughter to trace it back to…and it sure as hell wouldn’t be Isha.

When they get back in their office, after a celebratory insect death-match that ends in yet another draw, the two of them get to work designing the big-ass, super-exploder-y gun-of-DOOM (patent pending) that would hopefully help dad out while things went to shit in a new way.

Him coming in is pretty predictable—she’d expected it so much, in fact, that she had Isha set up some of the fireworks the two of them had stocked in the side room. Jinx shoots her a thumbs up when she only sets one off on accident.

That’s why, when he pops up, she doesn’t even turn from her work, her signature song that Isha’d helped her record blaring in the background as she poured over their designs. She made sure Isha stayed in their fort, outta the way for this.

She knew he’d be pissed, and she didn’t want the kid even tangentially in the path of Storm Silco when it came to crash at their shores.

As expected, when he caught word of what they were doing, his anger sorta faded…or maybe that’s just the effect the new, fancier blue rock had on people. Either way, she can tell this puppy had some kick to it just by tossing it around—and it’s so damn shiny that even when her and Isha'd dropped it a few times while they were playin' catch in the workshop, it’s super easy to find!

Silco ends up leaving them more shocked than angry, and before he leaves, she discretely waves Isha over to join in on the hug he hadn’t actually asked for. It’s all the kid really wanted, some of his attention, but he’s a busy guy—Jinx knows that more than anybody.

So they both enjoy it until he leaves, the door closing nicely behind him instead of slamming open like it had when he entered. ‘S part of the reason she’d turned up the phonograph so damn loud (and yeah, she’d modded the shit outta that after she’d pilfered it, ‘cuz it didn’t used to have a volume setting at all): kid was spooked enough.

After they watch him leave, she reaches over and removes the stupid little handle thing from the record, effectively silencing it as she turns back to her sister—

Who then launches into her side, her arms wrapped around Jinx’s waist in a vice grip.

“Easy there, kid: you tryna’ knock me over or somethin’?”

Isha’s only response for a long while is just to hold on to her tighter, and Jinx huffs a laugh that—for once—Isha doesn’t echo, instead pressing her face into Jinx’s side with more force.

After a while, she pulls back and looks up at Jinx, taking in her raised eyebrow and half-smile.

”Why’d you let me come with?”

Jinx cocks her head at the question, fighting to keep her smile on her face so as not to let the kid know something was up.

“Whaddya mean, why? I told ya’ why: needed a lookout for outside the room after we busted into that joint, ‘member?”

Isha shakes her head, a bit of agitation popping up into her face before it fades into something like hurt. The smile falls from Jinx’s lips as she watches the girl continue.

”No you didn’t—you coulda did by yourself. So why?”

Jinx sighs, running a hand through the girl’s curls as she answers her. No point in hiding it if she was this adamant about it all—guess the jig was up.

“Aren’t I allowed to enjoy your company? Do I gotta have a better reason than that?”

Isha watches her face for a hint of a lie—kid was pretty good at that, which is why she chose her words extra careful-like sometimes when the topic was important.

”You didn’t need me,” the girl pauses, pressing her head down into Jinx’s leg again even as her hands awkwardly float above her, ”But I needed you. And you were there. Love you lots.”

Jinx kneels down in front of her then, not surprised in the slightest when little hands come to wrap around her shoulders, and she ends up picking her up so they can settle in to sleep for the night in their fort, the little glowing stars twinkling above their heads under the fabric they’d strung up together as she speaks:

“’Course I was—I’ll always be there, ok? You never gotta worry ‘bout that…wanna know why?”

Isha nods, her head still tucked under Jinx’s chin. It’s awkward and it makes answering kinda tricky, but it’s frankly just a bit too cute for her to be bothered very much by it.

“’Cuz family never leaves family.”

Chapter Text

Weaponizing the stupid gem is turning out to be harder than she’d thought—and though the pipsqueak who’s been more or less glued to her side tries not to let it show, Jinx can tell it’s making her anxious.

Unfortunately for the both of them, the kid’s anxiety is making Jinx anxious, too—and it sure as heck ain’t a good combination, what with them fueling each other’s freak-outs.

Dad hasn’t stopped by since he’d shown up last night, and while that ain’t really outta the ordinary or nothin’, it’s doing very little to help her relax enough to focus. Double unfortunately, that means her annoying brother hasn’t shut his stupid trap in hours, and it’s getting to the point where she’s almost started answering him again. With the squirt here like she has been, that wouldn’t be great for either of ‘em, so she’s trying really, really hard to just chill the fuck out and concentrate, but it’s hard.

Maybe you shoulda thought about that before putting another one of your genius plans into action then, huh?

Her jaw creaks with the pressure it takes not to tell him exactly where he could shove that line of thought—everybody already thought she was crazy, and she’s not sure she’d be able to stand it if Isha joined in on it all, too. The girl in question cocks her head up at Jinx from where she’s sitting on the workbench’s surface, obviously confused about her sudden pause.

Jinx lets her hands drop back down to the wood below with a sigh, wiping some of the sweat from her forehead with a groan. They’d spent hours putting this stupid little marble-holder together with the pretentious Piltie notes as their guide—but while there’s a nice method in there to make a chamber like what the got assembled now, there’s nothing explaining how to shrink it down enough to fit this bulky ass thing into a weapon, nor how she’s supposed to tap into it in order to use its shiny, blue power.

And fuck, but she knows it’s got that.

The tattoos aren’t just for show, after all.

Sensing her frustration, Isha reaches forwards and shakes her shirt, pulling Jinx outta her thoughts long enough to see the kid’s question:

”Feed Isha?”

Some of the tension fades from as she barks out a laugh, shaking her head at the girl in faux-disapproval.

“Awright, fine: lets go bother him for some lunch or somethin’.”

She doesn’t strictly need dad’s cash or sway in order to get a meal—hell, ever since that one time she’d helped the guy out a couple ‘a years back, Jericho often just lets her eat for free—but she can see how the suggestion makes her sister perk up at her side, her eyes alight with that childlike joy that not even recent events had been enough to extinguish.

Jinx snorts as the girl hops down to the propeller floor below them, impatiently urging her to follow along as she takes off to the hatch. She flips around long enough to say one last thing, her hands playfully flickering up her little challenge before she’s off like a bullet:

”Last one there’s gotta clean the shop when we’re done!”

Heh.

Jinx cracks her knuckles, letting the kid leave the hatch (as is customary whenever they played this game—it’d be no fun if she won every time) before she starts after her.

“You’re on, pepperbox.”

Isha gets all huffy when Jinx sprints ahead of her at the last second, reaching the back door to the tavern with a smug grin that only grows in size at the mulish look on the kid’s face.

“Hah! Imma make sure it’s extra dirty just for you!” Jinx gloats, using the girl’s head as an armrest when she stays rooted in place for too long. Isha shoves her arm off after that, and Jinx laughs as she opens the door for the both of them…’cept, thing is, it’s kinda quiet for the time of day at the Last Drop. It’s noticeable enough that she and Isha exchange a look before heading upstairs, and Jinx glances at Chuck from where he’s nervously polishing a glass behind the bar counter. He quickly looks away when they meet eyes, and had Isha not been with her, she probably would have gone to poke him about it.

But Isha is here, and they’ve got a lunch to secure, so she only shoots him one last, narrowed-eye look before shutting the office door behind her.

Dad stiffens when he sees her—it’s a quick thing, just a widening of his eyes and a brief moment where he stops fixing his eyeshadow—but it’s definitely there. The weird shit that keeps piling up—the quiet, uncrowded bar, Chuck’s nervousness (well, he’s always nervous, this just felt a little worse than normal), and Silco’s little freeze up…

Ugh. It’s making her twitchy, and a twitchy Jinx usually made for an explosion or two within the next hour…which, considering they’re supposed to be laying low, probably isn’t super great.

Dad watches them for a moment, clasping his little pocket mirror shut as they make their way to his desk.

“Heyyyyyyy, Silco, wanna give us some lunch money and/or actual lunch?”

Even she can hear the subtle lilt to her own voice, and she’s almost positive Silco does, too, by the way he sighs and settles back into his chair. Jinx didn’t miss the way Sevika hadn’t been in the bar and wasn’t in his office, either…her fingers twitch at her sides.

Isha turns back to her, her arms wiggling at her sides as she beams, and Jinx forces her hands to still. Silco watches it all with an unreadable, but tired expression.

“I’ll have Sevika take Isha out to get something when she returns…but that might be a while off, yet,” dad says, pushing himself up from his seat.

She blinks at him, tilting her head to the side as she answers. “She’s still out doing collections?” Apparently, that didn’t count as “going out” if it was just ‘round to the chem barons.

Isha nods, humming enthusiastically at her side.

Silco presses a hand to his head as if he’s staving off a migraine. “There have been some…unintended consequences,” and oof, the way he says those words have got both of his kids tensing up, “of your little ill-advised excursion into Piltover. They’ve complicated matters—ones that I thought were resolved long before now. To my knowledge, she hasn’t even started on that task just yet—I had to co-opt her for another errand.”

Jinx frowns, shifting her weight to her other leg.

“Oh…well, do ya’ want me just to do it then? I’m faster than she is, anyways,” and while that’s true enough, he didn’t usually have her do it—not even when Sevika got seriously hurt a year ago. That was a pretty funny week….for Jinx, anyways.

After it was all said ‘n done, poor Chuck had never been happier to be back behind that counter in his life.

It mighta been a genuine question—and she really does want to help him—but the way he instantly nods his head, the way his shoulders immediately relax even though he’d made it pretty clear that all he’d wanted her to do for the foreseeable future was to work on that weapon…

See, the chem barons and her don’t really get along—they didn’t really like her nasty habit of killing the people they sent to intimidate her once they realized Silco sent someone that wasn’t Sevika, and she didn’t like their ugly fucking faces.

Both are fair points, in Jinx’s opinion…but it meant that she was a last resort kinda collector…and that meant something really is up here, because from what Jinx has heard, the chem barons somehow hated her even more after stirring up the enforcers like she had than they had before.

She chews on the inside of her lip, watching him for a moment longer before shrugging it off, all too-aware of the kid’s eyes on her during nearly the entire exchange. No need to ruffle her feathers more than they already were—she could bug him about all a’ this later.

She would be bugging him about it later, actually, since this whole thing was weird as shit, but that’s a problem for a later version of her. For now, she waves Isha along…at least, until Silco starts shaking his head at her.

“No. She’s going with Sevika to pick up lunch…or perhaps dinner. It is already after three…,” he muses, glancing at the Piltie clock Jinx’s fixed up for him back when she first took up the name.

She scuffs her shoes on the wood, matching Isha’s pout with one of her own. “But daaaaaad…”

Silco shakes his head again, eyeing her more firmly as he returns to his desk. “I’ll have them grab something for you, too. Start with that idiot Finn—he always takes the longest—”

“Finn? C’mon, do I really gotta go all the way out there?” The guy’s warehouse was on the opposite side of Zaun, and he had a bad habit of never shutting the hell up….honestly, she’s not sure she’s in a good enough mood to humor him today.

Hopefully, if she has Zapper out before she even opens the door, he’ll take the fucking hint.

“Weren’t you the one who offered to help, Jinx?” He looks at her knowingly and her shoulders droop. Great, now Isha can’t come and she had to take a two hour walk to the golden-prick’s clubhouse. Some day this is turning out to be.

“Ugh, fine,” she snaps, rolling her eyes as she turns to Isha, who looks downtrodden after finding out she wouldn’t be allowed to tag along. “I guess I’ll see ya’ in a bit: ol’ buzzkill over here hates me too much to let me bring you wit—”

He sighs from behind the desk. “Jinx, you know that isn’t—”

She cuts him off with a grin that makes Isha shoot her a half-hearted smile in return before she offers out her hand, speaking whilst they do their special handshake. “I’ll be back when I can—and don’t get me any a’ that nasty shit if you go to Roy’s. Thought I was gonna puke out my insides last time…”

Isha’s smile becomes a bit more genuine at that, and Jinx takes off, annoyed at the way she’d have to spend all this time she could be using to fix things with Isha.

“Me ‘n my stupid mouth.”

It takes. Six fucking hours to finish running dad’s collections.

Six hours!

The moon is way up at this point, and she’s like 99% sure her dinner’s gonna be colder than her reception had been at Smeech’s by the time she actually gets back to the bar, and she hadn’t even gotten a block away from her last stop at Renni’s, and—

—and what the fuck is that?

The light in the sky reminded her of one of their fireworks, though this one is definitely on the lamer side. It’s coming from at least a division or so away from her, and it’s way the heck up in the air, all shiny and noticeable in the…night…

Don’t tell her…

“Well shit.”

Her stomach growls and she grumbles as she takes off, silently dreading whatever she’s about to run into because her blood’s already started to run cold at the ever-growing light in the sky. For some reason, she hadn’t expected the damn thing to be blue—and she definitely hadn’t expected to see it as high up as the kid must surely be for it to appear over all those rooftops.

It might not be the kid, the nervous one says, licking his lips in her peripherals even as she’s in a dead sprint, bouncing off of the walls to propel herself onto the rooftops.

The other one snorts and she puts in a conscious effort to tune his ass out. Now was not the time—

You say that every time, he snarls through a deceptively lighthearted grin. She shakes her head, jabbing one of her nails into her palm to help focus. The flare’s started going out by now, and she has to be able to find the kid once the last of its faux-flames disappear from the sky.

It takes longer than she’d cared to admit to reach the spot where only a thin smoke now slowly dissipates in the air—and she immediately sees the problem when she spots four Firelights all trying to break into some little metal storage compartment with their spears and clubs.

She lands silently, but it wouldn’t have mattered even if she had made a noise, because they’re causing so much racket that they prolly wouldn’t ‘a heard her anyhow.

“Hi,” she calls out from behind them, startling one guy so badly he jumped. A cursory glance told her that he wasn’t among them—and when she spots the stupid kid Isha’d made friends with and he backs away from her gaze, she gets a pretty good idea of what had led up to this shitty chain of events.

Out at night with a Firelight to a high-up, easily hoverboard-accessible location that, presumably, he’d led her right to.

This is what she gets for trying to be nice.

The three adults are dead pretty much as soon as she takes out her gun, unprepared for ranged combat and honestly pretty shittily trained when compared to the Eye of Zaun’s daughter. She wonders, as she blows the smoke from the barrel of ‘ol Zapper, if that makes her, like, a cataract of Zaun.

She’ll have to ask Isha about it, after she’s done looking at her all disappointed-like.

Unless she’s hurt. Then she’s going on an insecticide sorta field-trip. That’d prolly make dad just as happy as if she’d finished the big gun, anyhow.

The kid Firelight freezes when he gets a look at her no-bullshit face, his hand twitching to the rock pistol at his belt. She glances at him, unimpressed with his antics.

"Yeah, that’s not the healthiest life choice you could make right now—so how ‘bout you just scram instead?”

When the boy doesn’t move, his shoulders shaking violently, Jinx raises an eyebrow at him and moves to holster her pistol—and apparently, that’s all he needed to see to spur him into action, sparing one last glance at his fallen buddies before bailing.

Damn brat’s lucky the kid likes him.

As soon as he’s jumped from the roof, Isha bursts from the storage room and darts into her side, eyes shining with unshed tears.

Jinx might actually kill Sevika after this.

“Hey, hey, don’t get all leaky on me now,” she teases lightly, kneeling at her side when the kid’s grip slackens a bit. Isha whimpers, burying her head into Jinx’s shoulder as she shakes. She suppresses a sigh, carefully carding through her hair for a while.

She opens her mouth to say something—words of comfort, or maybe a light-hearted joke to help ease the tension in the air—but then, she hears footsteps slap against the cement of the weird, kinda rooftop adjacent to the one they stand on and she turns over her shoulder—

And then, as the sound fades out and someone skids to a stop at the top of the stairs that led to where the two of them are still perched on, her heart catches in her throat.

"Powder?”

Chapter Text

It’s not great, right?

The way her brain does this to herself, the way it makes the boys laugh, the way his sneering and jibing only gets louder in intensity as it comes into focus—this vision, this mockery, this cruel fucking joke wearing the face of—

Jinx shakes her head, turns away from the illusion before the shit in her head starts blurring over the lines of reality, offering Isha a strained smile as she slowly stands, looking out at the rooftops around them instead when she notices…

Huh. Actually, the kid’s eyes aren’t fixed on her at all like she’d thought they’d be…fuck, was that an actual person over there that she’s ignoring just ‘cuz she’d thought they were a mirage—was it another Firelight?!

She’s about up to here with those shitbags right now, she swears—

“Powder! Is that—oh my god, you’re—”

The gun’s in their face before they can get any closer, her eyes locking hatefully with the asshole who’d thought this was a good idea…if they’re even actually talking at all.

Isha’d gone rigid at her side, and Jinx forces her back a step, hiding her more from view of this—whatever the fuck this was—even as their hands come up non-threateningly from their sides, their eyes widening as if they’re the one who gets to be scared here, as if her reaction to a literal spectre made corporeal is more unreasonable than them existing in the first place.

“Woah! Pow—”

“Shut the fuck up!” she hisses, her teeth grinding together for a moment as she takes them in. “I don’t know who the fuck you think you are or what you’re trying to pull here, but I’ve had a really shitty day and I am not in the mood for it!”

This is the part where she sends ‘em off, only thing is, something’s makin’ her stop. What is it? Is it the tattoo? No no no…the height? Maybe…

“I…it’s me, Pow—” they cut themselves off when her finger finds the trigger…but she still doesn’t press it. Why isn’t she pressing it?!

Hold on.

That’s it: it’s the fucking name it keeps calling her. No one called her that anymore—not even the ghosts in her head, not after she’d shot holes in their little effigies one too many times half-a-decade ago now and they’d quit it for good.

Fuck. Fuck!

The static comes back and her hand starts shaking, and some of her…she doesn’t know, uncertainty, she guesses—must show on her face because in the next second the stranger’s hand comes up and bats the gun away. They don’t hit her or anything, and the force isn’t even enough to loosen her white-knuckled hold over its grip, just enough to move it out of their way—

And she just fucking lets them do it and it’s making her chest tighten because they’re not—they can’t touch her, they’ve never been able to do that…

So it’s a real person?

So what! That Firelight had been, too—and it hadn’t stopped her from blowing all those holes through them, either—

When Isha shifts by her side, Jinx’s eyes widen and she loops her free arm under the girl’s armpit and drags them back a few steps, more than a little afraid that the heat is gone from her gaze now that she’s less certain what their play is.

Isha tugs at her pant leg and after watching the…it to be sure it won’t move anymore like the way it just had, trying to come close—too close, trying to push into space she only really let Isha and dad into anymore—her eyes flicker down to catch what she’s signing:

”Who that?”

Jinx shakes her head, eyeing them warily as that grating noise returns. She wants more than anything to rip whatever’s causing the noise out of her head, but she’d gotten so fucked-up once that she’d tried to and discovered that her entire head’s gotta go in order for it to ever stop, and Isha and dad wouldn’t like that very much, so…

God! It’s like—like 6 inch thick steel beams are being forcefully bent directly next to her ears, it’s making it hard to keep standing, it, it—

“Who the hell are you?! What do you want?”

The stranger stares at her for a long moment, their eyes filling with tears that Jinx doesn’t get because none of this made any sense!

If Isha could see them, too, it at least means she ain’t any further off her rocker than she’d been a couple ‘a days ago…but…

But that meant they were real, and that meant…

What did that mean?

The spectre swallows, looking physically pained for reasons that she doesn’t understand.

“Don’t you remember me, Pow—”

”Stop! Calling me that!” she spits, the metal twisting and ripping and sizzling, a whole-ass forge fire complete with the heat, “it’s Jinx now—it was Jinx long before now…no one calls me anything else!”

Their lips tremble and they look like they’re physically struggling not to get any closer…which is good(?) probably, because she’s yet to holster Zapper, feeling more off-kilter than she had in a very long time.

“I never should have—you’re not a jinx,” they half-whisper—and something about it makes her skin crawl and arms shake a bit more—this isn’t how this is supposed to go! It’s not how it’s ever gone!

“Shut UP!” she screeches, one hand finally moving to try and do something, anything to shut out that fucking noise—

But then the kid’s hand slips into it instead, and her eyes snap down to look at her, taking in that panic she knows is reflected in her own eyes—

And this turns out to be a mistake, because a few seconds later, the stranger’s wrapped her in a hug—a real, solid, not-ghost embrace—and she can’t…why are her eyes leaking everywhere for this…this thing?!

“You’re so much taller now,” they say, their voice wavering as one of their calloused hands snakes up her neck to press her head into their shoulder. It’s warm.

Ghosts aren’t warm. Dead bodies aren’t warm.

She’s seen enough—created enough—to know.

She’s shaking hard now, sure that she’s missing something, sure she’d forgotten something important as this idiot in front of her leaves themselves completely open, not bothering to try an disarm her as anyone with even a hint of self-preservation would—

And then it hits her.

That fucking flare.

She hadn’t shared how she’d gotten that with anyone—not dad, not Isha…

She starts shaking her head—slow, at first, but it speeds up as she tries to pull away—this isn’t…it can’t be real, right?

Except Isha’s still staring at them, too—the hair with the too-good-to-be-dyed job, the piercings…the tattoo, the eyes too specific a shade to be any of those fancy Piltie contacts…

“You’re not real,” she says softly, trying harder to pull away. The stranger doesn’t let her, though, even their strength lining up with what it should be in Jinx’s head.

Dad said she was dead. Dad said she died, that they’d found her body, that she’d tried scurrying topside and gotten caught in the wrong place at the wrong time—that Jinx shouldn’t even have cared enough to ask in the first place because she’d left her there!

“I’m real—I promise I’m real, I never meant to go anywhere, Pow—I stepped away to take a breath and then I got arrested and—”

Jinx might be sick, her arms slumping down to her sides as the weight of that hits her like a carriage, inadvertently allowing the stranger-who’s-becoming-terrifyingly-less-strange to pull her closer in an embrace that is as familiar and nice as it is filled with poison.

“Marcus,” she hears a voice utter that sounds like her own but isn’t because it can’t be because none of this is actually happening, she’s really gone and lost it, went right off the deep end with this one—

Except then Isha stirs again, and she knows that not only is that not true, but also that she’d left the poor little bastard to her own devices immediately after she’d almost gotten…well, whatever the Firelights wanted with her.

This lady is still babbling on about stuff that Jinx isn’t (can’t afford to be) listening to as she pulls away—only this time, when the ghost-that’s-not-quite-a-ghost tries to force her to stay, Zapper makes a spectacular reappearance and she finally backs off.

Jinx looks at her—really, really looks at her—before squeezing Isha’s hand where the little ragamuffin’s still holding onto her like she’s a lifeline. That trust, it’d scared her once: someone like her…she shouldn’t hafta’ be tied down to a crazy shithead like Jinx. Jinx didn’t deserve that kind of love.

Not anymore.

But Isha had made it abundantly clear that she didn’t give a sump-rat’s ass about Jinx’s opinion on the matter. Said she ”trusted her enough for the both of us.” And hell, she might not deserve it, might be destined to screw it up like she always does—but she’ll be damned if she doesn’t at least try to keep that faith going for as long as someone like her can.

And it’s then, with the woman’s hands back in the air—looking more like she’s doing it for Jinx’s sake than because she’s actually afraid—that Jinx spots something else.

“Is that a fucking enforcer?”

“Powder—I can explain, she’s—”

“Your sister is…Jinx?” Disbelief, heavy accent, hideous looking uniform…and…unarmed?

Jinx sizes her up, her eyes narrowing at her distinctive features even as the pistol shifts targets out of reflex. Yeah, she’s sure of it: that’s the one from their fire, the one who’d she’d let live so she could spread the news, paint a target on her (and only her) own back.

She should be really mad—and an old, sleeping and unused part actually is—but mostly, she’s never been happier to see an enforcer in her life!

“You’re not…you’re not her, she’d never have worked with one of them.”

Janna, it’s like a huge, suffocating weight has been lifted off her chest, finally squeezing enough air to her head to let her think…and here's what she thought, right now:

This shit-for-brains is trying to play her (regardless of who she is it’s not Vi it can’t be Vi), this Piltie is in way the fuck over her head…and they’ve both just given Jinx the perfect excuse to erase them from her thoughts for good.

The only problem is that not-her steps in front of her again—closer but not too close but still close enough to block her shot—with her hands still held out like she’s trying not to rattle a damned powder keg (get it?). Words drip from her stupid venomous trap like sludge at the bottom of a drainage pipe, festering in the air like an open wound exposed to dirt, and Jinx cocks her head dangerously as she tries to reason with her.

As if the real Vi would ever defend an enforcer.

Hah! She’d ‘a sooner slit their throats than stick out her own for them!

It’s not Vi (right?)

“Powder—”

Her eye twitches and her fingers slowly depressing the trigger, just a hair’s breadth away from finishing this…whatever this was. “Last chance, fucknut—don’t call me that.” Her voice is quiet, now—the scary kinda quiet, the quiet in dad’s voice when he ordered someone’s kid be killed after “an unforgivable transgression”, as he’d put it. The kind that makes most people shiver and Jinx grin.

The kind that not-Vi…just shakes her head at?

Huh?

It throws her off-balance a second—and while it doesn’t change the look on her face or nothin’, it does give ol’ not-her a bit more time to say her piece without getting a hole or two blasted through her.

“Stop! Just-just calm down a minute and listen!” she barks at her, a pleading note to her voice even as the smallest bit of frustration flashes across her face, hidden in the slight furrow of her eyebrow, the tightness in her jaw.

For some reason, it makes Jinx pause (familiar, too familiar—like when she’d chew Mylo out for running his mouth), and not-Vi doesn’t move an inch out of her path as she continues.

“That’s Cait, she’s a friend—”

Not-her’s eyes widen at the warning shot that flies right past her ear (it wasn’t supposed to be a warning shot, why did you move?), a cold anger freezing over Jinx’s expression even as the Piltie gasps in the background.

“See, if you’re actually who you say you are, then that isn’t fucking true. V—she didn’t make friends with the fuckers that killed our parents,” and yeah, maybe the cold is momentarily replaced with all that heat from the forge-fire that’d been bubbling in her ears a while back, but when the kid presses her head into her arm and not-her’s gaze flickers down to her, it comes right back. “So try again—but don’t fuck it up: I don’t have patience for liars.”

Not-her stares, looking hurt and lost and tired in a way that might’ve tugged more at her heart strings had she not spent years feeling the same way until her expression shifts into something more tempered—not harder, exactly, but not as open, either—before she begins to speak.

“She broke me out of jail,” she almost calls her that name again—Jinx can see it dancing on her tongue—but she doesn’t…and because she doesn’t, it forces her to actually process her statement.

Naturally, that screws her face all up as she repeats it over to herself in her head. That’s…a really bad lie—so bad, in fact, that it stops her from just killing them both on the spot. Not-her apparently takes that hesitation as permission to keep goin’.

“Yeah, I know: it’s crazy, right?” her eyes narrow again when the lady huffs a laugh and not-Vi talks the slightest bit faster. “But it happened and she’s been helping me find you—”

She must know this is the wrong thing to say because she immediately tries to backpedal, but Jinx isn’t that stupid: she ain’t so sentimental that she’s willing to get played for it. She scoffs, and Jinx shifts her aim to make the kill shot, ignoring the meaningless words for the nothing they are until she hears something so utterly idiotic that she has to respond.

“—on your side, Powder!”

“My side?” she barks a laugh that very quickly turns into a fit of hysteria, bringing tears to her eyes for the right and the wrong and the every reason because, because—”you say you come down here with an enforcer and help them find me, a criminal with a massive fucking bounty on my head, and you expect me to believe you’re on my side?!”

She brings the Zapper hand up to wipe a few tears from her eyes, ignoring the flickering shadows of her would-be brothers that twitch and whisper in the background—

Except, then (good gods, how many freakin’ thens are there gonna be tonight?!) her head snaps to the side, that familiar, whooshing sound even worse than the grating itself.

“P—err, what is it?” not-her says, that convincingly fake concern coloring her voice again.

“Shut up,” she says, distractedly attempting to get a feel for how many of them there are this time. It’s her own damn fault: she shouldn’t have stayed in one place for so long, shouldn’t have indulged the fake for a chance at a fantasy she frankly shouldn’t even want after everything that’d happened. Shouldn't have let the boy scamper back home to his friends, either...but hey, she's gotta earn that name somehow, right? Isha draws closer to her side, and she feels the anger and the twisted, scratchy feeling deep in her chest dissipate a little at her wide-eyed stare, her hands now both curled tightly around one of her own.

At least…six? No…maybe more…

Without hesitation, she spins Zapper around in her hand, holding it out grip first to the squirt she’d been ignoring for far too long with an apologetic, but stern look on her face.

“Two hands, ok kid? Stay close.”

Isha hums in agreement, offering her a quick nod even as her eyes flicker back to the ghost who’d stolen her sister’s face behind her…the ghost who looks genuinely shocked at how quickly things had changed, at the way she’d given an eight year old the most deadly weapon on her person like it was chump change.

Actually…

What better time to catch them in the lie?

“You wanna be on my side?” she spits somewhat mockingly as she turns away from both her and the unarmed Piltie just as the hoverboards finally zip out of the massive pipes built into the infrastructure away from them, sparing them one last, semi-hostile look over her shoulder as she finishes up, her knife already unsheathed and held in one hand .

“Then prove it.”

Chapter Text

He’s here.

Of course he’s here—of course he’s got that stupid owl mask on and of course he shows up now.

And…well, damn it, she can’t tell if that makes her angry or relieved!

This whole thing’s a fucking mess…and, well, what better to serve as a distraction-from-killing-her-maybe-ghost-thingy than the masked flying assholes that she already wanted to kill?

Isha presses closer to her back, anchoring her to the present: the hard roof beneath her, the warm hilt of the combat knife between her fingers, the dumb bug-gang floating around her, taking carefully aimed swings at her and the kid and the two phony tagalongs tryna’ get in her good graces.

For some reason.

The boys start talking again, whispers growing in volume until the words begin overpowering her sense of hearing, imparting it for all of a few seconds until not-her’s hand appears in her peripherals and Jinx nearly drops her knife in her rush to back away from her again—or really, to pull Isha back from her.

It…it might not be Vi, but the last time a wrapped fist like that got close to her face, it’d screwed everything up.

Or maybe Jinx had before then all on her own…but either way, Isha didn’t need to deal with any ‘a that. She’s just a kid.

Her head pivots to the side when that whoosh closes in from a new angle, and Jinx uses her free hand to twirl the kid around, making her laugh despite the circumstances as Jinx settles in the spot she’d just stood in, winking at the Firelight who’s already pulling away (only far too late) as their board dips down too quick for them to change course—

Well. Part of the reason she’d changed places with her was so she wouldn’t have to see the next part.

Jinx lets their body fall over the side of the roof, roughly scrubbing her hand in the fabric of her pants to get some of the bug guts off of her as she watches their descent. Briefly, she wonders if they’ll start glowing in the dark like the real firelights’ insides would, and she huffs a laugh.

When the kid mimics it behind her, for a really short moment, things don’t seem as bad as they had before.

Isha doesn’t shoot a lot—she’s a lot slower with the reload (Jinx ain’t blaming her or nothing, she knows the pneumatics take a bit of getting used-to, and she hasn’t let the kid play with it too much just yet) so Jinx’d told her it’s better to hold the shot until she’s pretty sure it’d hit. The other half of the reasoning, though, is that by not rapid firing like she’d normally have done, it seems to confuse the Firelights. They mostly hover far overhead or stick to messin’ with not-her and the unarmed Piltie…which is just fine in Jinx’s book—’specially given the occasional, mildly-horrified looks the pink-haired lady shoots her when she starts gettin’ into things.

Of course, there is one exception…and he’s really starting to piss her off.

He dips down, doing a needlessly fancy board-trick as he crouches away from her blade’s arc, the hoverboard tilting at a 45 degree angle as his pipe-club-thing swings towards her, and she moves to dodge—

—‘cept, she quickly finds out that his trick isn’t so pointless after all as his legs abruptly press down into one side of the board, launching him off of it and changing the angle of his swing.

Thunk!

She grits her teeth against the force of the blow, having shifted just enough that it hit her shoulder instead of her temple—but it still fucking hurts, and she’s already backing up a step—

—which sends her stumbling into Isha, and he’s already darting towards them like he’d counted on that, feet pounding on pavement as he approaches. Jinx curses, ducking under the board of yet another bug swinging from above her as her free hand wraps around their club, yanking hard to pull the already-off-balance Firelight from their board just in time to let gravity do the rest of the work, their body slamming into his as they both topple to the ground.

When she realizes she doesn’t feel Isha against her back anymore, she twists around to see some asshole had started pulling her away, and that’s all Jinx needed to see before she’s in their face, her knife slicing cleanly through the straps of their shabby chest plate. It makes ‘em panic enough that they release her sister, so she lets them fly back with all of their insides. Ahead of her, she watches as not-Vi slams one of the masked fucks into the cement, their body bouncing once at the impact before they stay down. At a noise from behind her, Jinx uses her free hand to tug Isha to stand flush to her back as she turns to face him again, nearly laughing at the way his head tilts and hand tightens over his club in obvious anger. Isha takes another shot—she can feel the recoil in the way the kid is momentarily pressed further into her back—and in the next second he’s trying to fight her again.

There was this one time when they were still fixin’ up the arcade together that he’d managed to fix up the sound on that stupid old mushroom game she’d liked as a kid and she’d tried getting him to dance to it. He wouldn’t, then—distractedly told her it “wasn’t how he wanted their first dance to go”—and then once he’d realized what he'd said, he’d turned an even brighter shade of red than the LEDs strewn about the room. She hadn’t let him live it down after that, remembers how smug she’d been every time they heard the theme, how he’d always avert his gaze and change the topic to anything else.

Now, as she’s ducking out of the way of his swings and attempting to parry the ones she can’t with a glorified pocket-knife, as she pushes and pulls and spins Isha around to try and put some distance between them and him, well…

This isn’t how she’d wanted it to go, either.

They’re getting so close to that storage room that the kid’d locked herself in initially that Jinx starts thinking she’s gonna have to end this for real. Her stomach twists itself into knots even as one shaky hand starts reaching back behind her to try and grab the gun, even as she remembers that stupid look he'd get on his face whenever he concentrated too hard on something.

He gets closer, and Jinx steels herself—

—and then he’s tossed to the ground, knocked away by the hoverboard someone’d apparently hurled at him—the same one that Jinx had yanked that other bug off of before…and when she grabs the kid and hauls ass back to the center of the roof?

The newly-unarmed Piltie stands there, eyeing her like she’s some rabid animal even though, of the two of ‘em, Jinx isn’t the one who just chucked a whole-ass hoverboard at someone.

…huh.

Jinx tilts her head, forgetting the pistol now that she doesn’t need it. When the asshole in the owl mask gets up again, he takes one look at how messed-up all ‘a his people are now and locks eyes with her (well, he probably locks eyes with her—it ain’t like she can see his or anything) before shaking his head, releasing a little black smoke bomb before he gives that signal to take off.

Just as fast as they’d come, the Firelights are gone.

Jinx waits until she can’t hear any more of that whooshing before she sheathes her knife, mechanically wiping it off on her pants as she surveys the area. He’s not above tricks like that—ones where you fool people into thinkin’ you left only to spring a trap. But after a while—after she cuts the tagalongs off with an arm when they start buttin’ into her thoughts—she calls it quits and drops a bit of her guard.

Not a ton of it, though: there were other problems, different old faces to deal with first.

She hums, and Isha hums back—which is when she decides it’s ‘bout time to check in on her, so she turns to face the kid…but then her eyes narrow at the way her hair seems to stick to part of her head.

“Oh—hold still a sec, twerp,” Jinx says, her face prolly a lot more serious than her jokey tone implies it’d be as she crouches down by Isha’s side, her hand gently sifting through the semi-matted hair on the side of her head as she carefully pulls it back from a pretty gnarly-lookin’ bruise there. A little bit of crimson streaks through her chestnut curls, offering a dye of the wrong color than the one the kid’d been begging dad to let her get for the past…well, ever, actually.

Jinx whistles lowly at the sight of it, but doesn’t say much else for a minute—too caught up at the small, bright red splotches now painting her own previously unmarred hand to say some smart-ass comment or another. Reminded her too much of…

She shakes herself from the memory as the boys reappear in her peripherals, removing her hand from her sister’s hair as she lets her fingertips slide to her cheek instead, poking her nose because she knows it’ll make the kid blink like it always does before she pulls away entirely.

Isha huffs at that, and Jinx leans a bit more of her weight on her knees as she raises an eyebrow, a half-smile already playing at her lips.

“Guess we oughta get you a helmet or something, huh, pepperbox,” she says, laughing at the way the words cause the girl’s eyes to flatten almost comically. She plays along, rolling her eyes as the kid crosses her arms in mock protest. For some reason, the squirt thought that such exaggerated reactions were hysterical, sometimes, and she’d had prolly ‘bout as shit of a day as Jinx’s had at this point, so she figures, ya’ know, why not? “Oh don’t be like that—it’ll look ‘s awesome as everything else we make.”

Isha looks away, closing her eyes with a dramatic sigh like dad did when he got that I’m so done with your shit today, Jinx look on his face, and when Jinx lets out a little surprised laugh at that (Isha didn’t mock him like that very often—’specially lately, with her whole freak-out about his questionable anger at her), Isha turns back and laughs, too. She abruptly cuts off as she locks eyes with something behind Jinx’s shoulder…a monster from Jinx’s past, the ghost-who’s-not-a-ghost that—for the moment, at least—she would have preferred remained as such.

But when have the stupid shitbags who run the fates or the whatnot ever listened to what she wants?

When would you have ever deserved that?

She sets her jaw as she rises, turning around to eye them warily even as her hand reaches back, the kid answering her unspoken request as the barrel of the gun slips between the fingers of her right hand.

The one lady eyes it warily before she looks back at Jinx, but Jinx isn’t looking at her at all, her own eyes focused on the Piltie’s. She slowly brings the pistol up in front of her, tossing it lightly until her palm’s wrapped around the grip, watching the enforcer with a hard, blank stare that the officer meets tit-for-tat while her not-ghost buddy rather urgently tries to get her attention—

And then Jinx twirls it around ‘til it’s angled just right to sit in her holster, givin’ the topsider a wicked looking grin ‘cuz she’d flinched back from the motion.

“Hah!” she barks, her eyes flickering to Isha’s down by her side, “that ain’t ever gonna get old.” The kid huffs another laugh, but her eyes still flit between the two strangers with obvious apprehension.

Well, this was getting kinda awkward, so…

“’K. Let’s hit the road, kid.”

Isha’s shoulders sag in a relief that lasts only long enough for the (apparently) ex-con to take a few steps towards them…steps that immediately falter to a stop at the look Jinx shoots her way not a second later.

“I—p—just, just wait, ok? Let’s just talk—”

“Yeeeeeeah, that’s gonna be a hard pass from me,” Jinx answers, her tone again much lighter than the hard look in her eyes. It makes that hurt from before flash across her—across that lady’s face before she opens her stupid trap up again.

“Please,” she says, begging her in a way that Vi never had, almost making Jinx snarl at her before she remembers how late it is, how much she’s still got something to do tonight. “I can’t lose you agai—”

Oh. Oh no, no, no.

“That’s a really interesting way of phrasing that,” Jinx hisses, finally finding that anger that’s been festering inside of her for fucking ages that’d all gone out the window with the rest of her senses once this person just sorta showed up—and they thought it’s all just supposed to be sparkles and rainbows now, did they?

She’s gonna go on—she really is, her rage is really gettin’ the best of her here and she’s most definitely in the mood to let it—but then Isha shuffles closer to her leg and that full blown boil she’s got going on simmers down to something more manageable. Without looking back to her, Jinx runs a hand through the kiddo’s hair, careful to avoid the cut as she responds.

“You wanna chat, then you ditch the Piltie, and I’ll come find you. Otherwise…?” Jinx shrugs, letting her words hang in the air for a moment before turning away completely, “we ain’t got shit worth sayin' to each other then, do we?”

She nudges Isha forwards, her hand slipping down to the girl’s back as they make their way towards the edge. Not-her(?) tries to call out to her a few times, but she thinks by now she’s made her point pretty clear…’cept, then the Piltie apparently feels a little more suicidal than Jinx’d given her credit for, what with the words that next come outta her mouth.

“Hold on a moment! Who is the child you have with y—”

She cuts off when Jinx runs at her, unable to back away fast enough to stop her from reaching up (stupid tall Piltie wearing stupid tall-people shoes) and resting her arm on her shoulder, her hand hanging loosely behind the enforcer’s back as Jinx crosses her legs, leaning into her like the pole of a person she is without looking up at her just yet. Before the lady can say anything in response (she’s at least smart enough not to have moved…unfortunately), Jinx cuts in, her voice and face casual and friendly enough that she can feel the lady get even more tense than she already had been.

“You’re an enforcer, right lady?” she asks, not bothering to wait or watch for her reaction before she continues. “Then I bet you know all about me…say,” she comments, tapping her chin with her free hand even as she hears the other lady shift from behind her. “Did you know that every single enforcer I’ve ran into down here for the past, oh I dunno, five years or so ends up disappearing for some weird reason?” Her tone’s still light, but when she shifts to actually look up to the Piltie, she knows her face isn’t any more. “I’m doing you a favor right now by letting you walk outta here with that obviously air-filled head still attached to your body—so how ‘bout you stop pushin’ your luck before I pop it like a balloon…’cuz just between you ‘n me, I’m pretty proud ‘a that streak I got goin’.”

Jinx roughly shoves off of her, not sparing the woman another glance as she makes her way back to Isha’s side, offering her a little wink at the look of awe on her face.

‘Course, before she can make it there, the stupid other lady gets in her way again.

“I—”

She rolls her eyes before the not-ghost can keep going, moving to walk around her before they sidestep back into her way again. She couldn’t have kept the implicit threat off of her face even if she’d wanted to, then, eyeing the lady with a look that—she’d recently found—could actually kill (she hadn’t meant to give the guy a heart attack, but considering he had to die anyways, she hadn't been really broken up about it).

“Move.”

“But—”

“Look,” she snaps, trying and failing to temper her anger as she watches the stubborn wall that had just settled itself directly in her path. “I don’t know if you got hit in the head or somethin’ and somehow forgot this,” Jinx puts one hand on her hip, her fingers itching for the trigger on a gun not two inches from her reach. “But we didn’t exactly leave things on the bestest ‘a terms, did we? Unless you wanna keep your own streak goin’,” she can’t say she doesn’t appreciate the wince on the lady’s face as she continues, “then how ‘bout you move outta my way before I make you."

The ghost shuffles in place, clearly unwilling to let sleeping families lie as she watches her in disbelief.

“The flare—if you really didn’t want to see me,” there’s that hurt again—the kind Jinx can’t react to or else they’ll know this isn’t as cut-‘n-dry as she wants it to be, “then why’d you shoot it off?” It sounds accusatory, like of all the crimes she'd ever committed in spite of all that Piltie law, this was somehow the worst one.

“I didn’t,” Jinx says easily, rolling her eyes at the stupid look on the spectre’s face before her.

“Then who—”

“Nunya—now move it already, dipshit. You don't get to just come back!"

Not now, not when they're so close to dad's goal, not when she had a pipsqueak to protect.

It doesn’t get to be that easy.

The red-coat lady holds up her hands again when Jinx jerks her thumb to the side, too in-a-hurry to bother with this whole she was in jail or she's sorry spiels that the ghost had apparently pre-cooked up in that stupid fat head of hers. In fact, she’s very quickly approaching the point where Zapper comes back out to play when not-her starts at it again.

To her credit, she doesn’t bat an eye when Jinx’s hand slips further towards the grip.

“Are you seriously not gonna move?” Honestly, she’d be impressed if it were anyone else: like, she’s really not known for her restraint, and pretty much any other person who’d would be absolutely riddled with holes by now.

So why isn’t she?

Her knuckles pop in irritation as she struggles not to snap at him. Not-her keeps on a-talking, and Jinx decides she’s done waiting as she starts walking around her again, a stupid, annoying sort of thought clawing its way to the front of her head as Jinx dodges away from the attempts that wrapped hands keep making to grab at her.

She shouldn’t let the Piltie stick around her s—not-Vi like this. She should just kill her now. It’s what dad would want, probably, and heck, if the owl-boy did come back, he might just take care 'a the problem for her…but…

Well, she had just knocked him away from Isha…

“Not that I care or anything,” she prefaces, her arms crossing for a moment as she looks up at the moon, “but you shouldn’t stick around here much longer—that’s already the second time I’ve had ta’ deal with them tonight, and I doubt he’ll be real friendly with ya after all ‘a this.”

“You know who their leader is?”

Not-her looks back at the Piltie at the topsider's words, and Jinx mentally curses herself for somehow giving that away…not that she knew which part of it had done so. Maybe it’s just a lucky guess? Still…it makes her dumb head think about other things, about other days—ones maybe best left in the past.

She scoffs, shaking her head as her eyes narrow at the thought—old, happy memories of a person she used to be turned as dark as the shitty tea Sevika made, steeped too long to taste anything but bitter.

“Oh, you could say that.”

Jinx doesn’t even ask Isha to follow behind her, too worried they’ll be tailed to bother with anything but kneeling so she can cling to her back like the little monkey she is before they take off, Isha’s head propped up on her shoulder as she hops from building to building faster than she’d maybe ever moved before.

It turns out not to really matter, because neither the topsider or…or the other one actually bother giving a chase.

When they get far enough away that she’s not worried she’ll run into them or the Firelights, she stops, lets Isha down, and slumps against the wall. Runs a hand through her bangs and down her face, lets it rest there for a while as she thinks.

Isha doesn’t say anything, doesn’t try getting her attention, doesn’t make a noise at all. Instead, they both kinda just stand around in silence, and Jinx closes her eyes.

She wishes she could say it’s calming or productive or helpful…but it isn’t.

She’s stalling—she knows that—waiting longer to initiate this conversation with her sister (or maybe just one of them?) that would totally suck because she hadn’t—there hasn’t been any way she could have ever prepared for a shitty chat like the one they really had to have now because Vi had died and dad hasn’t ever lied to her before—

Except, that’s obviously not true.

So…so what else was he keeping from her? From Isha?

When she shakes her head, opening her eyes to dispel the thoughts before the boys came back to somehow further ruin her already terrible mood, she notices why Isha hadn’t been talking.

Fuck.

“H-hey, kiddo, it’s…,” she bites her lip, trailing off as she slumps to her knees by the girl’s side. She’d been going to say it’s ok, but it really wasn’t, and she doesn’t want to lie to her (unlike some people), so instead she places a hand on her shoulder and waits for her to cry herself out.

Isha rushes into her arms, shaking like a leaf in the Grey, and Jinx sighs as she wraps her arms around her. They stay like that for a long time—by the time she pulls back a bit, Jinx’s knees have gone numb and that little cut on her shoulder’s clotted completely. Between the two of them, you’d think they got caught up in some kinda explosion or something…but in her opinion, it’s a whole heck-of-a lot worse than something as simple as that.

“Talk to me, squirt: what’s up?”

It’s lame, she knows, but it’s all she’s got at the moment—her words and her arms and her shaky little smile.

Jinx only hopes it’s enough.

”Was it my fault?!” Isha signs, her face as searching as it is panicked. Jinx freezes, the question catching her off-guard. When the kid notices her lack of a reaction, she continues, her motions quick and barely comprehensible even with all the time Jinx has spent around her. ”She made you sad—I shot flare—she came—my fault?”

“Nope,” Jinx answers before she’s even really thought about it, eager to get that awful look off her face—but even when she does, she knows it’s not the kid’s fault. Isha sniffles as she wipes her face with her arm, and Jinx’s face relaxes into something more natural.

There was a time, long ago, that one of the ghosts who haunted her had said she couldn’t do anything…but it’s not true anymore. This feeling where someone’s relying in her for comfort hadn’t come easily—she’d never had to worry ‘bout it, before—and she’d probably screwed it up a whole lot when she’d first started out, but as she wipes the rest of the ick from the kid’s face, it’s as familiar as makin’ a Mouser, as wielding Zapper.

As carrying around Isha had become.

“It’s not your fault—heck, it’s actually mine,” she adds at the narrow-eyed look the girl shoots her. Jinx huffs a laugh at that, smiling when Isha does, too as she begins to explain the whole why of it all: who the one lady maybe was (it's hurting Jinx’s head too much to call her by the name the pink lady probably is), the flare, dad's assurances, the prison and the sheriff and the everything.

All of it.

When she ends, Isha wraps her back in a hug and clings to her front in a way that meant Jinx would have to keep a hand free to hold her there as she got ready to take off again…’cept Isha let’s her hands fall to her sides again before she asks something that Jinx doesn’t know the answer to. Luckily, she’d already decided what they were gonna do about it.

”How come she’s still alive?”

She snorts, glancing down at Isha before the two of them start off towards the tavern, a half-smile playin’ at her lips.

“Heck if I know, kid,” and yeah, it’s way, way more complicated and painful and terrible than just that, but there isn’t an easy way she can think of to express the full depth of it to a tired, anxious lookin’ eight-year-old, so she decides the rest of her answer’s more important than the hard part is. "Buuut there is somebody around who probably knows." She adjusts her grip on Isha, kicking them off the next fire escape with more force than she maybe should because with the fighting over, she'd lost a convenient outlet for all 'a this frustration.

“Guess we gotta talk to dad.”

Chapter Text

They make it to dad’s place without a lotta fanfare—and that only makes her even more irritated ‘cuz she’s wound up tighter than a Piltie’s corset on their wedding night—but when they get inside and walk between the rooms in the apartment, the guy’s not even there.

Jinx grimaces before settling on the couch, crossing her arms with a huff. She knows better than to go out and find him; the last time she’d done that, he ended up leaving the bar before she got there, and then she’d had to walk all the way back home, and…

Well, he gets sorta bitchy when you wake him up from his sleep.

Instead, the two of them wait sorta impatiently, with Jinx kicking one of her legs around in an effort to work off some of her nervous energy. Isha curls up in a ball next to her, eventually drifting off against Jinx’s arm after an hour or so passes them by.

Jinx hunches over the side opposite of Isha’s head, one hand squeezing her knee to keep her grounded to the here-and-now as opposed to the before-and-then. She’s only kinda successful, and she only barely resists the urge to throw the mismatched couch pillows Silco'd acquired throughout the year at the boys who keep popping outta her head and into the living room.

Another hour passes and she just about says “screw it” and gets up to go hunt him down anyways, but then the door knob jiggles from behind her and Isha shifts in her sleep. She turns over her shoulder, locking eyes with the man of the hour (of the past like three hours, actually) as he walks through the door. She’s real careful with keeping her face all casual-like ‘n stuff, but she’s honestly pretty angry (and some other stuff, too, but she’s not gonna let herself feel that too much ‘til she’s alone). When she sees how relieved he looks to find the both of ‘em there, though, some of her mad-ness evaporates a bit.

It's not fair! She’s got a right to be angry!

Right?

“Jinx,” He says through a sigh, slumping on the couch by Isha’s other side. “Where have you been? Renni reported your departure hours ago…”

He trails off as Jinx casually gestures to the collection bag on the coffee table, her eyes not straying from his own. He hardly even glances at it before looking back at her.

“And where did you…?” He looks at Isha, cutting himself off at the sight of the bruise on her head. He shakes his head, propping his head up on one hand over the arm of the couch before he continues. “What happened?”

Jinx studies him a moment before shrugging her kid-free shoulder, still kicking that one leg as she answers. “Just some bug stuff—don’t worry, I took care of it…unlike Sevika,” her voice comes out a little meaner than she’d intended it to, if his face is any indicator. “But before we get into all ‘a that, I’ve got a question for ya’: see, I keep hearing this rumor everywhere I go that people’re seein’ someone who looks a whole lot like Vi used to,” his eyes widen slightly as he listens, “’n so I figured I’d maybe ask you what was up with that before I did something you probably wouldn’t like. So, whaddya know about that?”

Silco leans back a bit in his seat, looking tired. “The rumors are just that: rumors,” he says, sighing as he eyes the two of them. “They aren’t anything you need to concern yourself with—and before you ask, I already had some people look into i—”

“Holy shit,” she whispers, head turning in disbelief, “you actually have been lying to me.”

He turns to her in alarm, one hand raised as if to tell her to hold on for a moment, but she’s far past the point of listening to him—not now.

“Jinx, she isn’t—”

Her eyes narrow dangerously. “I already saw her, jackass!”

He stares at her a moment before leaning over his knee, massaging his temple as he speaks.

“I was only trying to protect you, Jinx,” he says, sounding more exhausted than she’d heard him sound in a long time. “Just give me some time: I’ll take care of it—”

“That’s not even the point!” she says, pausing to look down at Isha when she starts to stir…a motion Silco watches between his fingers with silent interest. “You’ve been actin’ funky all day—you knew and you didn’t tell me!”

He shakes his head, pushing himself back up to watch her as she seethes. “Jinx, I didn’t find out until today, just like you did—and before you continue,” he adds forcefully when she begins to cut him off, “I want to ask you something: does any of this change the fact that she left you?”

She freezes, her teeth grating against each other as she considers his words. Normally, she already woulda left, but the kid-shaped rock using her as a pillow stops her from just up ‘n leaving like she wants to.

When he continues, his voice is softer, “can you imagine being so angry with her,” he asks, gesturing to Isha’s sleeping form, “that you’d leave her, scared and crying and alone next to a burning building?”

Her breathing’s getting a lot heavier now, her eyes flickering between Isha and the wall as she wages a war in her head, unsure of who she’s fighting or who she wants to win. Her fingers crack as her free hand balls into a fist. Her other hand wraps around the girl protectively, finally moving her enough that she wakes up, her sleepy little eyes blinking up at her as Jinx pulls her into her lap.

“No,” she says finally, her hand coming up to brush some of the girl’s curls from her eyes, “I can’t.”

Silco relaxes a bit at that, nodding once before he turns to look out the window…one that he’d had installed after she’d been playing with explosives in the apartment again even though dad’d told her not to, and, well…

Now they’ve got a nice view of the outskirts of the Lanes.

“Right,” he replies after a moment, leaving them in silence for a few minutes. Isha tries asking her what’s going on, but Jinx waves her away—she’ll tell her, don’t get her wrong, but not with dad around. She’s still sorting out how she felt about all ‘a this, and she’d maybe left a few details about why the Firelights were around in the first place that they probably shouldn’t rehash near Silco.

Somehow, he still didn’t know much about the kid’s friend, and if he found out that the flare the squirt’d shot off kinda jumpstarted this whole deal…well, then that maybe-anger he harbored for the kid would be less a maybe and more a how much.

“In any case,” dad continues after a while, a cautious edge to his voice, “the Council has become increasingly hostile towards the undercity in the past few days,” he turns to her then, an oddly open look on his face as he urges her to forget about this, “I need you to weaponize the hextech, Jinx,” she bristles, mad he’s asking her to do something for him after he’d lied to her like this, after he’d left her baby-sister with the shittiest babysitter again and that that screw-up domino-effected them all the way here—that…that Vi’s alive and she wants to come back and Jinx’d left her there, that she’d been with a fucking enforcer, that they were pals, that she didn’t think Vi’d been lying to her.

That somehow, all of this felt like it was her fault, that it was inevitable because she’d finally been kinda happy—so of course she’d screw it up.

Maybe she really shoulda just killed that Firelight brat when she’d found him the first time…or better yet…

“Please, Jinx. If you can do this, Piltover will be forced to parley. Just leave all of this...unseemly business to me, and soon, we can put this mess behind us," dad says, his hand brushing some of Isha’s hair from that cut on her head even as Isha shrinks back into her (she ain’t scared or nothin’, but Jinx can tell she feels bad about all of this, and the purplish bruise there probably didn’t feel so good when people picked at it, either).

“You’re the only one I can trust with this.”

They don’t end up staying long after that.

Jinx decides she can figure out all this stupid emotional stuff later and stands up to make her way back to the workshop—only, dad tried to stop her from takin’ Isha, which is how Jinx ended up directly going against his orders for the first time in her life.

She can’t trust them with her again—not so soon, not after this.

She didn’t even hide it from him, didn’t listen when he started getting into the many ways the kid would just distract her from her work—and he didn’t stop even as Isha sank further and further into her arms, even as she hid her face in Jinx’s shoulder.

It…starts makin’ her wonder things…like, is that why he’d always pawned the girl off with Sevika or some other idiot at every available opportunity?

Because she’s a distraction?

She chews her lip raw thinking about it on the way to her workshop, continues even as she starts tinkerin’ with the design that the two of them—Isha included—had come up with to try an’ tap into the stone’s power, even as Isha settles quietly on the empty space on the bench next to the twisted hunk of metal.

She doesn’t stop until well after the sun’s up.

On the one hand, he always sent someone to look for the kid when she inevitably wandered off—it’s a part of her charm and not unlike what Jinx’d got up to at her age (or heck, even now). Sevika always looked one step away from breaking something whenever she lost her, had half her own people searchin’ the undercity every time it happened…

But on the other hand, Silco never really went out to search for her himself…and he’d done that at least twice for Jinx in the last like three days alone.

It leaves her with a question—one she really doesn’t want to have to ask:

How much of what he does for Isha is because he wants to, and how much is ‘cuz he feels obligated to?

Is lookin’ out for family supposed to be an obligation?

It wasn’t for Vi—‘least, not in the end.

She closes her eyes, flinging his old goggles back at the comically tiny doll she’d made of him as she thinks it over. The second brother had always been a bit more level headed than the first, so if she has to hear from ‘em today, then at least it was him and not the other one…

Doesn’t mean she’s real happy ‘bout it, tho, ‘cuz she always felt much worse after they started showing up too much…plus a whole lot more reckless. She can’t afford to be either if she’s gonna be lookin’ after the kid like this.

Speaking of which…

Jinx pivots on her heel, looking back at the worried girl on the counter. Yeah, in hindsight, dramatically chucking those goggles at the doll she’d pried ‘em off of without any explanation would prolly make anyone jumpy.

Too bad you’re such a screw-up, then, he whispers not even an inch from her ear, ’cuz I bet that ain’t gonna stop anytime soon…dontcha’ think, Pow—

Her hands curl in her hair and she falls to her knees. They weren’t—that isn't supposed to happen, no one calls her that anymore!

Arms envelop her a moment later, startling Jinx into flinching at the touch…but unlike most surprises, this one isn’t bad. She returns the embrace a second later, burying her head into her sister’s neck as the girl tightens her hold.

How, she thinks, closing her eyes in the blissful moment of quiet her little human tether provided her with, could you not love this?

…how could he not…

She shakes her head, causing the girl to hum in confusion as she shifts to press their foreheads together. The kid smiles at her, laughing at the probably super soft look on her face. A small hand pulls away from her back and gently presses on her nose, and Jinx smiles at her as she scoops the kid up, dramatically throwing them both down into their fort like she should have done the second they got here. Maybe Jinx is being too hard on dad—he had a lot on his plate, and at the end of the day, he kept the kid safe enough and fed and alive. Jinx prolly owed it to him to take care of the rest…and even if she didn't…

Jinx would do anything for Isha.

Anything.

Chapter Text

“OK, that should about do it,” she says, backing up so she can look at her work. She’d spent the better part of the day tinkering with it, answering Isha’s questions whenever she asked anything (though thankfully, the girl had avoided asking anything to do with the ghost that decided to wake from a seven-year slumber), playing a few rounds of that Piltie game (which her sister always lost even with her many “repeats”), and desperately trying to ignore anything besides what was right in front of her. The tools in her hands, the game pieces at her fingertips, the little scratches slowly accumulating on her palms and along her wrist as she worked.

And now, now they might have something they can work with.

The base of the weapon didn’t take long to build—Jinx’s had something in mind like this for ages, only it never seemed to matter before because they never seemed to have a good enough power source for somethin’ this big—but making something strong enough to withstand the force of the stupid blue rock was another story.

Normally, you could beat the shit outta the gem thing and nothin’ would happen, but if you actually wanted to use it for anything other than a very fancy LED, it was different—like the damn thing knew and was being a huge jerk about it. That’s why it’s back in its timeout stand right now, why Jinx had spent the last six hours pouring through that stupid Piltie’s notes on it with a critical eye, trying to find the right magic picture to not accidentally explode everyone around her when she inevitably fired it off.

Dad said it was gonna be like a repellant—like…a campfire is for some kinds ‘a bugs—but Jinx would honestly be disappointed if she put all this effort into Fishbones here and not even get to see it in action.

If it helped the guy get that stick outta his ass, though, then it might be fine…and maybe then, if the dumb topsiders actually decided to listen for once in their lives…

Maybe Silco wouldn't need her to be like Jinx if he had his Zaun. Maybe she wouldn't need to...

Jinx glances at her sister outta the corner of her eye, watching as she finishes repainting the playing board a new shade of yellow and purple—”to contrast pieces”, as she’d put it. Then she bites her lip and nods to herself. A world like that, a world where Isha could stay Isha and Jinx would have all the time in the world to show her how to do things besides just firing her guns or makin’ explosives…

They were so close to making it all work. Dad’s counting on them.

She motions for the kid to get down off of the workbench and takes a step back, tossing her his goggles before nodding, activating the magic button that would serve as a kind of test for the sort of firing mechanism she wanted to implement.

The rock crackles, jiggling unstably in its little holder—

BOOM!

A burst of blue energy shoots high into the air (though not through their “roof”, thankfully), knocking her back with its force and making Isha close her eyes as she hugged one of the workbench’s legs for support.

Images flash before her eyes, unstoppable long after the moment passes them by—

Vander, dead, a purple ooze trailing from his mouth as tainted blood ceased to pulse through his veins, his eyes a vacant stare—

Fire, smoke, dust and the smell of burning flesh permeating the air, heating and cooling her skin alike with the warmth of the flames and the shock of the situation, of everything happening too fast and not fast enough—

Violet, leaving, Violet, getting too close, Violet, disappearing, Violet, punching her in the face, Violet, ignoring her cries, Violet never ever ever ever coming back—

Blue crackling energy shifting the air, spinning the life around them all into ashes and blood as she stares at the clouds, transfixed by a beauty that lasted only long enough for her sister to grab her by the face and—

She breathes hard, fast—trapped in a world that isn’t her own but used to be, once, before she left it behind for something less shattered—her palms sweat as she curls in on herself, the air boiling in her lungs because there’s not enough of it to go around, because the fires of the past scorched the insides of their workshop and burned her from within.

Some part of her—the part that still trapped there, in that moment—pulls the rest of her there with it, forces that blood back down her face, the bruise that hadn’t gone away for weeks after, the soot staining her fingertips until she’d washed them so much they bled. It’s all still there, it had never left, just waiting for the moment it needed to remind her of what she is, of what she did.

As if you could ever forget.

She can’t even tell if the thought is her own, and it’s dizzying, suffocating, more incendiary than any fire, more explosive than any bomb.

And then, arms wrap around her from the floor and she looks towards their owner, expecting to find the husk of the boys she’d left buried under the rubble—

Oh.

Isha.

Her sister’s head is buried in her neck, her brown curls pressing into her cheek.

Isha’s there and real and Jinx is not back there, back at that awful place she’d messed everything up.

Jinx isn’t Powder—not anymore. Jinx is Jinx, Jinx is Isha’s sister.

And Isha’d seen the whole thing.

Now she knows your crazy, too.

She twitches, brings her arms to return the embrace even with how horribly awkward it all is, what with the whole fetal position she’s got goin’ on. Her face is covered in tears and snot, and Isha had seen it, and now—

…uh. Now she’s…still here?

That…that can’t be right. Jinx didn’t usually cry around Isha. Crying’s what did Powder in, crying is how people left you.

Crying’s what made Vi see how weak she was, how it’d sent her away forever…

Not forever—she came back

The timid one tries comforting her. It doesn’t work.

Does it?

Just because she’s back doesn’t mean she wants you.

There he is.

She rubs an arm over her face and sits up, pulling Isha into her lap as she presses her head into her shoulder. Better to not let her see Jinx’s face—can’t risk it, not like she had with…

No, that’s stupid. Isha wouldn’t leave her—she’d said so herself. Not even Vi had ever said that.

Slowly, her grip relaxes and—tears and all—she pulls back enough for Isha to see her face, anxiety clawing at her chest when their eyes meet.

”What was an accident?”

Her question surprises Jinx, and she doesn’t have an answer before the kid brings her arms back in front of her again, rapidly flipping through the motions as Jinx watches with wide eyes.

”You said ‘it was an accident!’, but nothin’ bad happened. Just blue zap. Not bad. We’re ok.”

We’re…ok?

“I…,” she starts, looking back at the stand still on the workbench with a now silent little rock in it as she bites her lip. What was there to say? The kid’s right, of course, but that didn’t mean her heart wasn’t still beating louder than that one really loud song at the tavern. It’s starting to make her skin crawl…

Her sister cocks her head, her arms waving in front of Jinx’s face when she doesn’t answer. Jinx turns back, her stomach turning at the quick, but terrifying image of a dead little girl, eyes as unseeing as the bodies of her brothers had once been after a fatal encounter with her monkey bomb…

”Feed Isha?”

Jinx blinks, startled less by the question and more by the knowing look in her sister’s eyes. She’s…trying to distract her, maybe?

Heh. Jinx thought she was supposed to be the older one.

Same little baby you’ve always been, never growing up.

She shuts him out as she stands, setting Isha down with a nod she hopes will be enough to hide her discomfort as she starts towards the door. Isha runs ahead of her at first, but Jinx stops her with a hand.

“No, we’re not racing this time, squirt.”

Her voice isn’t as cavalier as she wants it ta’ be, but she’s at least trying, and that had to count for something.

Didn’t do much for us.

She grates her teeth together and waits for the sound that comes with his voice to end, blinking distractedly at what is probably the third time the poor kid’s had to repeat her question.

”Why not?”

Lots of reasons, actually…but most of them have to do with dad. The weapons not done yet, so Jinx doesn’t really wanna see him…actually, she doesn’t want to see him at all right now—not after the last time, not with Isha. He’d try to keep her away, and that would make Jinx worry again and then nothing would get done, and he’d lied to her and said things that made her feel all weird when all she really wants is to keep the pipsqueak safe and, like, color or something.

But she can’t really say any of that to Isha, so instead she says:

“I was thinking…we could hit up Jericho’s?”

Isha’s eyes sparkle even as Jinx silently prays he won’t make her pay for this. Kid could eat her fucking weight in…eh, whatever he served. It kinda varied by day, and by season, and by his mood (or sometimes, by what grew under his countertops).

The important thing was that it was always good, and right now, Jinx could use something good.

Her sister hops up and down and impatiently waves her on with her head, making her smile despite the bile still burning at her throat.

“Just—just stay near me, ok?” I can’t lose you, she really means.

In response, the girl grabs her arm before taking off, causing Jinx to let out a laugh. She picks up the pace, watching that innocence twinkle in the kid’s yellow eyes.

A world that would let her keep that spark, Jinx muses, her own eyes relighting with that fire Sevika liked to see on her face as they jump from rooftop to rooftop, skitter up and down stairwells, swing around signposts and broken street lights.

That’s a world worth fighting for.

Chapter Text

Jericho takes one look at her when they finally arrive, arms swinging at their sides where their hands are interlocked, before shaking his head. An amused smirk plays at his bulbous lips, and he lets out a guttural laugh that surprises a few of the people at the stand so much that one of them spills their food into their laps.

This, of course, makes Isha huff a laugh as well—and when the woman who’d decided to wear her food turns to try and pick a bone with them for it, she catches one look at Jinx and thinks better of it. They eat in peace after that, and Jericho refuses payment like the saint he is when she reaches for her coin purse…though he leaves a note under her bowl, messily folded into fourths and a bit stained from sitting in the sweaty guy’s pocket all day…

Almost as if he’d waited for them to turn-up—or maybe just Jinx.

It makes her not want to open the note (not right now, not right here), so she discretely tucks it into her bracer instead, not even showing Isha the letter’s contents...or the letter at all, actually.

Instead, Jinx starts heading back to the workshop, thanking Jericho even as her mind is elsewhere…at least until a few blocks later, where, after turning a corner, they find—

“There you are,” Sevika growls, looking annoyed…and relieved. That’s strange enough on its own, but she also looks fucked-up.

In her bracer, pressed between worn leather and her skin, a paper starts to itch.

“What the hell happened to your arm?” Jinx asks, her surprise coming across only in the slight twitch of her eyebrow. Isha shuffles closer to her side, one of her hands still held tightly in her own as she looks between the two of them.

The ogre scoffs, the sling holding her mechanical arm up creaking as it shifts on her chest. The clasping mechanism must be messed up or something…she shakes her head, willing herself to focus despite the pit that’s forming in her stomach—this weird, loomin’ dread eating away at her insides as sure as any stab wound.

Those metal fingers of hers are splattered in—

Jinx sets her jaw, intent on tuning them out. She’d noticed…but it looks old, now.

How old, though?

She nearly shuts her eyes at the implications of the question that force their way into her stupid head—because…because whose blood would that even…was it after she’d talked to dad?

Caught between a silent, blissful thrill and a horrid, gut-wrenching terror, Jinx only barely manages to catch the woman’s response—and it ain’t an answer to her question, either.

“Silco wants her staying nearby until this whole…situation blows over,” Sevika spits, pausing meaningfully before she decides on a word to describe this shit-show they’d all found themselves in. She reaches out towards Isha, but is smart enough not to actually walk towards them as Jinx processes her words…and she rolls her eyes when Jinx pulls the kid slightly behind her, protectively eclipsing her small frame with her own. If the situation is still going on...then the ghost...

She's still kickin' after all, huh?

Her eyes narrow as she eyes the woman before her, waiting for her to continue. After a long, tense moment, Sevika’s gaze flattens and she sighs, letting her hand drop to her side.

“Look,” she starts, not batting an eye when Jinx’s eye twitches as she speaks, “what do you think’s gonna happen if they get their hands on her?”

“How the hell are you gonna be able to stop ‘em right now, Lefty?”

The woman’s mouth dips down into a sneer that would normally make Jinx’s day…but right now, all it does is piss her off—and it shows in the way she cuts Sevika off as she tries to answer.

“Actually, scratch that—you couldn’t even stop her," she nods towards Isha, her expression sharpening as she goes on, "when your arm wasn’t all gimpy." She seethes, uncaring of the massive amount of heat in her voice as she eyes the lady with a look that could boil her alive.

Yeah, she hadn’t forgotten that little detail.

Sevika snorts, but it sounds less intense than it normally does. “That wasn’t me—I stuck Gregor on kid duty when she slipped out,” she grunts, offering Isha a cold glare that the girl shrinks away from. Jinx further blocks her from the woman’s gaze at that, her own expression flash-freezing before she continues. “And that won’t be an issue anymore.”

Jinx’s gaze flattens as she crosses her arms, the paper tickling her skin as it shifts with her movements. “Oh yeah? An’ why’s that?”

“Because I killed him.”

There’s no hesitation in her answer, no change in her position or facial features as she fixes Jinx with a leveled stare. That’s enough to get her attention—it ain’t somethin’ the lady really went for, killin’ her own people like that. You had to really fuck up for Sevika to do something like that.

Musta’ got an earful from him about the accidental rooftop reunion, she thinks.

Whatever look Jinx shoots her must be enough to egg her on, because the woman continues without further prompting. “She’ll be safe, Jinx: I’ll personally see to it. So fuck off already and finish that damn weapon.”

Jinx eyes her, a bit unnerved that she’d figured out the problem so easily like that…and also because being near Sevika meant being near dad, and she’s not too sure about Isha and him at the moment…

Noticing her hesitation, the woman continues again with a long suffering sigh. “Still off ‘a missions—thanks to your dumbass decisions,” she adds pointedly, a half-hearted scowl on her face, “so we’re not even gonna leave my apartment. They don’t know where that is, and Silco’s distancing himself from the mess at the hexgates as much as possible right now, so he won’t be swinging by.”

Jinx stiffens. Is she really that transparent?

You’ve been around her for years now, idiot, he cuts in, his voice malicious and grating, of course she’d notice shit like this. Anyone would, with that much time.

She relaxes a bit at that before tensing again. No Silco, no ghosts, no enforcers…Jinx chews on her lip, thinking it over. Eventually, she turns over her shoulder to look down at the kid, frowning in thought as her sister looks up with those big, yellow eyes of hers.

“Whaddya think, kid?”

A sigh sounds from in front of her. “You’re seriously asking the k—”

“I’m sorry,” Jinx cuts in, her voice much more unfriendly than it had been a second ago, “is your name ‘kid’, Sevika?”

There’s a growl before the silence that follows, and Jinx takes it for the win that it is as she watches Isha respond:

”Is that what you want?”

Jinx sucks in a breath, hesitating. No...but also yes. She wants Isha to be safe, but she’d like it better if she could make sure of it herself…but Jinx attracts a lot of danger to her just by being her, too…and much as she hated to admit it, she did trust Sevika when it came to following orders from dad, at least (and not for a damn thing else)…

And then, there's that other problem she's gotta handle, too...one that would make her feel a helluva lot better if she didn’t have to drag an eight year old into the middle of it...

Her silence must speak for itself, because in the end, Isha pulls away from her, dejectedly walking to Sevika’s side with a frown. Jinx stops her when she’s about a step in front of her, bending down to pull her into a hug.

“It won’t be long, ok? Promise,” she says, offering her hand out to do their special handshake. Isha returns it, shooting her a weak smile that Jinx used to see a lot on…on this other person she used to see in the mirror once upon a lifetime ago.

Sevika nods at her, her good arm on Isha’s shoulder as she starts to walk away, but she stops when Jinx pins her in place with a glare.

“Don’t fuck this up.”

The lady scoffs, but shoots her a grin afterwards—like she’s impressed at the threat. Throws Jinx for a fucking loop. “That’s rich comin’ from you, brat.”

They walk away and Jinx bites at her lip, turning only after they disappear around a bend. She perches on a rooftop, overlooking the city and absently scratching at her arm…the arm, she remembers as her fingers snag on the note, that isn’t scratchy for no reason.

When she unfolds the paper, she’s met with a tiny, poorly drawn and familiar-looking cartoon yordle followed by a simple, short message:

You know where I’ll be.

-Vi

Chapter Text

A long time ago—after Powder, but before Isha, back when Sevika still felt like a threat and her bombs rarely worked and before she’d gotten over her habit of holding onto long, brown overcoat sleeves whenever they went anywhere together—she’d gotten real scared of it all: the violence, the threats, the the way people turned tail when they saw her even though she was next to useless back then…

The killing that just never seemed to stop.

…back in that time, she’d been real scared. She trusted dad, but it’s not because she wanted to, it's because she had to. Even then, she wasn’t the dumb idiot kid people sometimes made her out to be: she knew that she’d burned her family, that she’d drove Vi off into an early grave, that she’d destroyed a building with just her tools and her mind alone…but she also knew that she’d ‘a never been in that situation in the first place had the man who’d calmly taken her in that night not set it all up to start with—that had her sister not listened to Little Man’s stupid fucking tip, had Powder not taken those compact little death rocks with her, had Vander not gotten himself nabbed by the boogeyman of the undercity and her siblings not walked into that super obvious trap—that maybe, things could have been different.

It made her feel all sortsa messed up…and for the longest time, for months after, before dad knew how to talk to a kid and she knew how ta’ say what’s on her mind, Jinx’s only real regret had been that Vi’d caught her arm on the rooftop that day.

Her brothers could have escaped topside, Vi coulda led them back home…they wouldn’t ‘a really have done anything super illegal, so the enforcers wouldn’t have cared…and that woulda been that.

What’s the life of one screw-up kid worth compared to an entire family?

And now, she’s just, what? Working with the guy who’d rigged everything in the background, who’d orchestrated the catastrophic symphony of their deaths like it’s all just dandy?

She felt things about that, too…but what was she supposed to do? She’d killed or maimed lotsa his people, too, and he hadn’t so much as lifted a finger against her in retaliation. His closest advisor-type lady lost her fucking arm and he’d only quietly paid for the medical care, organized the creation of her prosthetic…and forbid her from taking it out on the twitchy kid clinging to his side all the while. It was…well, it sucked. A lot. She wanted to be mad, but she wasn’t—couldn’t be, with all the crying and the boys that only she ever heard yellin’ at her for everything that happened, saying it was all her fault…’cuz ultimately, it was.

Nobody had wanted Jinx there—not even Jinx herself, by the end of it all—and yet she’d injected herself into it anyways, determined to prove to someone, anyone that she wasn’t worthless, that she could be useful…and outta the few people still left to see her and what she did, only Silco really saw her as something valuable enough to keep around. He didn’t leave her, not ever—not even when she accidentally broke things or flinched when he spoke or acted like a lightning rod to all of the hate his people harbored for her because of the incident. She’d destroyed nearly all of his Shimmer, severely injured the Doctor in the process, and what had she accomplished?

Nobody was happy. Everyone lost, in a way.

She was a Jinx.

And yet he still wanted her.

She couldn’t hate him—how could she? Not even her own blood had wanted her after that. This was the only person who thought she still mattered enough to keep around.

And he scared the ever loving shit out of her.

She couldn’t just admit that, either—not with the way Sevika kept eyeing her like last year’s expired meat, not with the way everyone else already hated her, not with that connection to Vander looming over her head like a headsman's axe, ready to swing down over her neck in a moment’s notice—she’d look weak, and to them, she was already too weak, already a useless, hopeless extra mouth to feed in a time where food was harder to come by than bullets and blades alike.

She got real good at pretendin’, that year—so good, in fact, that eventually, when she fired a real gun for the first time and shot someone not for play, when they sputtered and choked on their own blood before collapsing with their hands uselessly trying to stem the bleeding to their neck, that when she’d immediately broken down at the absolutely horrible image that reminded her of other horrible things that also never leave her memory, the people with her had been shocked: she was a good kid now, she was one of them…so how the fuck could she be so sensitive to “a little, easy job” like that?

They’d dragged her to the boss himself, told him of her disgrace even whilst she still couldn’t get the tears to stop because she was a bad, bad person now and it’d been so much blood and she’d done it on purpose—

…and all Silco’d done when they demanded he get rid of the dead weight was wave at them dismissively, saying something about them “ruining his floors” with all the gore on them and “wasting his time” with such trivial nonsense.

The people left and grumbled, and Jinx cried herself out like she’d done only in the silence of the night when she was certain he was asleep, and he didn’t say a word about any of it. She sat on the floor by his desk, huddled in a ball and shaking like an addict going through withdrawals, dreading the moment he finally decided she wasn’t worth all of this effort…and then, she'd woken up on the mattress he had set up in the corner of his bedroom in his apartment that’d been serving as her bed since she‘d started staying with him and life went on as if nothing had happened at all.

It took her three days to finally work up the courage to as him about it, with every instinct telling her not to because why ruin your own second-chance, right? (Jinx, Jinx, Jinx was a Jinx!), and he’d leveled her with a steady gaze before saying:

“Do you want to talk about it?”

And fuck, but she’d finally snapped like a metal beam with too big a load.

“Why? Why do we do all of these terrible things?! Why do we have to be so awful all the time?! What—what’s the point in your stupid Zaun or whatever if nobody’s around by the end to see it?!”

She’d felt bad for asking, then—and also very, very stupid, because no one talked to Silco like that and left alive—and all he did was raise an eyebrow at her before answering, his voice an infuriating calm that she had never been able to reach herself no matter how hard she tried.

“There will be people at the end of this road, Jinx—and we don’t kill without reason. The deaths, while tragic in their own right, are a necessary evil. It’s about respect, child.”

She shook her head, one hand coming up to her temple like she’s trying to stop the motion—or perhaps the words threatening to escape from her own traitorous lips.

“But why? Don’t the enforcers kill enough of us?” Hadn’t Jinx herself? Hadn’t Sevika, or the Doctor, or any of the chem barons, or Silco himself destroyed enough lives by now to inspire enough fear, or respect, or whatever the fuck else Silco wanted to call it?

When would it be enough?

He eyed her for a long moment, noticed her trembling and the way she couldn’t seem to hold his gaze for too long, the way it flickered about the room with seemingly no destination in mind. Eventually, he sighed, clasping his hands over his desk. “The more they fear us, child, the easier maintaining our control will be. We cannot put up a real resistance against Piltover’s subjugation without proper unification—and if a few brutal examples must be made so the rest of the undercity’s resistance will be snuffed out, then so be it.”

“But Vander didn’t hafta’ h-hurt anybody to keep the Lanes safe!” She’s treading dangerous waters, there—ones she didn’t really like wading through herself, considering what’d happened to the guy in question.

Silco merely scoffed. “You saw how his leadership,” he spat this word like a curse, but he eases up a bit after she flinches back from him, “turned out for him in the end, Jinx. All he really accomplished was carving out a small hole in the undercity, digging a grave for himself to die in while our people burned around him. Our dream—the original dream, the one the three of us sought out together before that sentimental fool lost his will to fight for it—was more than that. Can you imagine it, child—a world where no enforcer would dare step foot on our soil, an independent, self-governed nation free from the tyranny of those who would rather us starve to death on the scraps they feed us all while calling it privilege?”

He’d gestured around him, a light in his eyes appearing where normally only fatigue would be.

“That’s the world I want to create, Jinx. Once we accomplish that, all of this…unpleasantness will be a thing of the past.”

She’d stared at him for a moment, thinking she understood whilst not liking it all the same…but if it wouldn’t be forever…

Wait.

“’Three of us’?” she says, cocking her head.

Silco frowns, humming in thought. “He never told you…?” He shook his head after she remained silent, drumming his fingers on his desk before he pushed himself up. Jinx watched as he stood, watched as he made his way over to the safe she’d only ever seen him stick things in before (old things, bad things, stuff that made her remember the ghosts she’d sent to an early grave) and watched as he put in the code and, for the first time, taken something out.

It's a…photograph?

When he spun it around on the desk for her to see, she felt her jaw slacken at the sight of the people in it—Silco and dad Vander are in it, sure, but it’s the third person that caught her attention:

It’s her mother.

She’d know that face anywhere—it’d haunted her dreams for so long, that empty, vacant expression there the only way her brain had decided to remember how she looked at all—but here she’d looked…happy. Satisfied. Tired, maybe, but few people in the undercity weren’t.

“It was her dream, too,” he’d said, settling back in his seat as he watched her reaction with interest. “She’s actually the one who pushed us to continue with it all—what if the Zaun we all wanted to see could be more than just a simple safe-haven in the undercity, what if it could be the undercity? What if all of it could be safe, what if the children here didn’t have to feel inferior, to grow up wanting and sick and broken just because they were born on the wrong side of the bridge?” He’d fixed her with a look, then, and she’d finally stopped tracing mom’s face with her fingers, pausing in her rekindled memories long enough to really hear him. “She wanted that for you, Jinx—said Vander and I ‘weren’t allowed to fail anymore’.”

He trailed off, looking lost in his own thoughts as he glanced down at the photo on the desk with a sigh.

“Someone has to do something about the mess that topside has made of things, or they’ll wipe us out, grow fat and old whilst our children fight to survive. Don’t you want to be a part of that, too? Don’t you want to fix this?”

Jinx had looked at him then, had seen the sincerity in his eyes, had looked back at mom’s face, had remembered how those lively eyes looked staring up at nothing, how she’d fought just for them all to have a chance at a better life because she felt like she had to, because topside wouldn’t listen to anything else. She’d remembered dad—her first one and Vander, remembered how tired and beaten-down and broken they’d always been, remembered how that’s how all of the adults in her life seemed before she’d met Silco, how unhappy and sick and frail people became until they just…weren’t anymore because hunger or crime or disease eventually took them out…

She remembered how Vander used to tell them (well, he’d tell Vi) not to fight the topsiders, how it “wasn’t the way”, how he’d made that deal with their sheriff even as the world crumbled around them, remembers how he’d tried talking the more rebellious trenchers down when they wanted to storm the bridge again because the Pilties wanted the heads of Zaun’s children over an accident…

And for the first time since Silco’d taken her in, she felt her world shift. What if he was right? Yeah, it seriously sucked that all ‘a this was necessary, and it sucked that the Lanes had become like the rest of the undercity even after all that effort Vander’d spent keepin’ it safe…but Silco wanted to fix that—and not in the same shitty way Vander had, either.

What if they could all be safe from the enforcers? What if nobody had to remember their mom the same way Jinx had to—by waking up in a cold sweat screaming at that look on her face—because someone finally decided to fight back?

Alone, they wouldn’t stand a chance…but if Silco could bring ‘em together like he wanted…

The problem wasn’t Silco, it was topside.

She’d looked back at the picture again before pushing it back to him, a determined look on her face. She’d decided, then and there, that she’d done enough to disappoint her family in her stupid life…but maybe, if this is what mom’d wanted, too…maybe this could be enough—and if that meant she had to stop a few stupid trenchers from getting in their way, well, then she’d do it. Nobody was gonna mess this up, ‘cuz in the long-run, this would be good for everybody.

Jinx would make sure of it.

He’d asked if she wanted to keep the picture, but she’d told him no—that the next time she’d look at that photograph would be after they’d freed Zaun for good, and it’d made him so proud.

They really would show them all, with mom lookin’ down on them from above.

Isha came into her life not too long after that, and her presence only made her fight that much harder—now, she understood that fire that drove her mom and Silco to go to such extremes. How could you not, with somethin’ that small and precious staring into your soul like that?

Everything had gone pretty great since then, too—sure, it’s not always a cakewalk or nothin’, but Silco’d kept ‘em both safe enough until Jinx could do it for them, and she still has the occasional bug problem, but mostly, they don’t have to kill a ton of their own because people are too afraid of dad to fuck with them. Most of the fight now was of the type that didn’t actually involve any weapons at all: it’s a technology thing, a “the Pilties are on the cusp of creating weapons with the capacity for an ass-ton of destructive power” type of thing…and that, well.

That’s even more in Jinx’s wheelhouse than actually shootin’ people is—and she’s a damn good shot.

All she really has to do now to make her parents’ dream come true is go back to the workshop, finish that hextech-y gizmo thing that could (theoretically) blow a whole building off ‘a the map…

So why is she here, then, sitting in the rafters of their old arcade cleaning her gun?

It’s a question she’s got a few different, disappointing answers to…but they’re all kinda background noise to her one, more important question:

Where the hell is Vi?

Like, that note couldn’t ‘a meant someplace else, right?

There’re obvious signs someone’s been here recently: new-ish footprints through the dust-caked floor, some boxes that’d been moved from where she remembers ‘em being…but honestly, Jinx hasn’t been here in years, so those coulda just been from…

She shakes her head, almost grumbling at the thought. For some reason, she’d had this weird notion that if she had decided to stay away from this place, then he must have, too, but it’s not like she’s got any proof of that or nothin’.

She’d stay here for a bit longer, then call it quits: this is already against what dad’d wanted her to do—what she needs ta’ do, to accomplish their dream—so a big part of her doesn’t even wanna be here, anyways…but see, for a little bit after she’d finally admitted to herself that Vi really is still alive when Sevika’d hauled Isha off, she’d been…happy.

It's maybe not her usual, blowin’ stuff up, colorin’ with Isha, sleepin’ in the rafters while dad does his paperwork kinda happy—heck, it ain’t even her piss Sevika off, fix the heating in an old building, make a new bomb kinda happy—but despite all these shitty conflict-y feelings she keeps havin’, despite the boys and their voices and that tension that hasn’t left since her kid sister fired off that flare…it’d still been there.

So here she is, reattaching the barrel to the base of her pistol as she finishes wiping out the gunk that’d built up inside the chamber on her pants. She’s got her braids pooled in her lap just in case her seein’ her again makes Jinx want ta’ scram instead of talk, too, so as long as Vi doesn’t feel like starin’ the ceiling or anything, she should be good to go…assuming she even showed up at all.

Half of her wishes she won’t: ‘cuz then, she won’t need to face the spectre at all. She doesn’t think she’d be able to work up the nerve to pull this kinda behind-dad’s-back sorta stunt off again, so if she left without talking to her, Jinx had decided before even coming in here that they wouldn’t be talking at all.

As she finishes the clean-up job (as well as she can without a workbench, anyways), she almost resigns herself to do just that…’cept just as she’s moved to push herself offa’ the wooden beam, she hears her voice coming from outside the shattered stained-glass window and down the street…and to Jinx’s profound irritation, it ain’t just her’s, either.

“—on’t see why you feel the need to do this.”

Jinx’s eyes narrow at the accent accompanying the Piltie’s voice—the one from before, the enforcer Piltie too stupid to bring even a knife to the gun fight.

“She’s my sister, Cait,” comes her response—her voice, Vi’s voice, the one that haunted her nightmares, that egged her on whenever she faltered, that kept her moving when she faltered before she had Isha around to protect instead. Their footsteps draw closer, and the volume of their conversation increases as they get nearer the still-broken entrance to the arcade. “Wouldn’t you try to look for someone that’d gone missing in your family?”

There’s an uncertain, posh hum that follows, making Jinx turn towards the noise with a glare even though she can’t see them quite yet. “To my knowledge, no one in my family is a wanted criminal.”

She can practically hear the eyeroll in Vi’s voice as she answers, her boots finally passing over the broken glass entrance into their meeting place. “Sorry—I forgot that everyone topside is perfect like that.”

The Piltie sputters as Jinx raises an eyebrow as she processes Vi’s words. “Perfect? No, they’re not perfect, but they aren’t terrorists, either. Do you have any idea how many people she’s—”

She watches them stop in front of that small staircase that led to the old boxing game she’d helped him build a lifetime ago. Vi spins on the Piltie, gesturing emphatically with her big fat hands. Jinx watches her move, takes in the new tattoos that paint her arms and neck and one really stupid one on her face.

“No—and before you keep going, I don’t care, either: whatever she’s done, it’s all because that sick little fucker made her do it—she’s barely eighteen and she’s had to grow up in this shithole with no one around to protect her because some dipshit threw me in prison. That’d fuck anyone up.”

The topsider huffs a laugh, but it’s not the that was funny kind, it’s the that was fucking stupid kind that dad used right before he ordered her to shoot someone who’d disrespected him in his office.

She did more than just sleep in those rafters.

“She didn’t look very forced into anything when she pulled that gun on you.”

Vi rolls her eyes—Jinx actually gets to see it, this time—before shaking her head. “She didn’t shoot me—and she wasn’t going to, either,” wow, she’s more confident in that than Jinx had been, “she didn’t even shoot you.”

The topsider’s gaze hardens at that. “She blew up a building, Vi—it killed six people.”

“Six enforcers,” Vi corrects.

Huh. Did she just conveniently forget who she’s traveling with, or…?

The Piltie blanches, and Jinx glances at the pistol in her hand, her finger inching towards the trigger. “They’re still people, Violet! Have I not—”

When the Piltie cuts off, Jinx shifts her gaze back down again and locks eyes with her, offering her a small little wave even as she curses her own luck. She’d planned on just waiting this out as soon as she’d discovered Vi wasn’t alone, but it seems the jig is up.

Oops.

“You!”

“Powder!”

Two very different responses to her presence she finds equally unwanted in their own special ways.

She lets her glare fall on Vi when that old name slips outta her mouth, and the lady’s face falls when she sees it even as the enforcer tenses up—probably thinks Jinx is ‘bout ta’ kill ‘em or something.

“You got bad memory, or are you trying ta’ piss me off?”

Vi blinks at that, the hurt fading into something more confused-like. Jinx rolls her eyes and continues on, resolving to speed this along.

“I told you not to call me that…but more importantly, I said I’d find you…and to ditch the Piltie,” she adds, eyeing the enforcer with no small amount of disdain. To her credit, the lady doesn’t back down or nothin’, even if she looks a little paler than she had on the rooftop. ‘Course, that could just be from bein’ in the undercity, though.

“You still came,” Vi replies, sounding half blunt and half in shock—like she hadn’t believed Jinx’d actually show.

That’s fair, though, because Jinx had only half believed that herself.

She rolls one of her shoulders, making the Piltie eye her warily even as she speaks. “Only ‘cuz I didn’t know that…and because I figured I’d warn you not to do that again.”

Vi’s face scrunches up at that and Jinx snorts, cutting the pink-haired woman off before she can say anything. “You got any idea what woulda happened to Jericho had the wrong person got ahold ‘a this?”

She slips the paper out of her bracer and releases it, letting it slowly fall to the floor. A look of understanding passes across Vi’s face even as the Piltie answers herself.

“…you’re not the wrong person?”

Jinx glares at her without responding, shifting her gaze back to Vi before she continues .

“Why is she still with you?”

“I told you, P—uh, she let me out of pris—”

“No, see, I got that part,” Jinx cuts her off with a little wave, “the part that I’m having trouble with is why you’re still with her—why didn’t you just ditch her after that, or, I dunno, kill her and toss her body over the bridge on the way here?”

The enforcer tenses, and Jinx doesn’t even glance her way.

“I…,” Vi falters, glancing at the Piltie with poorly concealed unease. Jinx’s eyes narrow.

“See what I mean? Do you just, like, want help or something? Cuz I could totally—”

“No!” Vi’s answer is frantic, quick. Too quick.

Jinx stares in silence, raising a single impatient eyebrow as she waits, somehow knowing that she won’t like whatever answer she ends up getting here…

“She saved my life.”

…and yet even knowing that, it still comes as a shock to her.

“What.”

She waits. Vi explains (apparently, dad already had tried to take care of this just like he’d said…just, he’d done it before that flare had even gone off), and suddenly the Piltie’s lack of a rifle didn’t seem as stupid as it just had. Vi, on the other hand…ugh! Who’d be stupid enough to challenge Sevika to a brawl in the middle of the street like that?!

Why did Jinx even care?

They both watch her after that, but it makes the conflict churning around in her head start going so quickly that her thoughts become butter: slippery, ungraspable, and freely sliding around in her screwed-up head.

That’s prolly why it takes a little longer than it maybe should for her to realize Vi’s trying to get her attention.

“Hey!” She blinks, looking back to them again as Vi calls out to her in exasperation. The lady sighs, a half-smile on her face that didn’t really touch her eyes. Instead, she looks worried for reasons Jinx doesn’t really get…’least, not ‘til she starts yapping at her, anyways.

“Were you gonna come down so we can chat, or…?”

There’s something there, a hope, maybe, hidden under all that familiarity she kept accidentally flaunting about, and Jinx crushes it under heel just like she did everything else…accident or no.

“I’ll…stay up here, thanks,” she replies, forcing her voice to remain casual even as her eyes narrow, flickering between them both before they resettle on Vi.

She looks disappointed, but also not really surprised, and Jinx doesn’t get a whole lotta time to think about that before Vi’s talking again.

“Ok,” she raises her hands in mock defeat, apparently trying to lighten the mood before she goes ok, “so…what’s up?”

Jinx raises an eyebrow at that, her expression unfortunately but justifiably mimicking that of the Piltie’s as she stares. Vi opens and shuts her mouth a couple of times, swallowing nervously before speaking again.

“Fuck, sorry, I don’t…I just—are you OK? Last time we talked you didn’t seem…,” she runs a hand through her hair, the other one curling and uncurling at her side.

Jinx considers that, keeping her expression blank. “Did you seriously leave that note so we could have some small-talk?”

Vi’s shaking her head before she even finishes her question, the expression on her face oddly serious. “No, I really wanna know: is he—are they hurting you, or forcing you into anything? Are you OK?”

Jinx shrugs, her hand not wrapped around Zapper’s grip spreading with the motion. “Fine as I always am, I guess.”

It's…well, it’s not that much of a lie, but it’s also not that much of a truth, either…

Vi doesn’t look convinced, biting her lip again as her eyebrows furrow. “And the rest of it?”

She watches her expressionlessly from where she sits perched above her, trying to decide how she wanted to answer. Finally, she tilts her head, deciding just to bite the bullet and get the hard part over with—and about 80% of it’s ‘cuz she needs to see Vi’s reaction to it.

“You seem a little confused, here, so let me clear this up for you: no one’s ever forced me to do jack-diddly-squat here. Everything I do, I decide to do on my own—heck, I even make some of the plans myself,” she eyes her carefully, not oblivious to the way the Piltie’s eyes narrow at her response, “so all that bein’ said, what are you wantin’ outta this, here?” She points at her as she speaks, watching for any changes in her expression.

“I…what do you mean?” The way she says it…it’s like her answer should be obvious to her—like any of this was simple or predictable in any way.

Vi’s whole reverse magician act had really got her going, got her thinking about things she didn’t usually like thinking about, had made the stupid boys even louder and her stupid mood swings even worse because of it...but she can’t exactly just say all of that to this lady who might not even really be on her side (despite how it seems), so instead of letting her continue when Vi opens her trap again, Jinx cuts her off with a question of her own.

“Are you staying, now?”

It’s not really how she’d wanted to ask it, but it’d have to do—her tongue keeps knotting at the words she actually wants to say, making her sound more petulant than she’d like to seem.

Vi blinks up at her, and the Piltie shifts her weight from foot to foot.

“I’m not going anywhere, Po—,” she cuts herself off when she catches the hard look Jinx shoots her at that, “not without you.”

Ah, there’s the loophole—the kicker, the fine print, the catch.

“So…do you want me to talk to him, then?”

Vi stares at her uncomprehendingly, and Jinx huffs a mirthless laugh as she continues. “…you don’t know what I mean, do you?”

Vi shakes her head, and Jinx watches as some tiny bit of understanding finally creeps into her expression. “No…what are you—”

“You said you’re on my side, remember?” Jinx muses, idly tapping Zapper against her knee as she watches them with a hawkish focus, “Well, I work for Silco.”

The reaction—the shock and the hurt and just a touch of that anger she’d been missing since this whole talk started—is instantaneous after that. It’s like Vi knew what she’d been getting at but hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it until she’d semi-spelled it out for her.

“Pow…,” she breathes, her voice quavering with emotion even as she ignores Jinx’s look of warning. The Piltie next to her stands stock-still, like she didn’t know how Vi would answer.

That made two of them…kinda. You know, she’s hoping for a particular response, but she’s not naïve enough to actually expect it.

Still, this was the reason, she’s beginning to realize, that Jinx had come out here tonight instead of going back to the workshop. She might sorta know how this is gonna shake out, but…

She needs to hear her say it—

Vi shakes her head, her face softening as if that could ever soften the words that fall from her lips like blows from her fists. “Oh Powder, what did he do to you?”

Jinx watches her for a moment, but she doesn’t cut in. She merely waits—had seen Silco utilize silence like this when he thought someone was hiding something from him, and if she’s gonna hear her out, she’d rather hear it straight.

Can’t really afford any misunderstandings, here…even if it might tear a little piece of her out to listen to it.

“You don’t need to work for him anymore, Pow—it’s ok,” she says, her arms slack by her side. Jinx waits, her eyes tracing new scars on her arms so thin she can only see them because of the light Vi stands under. She notices, in a detached sort've way, that someone had inked through one of them—a long, faint one near the curve of her neck—with whatever picture the lady’d had etched onto herself in Stillwater. She’s getting impatient, but she doesn’t let it show.

In the back of her mind, she tries to remember if mom had any tattoos and finds she can’t, doesn’t really know how that makes her feel, either.

Vi bites her lip, her fingers twitching at her side. When she finally speaks, her voice is the quietest Jinx’s heard it since she’d heard her speak back in that basement, back when she’d given her that flare.

“I can’t.”

Jinx nods, that void growing in her chest…but in a way, even though that part of her that’d been slowly breaking away from the rest of herself finally cracks, it’s…

Freeing.

Her lip twitches up into a smile, and the Piltie must read something that frankly just isn’t there as she backs up a step, chivalrously tugging Vi with her as she watches Jinx with wary, but unafraid eyes.

Jinx pushes herself into a crouching position, eyeing her pistol for a second before abruptly shoving herself off of the rafters, straightening as her feet hit the dusty wooden floor below…and to apparently both of her guests’ surprise(s?), she holsters Zapper and turns away, starting back towards the broken entryway to the arcade.

“Powder?”

“Just what is it that you’re doing?”

Ugh, she hates that accent.

Haha.

Ha…

Jinx doesn’t answer either of them (I mean, isn’t it pretty obvious what she’s doing?), intent on not dragging this out too much…’cept Vi isn’t having any of it.

She has to spin on her heel and jump back when that muscl-y hand almost nabs her by the wrist. She might be ok with ending things here (she is, right?), but that didn’t mean she wanted to play around like that, either.

Best for both of them if this didn’t drag out too far, she thinks.

She looks Vi over, keeping her face bored-like even though it’s not even close to how she actually feels…not that she could have told you what that even is, if you asked her.

Just that it’s not bored.

“I—he killed our family, Pow,” there’s that tremor in her voice again, oscillating like a pendulum. Little Man had one of those, once.

She nearly shakes her head at the thought, can’t tell if it’s her head’s way of distractin’ her or just somethin’ she’s remembering ‘cuz of where she’s at. Whatever it is, it needed to wait for a time that’s not now. Vi watches her closely, visibly struggling not to come any closer than she already is.

Just a few steps away, and yet still so far out of reach.

“No—I did that, ‘member?” Her voice isn’t angry like it maybe should be—she gets to be mad about this, right?

Right…?

It’s funny, then, that she doesn’t feel real mad.

Maybe she’s just gotta try harder?

Is that how that’s supposed to work?

She closes her eyes at his voice, a hand twitching up to her head as he speaks right next to her ear. Was that really necessary?!

You should leave—what if she gets mad again?

Oh boy. His panic’s starting to make her panic, and that’s…she just doesn’t have the energy for alla’ that right now. Not after earlier, with the gem and the light and her real sister—

She flinches hard when Vi steps towards her, a wave of dizziness crashing into her frame at the same time as the lady moves, making her sway even as she backs up, nearly tripping over that stupid staircase. The Piltie’s staring again, but she can’t focus on that because the room’s spinnin’ just a bit and maybe the wooziness got a little worse than she’d thought, because something’s wrapped around her wrist a second later and it takes her longer than she’d care to admit to realize that it ain’t, like, a handcuff or nothin’.

Vi holds on to her arm, the muscles along her palish skin (not as much as Jinx’s, not as much as they used to be) tensing like she’s carrying somethin’ heavy—

Oh. Maybe she should, like, not lean on her so much. Or get more than like an hour or two of sleep.

…yeah, now that she’s thinkin’ ‘bout it, that mighta helped.

“That wasn’t your fault,” Vi says, and Jinx has to blink a few times to actually understand what she’s sayin’. Still, a part of her musta’ been listening after all, because she answers all the same, her voice more mechanical than mean.

“Really? That ain’t what you seemed to think back then.”

Oof. It’s hollow even to her own ears, an empty thump kinda like when you hit an unfilled barrel.

Hah. She likes that noise…

Something’s up here, she thinks, but it also doesn’t really feel like it’s her problem, but then also that thought feels wrong, too. She tries to focus on that grip on her wrist (it’s more than just her wrist, actually, the wraps on Vi’s hand tickiling her own skin just like…)—

Her eyes flicker back to that note, the stupid little Yordle smiling up at her from the ground, a few bits of dust clinging to the edges.

”You know where I’ll be.”

Hah. Hahaha…she will?

No, no. Vi had been in hell, Vi had been gone, Vi had been dead and Vi sure as hell hadn’t been here.

Jinx would know.

She’d looked everywhere, always trying to apologize even though dad said she had no reason to, always slipping off, slinking away from dad before she’d allowed herself to call him that, before she’d even known that’s who he was…

Before he’d told her about the body.

He’s apologized. He looked like he really felt bad.

She hadn’t wanted to believe him, then—why would Vi go topside of all places? Who’d be strong enough to bring someone as tough as her down? She was invincible.

And yet…

”You know where I’ll be.”

…here she is, really, actually here and with a topsider, with an enforcer, refusing to come be with her again.

Someone’s calling out to her, down a tunnel or a street—somewhere far, far away. It’s fine. It’s not her problem. It’s…

How far off was he, really?

He lied.

But did he?

She shakes her head, dully kinda coming back to her senses—but when the mean one speaks up again, in her head and yet also not, it sends a jolt down her spine that flings her back into herself for real, and it all comes crashing back.

Told you she wouldn’t want you.

Yes, this is actually happening. Yes, Vi is here.

And yes, she’s really choosing not to come with her.

So what the fuck is she still doing here?!

“What do you want from me?!” she finally asks, fed up with all of the horseshit talking and stalling and stopping that keeps goin’ on. “You can’t just ask me to drop everything and leave with you—I can’t do that, Vi. I won’t. It’s not fair. You don’t get to be picky with how we stay together—not when I’m not the one who tore us apart.”

Ah. There’s the anger.

“That wasn’t—the enforcers are the ones who did that, not me, I wasn’t going to—"

“No one made you walk away, Vi. You did that all on your own.”

“Can you really blame me for needing a minute to cool off?!”

And there’s Vi’s again.

“No,” the calm in her voice surprises even herself, and Vi startles, looking back at her in disbelief as she continues. “But you should have taken it later.”

“Rich of you to go on about what’s ‘fair’, then,” Vi says, her eyes widening at the volume of her own voice as she dials it back some, the regret there just barely scratching the fucking surface of Jinx’s own. “I was worried I was going to hurt you, Po—‘”

Jinx scoffs, pulling out of her grasp…or, well, she tries to: Janna, what did they feed her in prison?! She scowls at her when she doesn’t let go. “Oh, you were worried I’d get hurt, huh? Did it never occur to you what the underground crime lord might do to the eleven year old if he got to her first?!”

Yeah, the calm was maybe a little short lived.

Vi winces (musta’ struck a nerve…go figure) and she cuts Jinx off before she can continue. “No—not until I saw him standing over you,” she admits, looking more ashamed than Jinx had expected she would. Honestly, the fact that she’s owning up to any of this at all is throwing Jinx for a real fucking loop. “I tried to run back to you—but that enforcer got to me first and—but you’re right. You’re right and I’m so sorry, Pow,” there’s an actual tear traveling down her cheek, then, and Jinx thinks her eyes have gone wide as saucers at this point.

Why had she come here, again? This isn’t making her happy, it’s not making Vi happy…it’s not even making the Piltie happy, the lady watching in shocked silence.

‘Least they had that in common.

She doesn’t know what to say, anymore, and she’d planned on saying nothing…just, her brain apparently didn’t agree with that plan, because words are tumbling out of her mouth before she knows she’s even still talking.

“You should have brought me with you,” her mouth says without her cooperation, the heat long gone from her tone. “Not because I could have helped or anything—I mean, we both saw how that went,” Vi bites her lip and Jinx only continues despite her trying very much not to. “Just, he sent people to the bar, you know?” Vi’s freezes, her eyes widening in realization. “I didn’t know ‘til…’til after,” she adds, begging herself to shut the fuck up already, “he kinda let it slip once in passing a few months later; he wanted to make sure we all…,” she sighs, her shoulders drooping a bit at the memory, “I was already gone by the time they got there, anyways…I don’t even know why I’m telling you this,” her voice is quieter, now, and it sorta feels like it’s not really her that’s talking anymore.

Vi’s hand tightens around her shoulder (when had it moved?) as she pulls her into an embrace. It feels wrong, somehow—like she’s betraying dad just by being here, like she should pull away or shoot them both or something—but luckily for her, this is when the Piltie finally remembers she had a mouth and decides to cut in, and her words help snap Jinx back into herself once more.

“What happened to that child you had with you—the one on the rooftop?”

She freezes and Vi tenses, too, her arms tightening around her so Jinx can’t immediately pull away like she wants to. Instead, she narrows her eyes at the enforcer, her glare hot enough to melt steel as she locks eyes with the woman over Vi’s shoulder.

“Would you knock it off already?!” Jinx snarls, the real, actually dangerous kinda anger starting to make her more aware of her surroundings even as Vi pulls her in closer.

“Please don’t leave again, Pow.”

She freezes, all of her muscles tensing—

"I never did."

—and then she whips out her gun, hitting Vi in the stomach right where she’d seen that big ‘ol fresh-lookin’ scar.

The one that dad put there.

Predictably, she staggers back and the Piltie bravely (stupidly) steps in front of her crumpled form even as Jinx trains the pistol at her head.

Would this make her choice easier?

She doesn’t want you.

She made her choice.

It’d only take one shot…

Enough!

She bites her own lip, eyeing the Piltie with as much anger and hostility as she can muster—which, at this moment, is a whole fucking lot. The enforcer only keeps her arms raised, a thin looking frown on her face as she blocks Vi out with her own form.

“Jinx, listen to me,” she starts, her voice calm and quiet and infuriating because—because her being here and knowing about Isha is really messing with her head she should just kill her already— “if you cooperate with me, I can help you—work out a deal, get you help, keep you and that child with you safe.”

Jinx tilts her head, her expression taking a turn (‘least, judgin’ by the topsider’s own face, anyways). Safe? Safe?!

“Yeah, I was doin’ just fine before you showed up here, thanks—and before you keep goin’, you should prolly know that unlike her,” she spits, nodding sharply in Vi’s direction as her glare sharpens, “I ain’t a fucking idiot: you didn’t break her out outta the goodness in your stupid, shriveled little Piltie heart—and you sure as hell didn’t do it to help her find me,” she hisses, her voice getting quicker and hands getting more twitchy as she keeps it goin’. “You want somethin’, and I ain’t in a real giving fucking mood.”

Her words make something flash across Vi’s face, but Jinx isn’t really paying attention to her at the moment, her eyes trained instead on Little Miss Perfect here to solve her stupid Piltie crimes so the fat pigs across the bridge don’t have to buy a fourth lock for their front door.

“Jinx,” the lady continues, either oblivious or uncaring of the way her voice is making her trigger finger itch, “I’m trying to stop a war. If we let tensions continue to escalate like this, then your people will be massacred. I want to help you—I want to help mend this rift between our homes before it can no longer be fixed—but I can’t do that unless—”

Jinx cuts her off with her laughter—normal at first, but it quickly grows erratic, even to her own ears. Dad says that’s OK, though: adds to the fear, really helps sell it. And when she abruptly cuts off, a tear dripping down her cheek from the oxygen deprivation all that fucking humor had caused within her and she stares back with her favorite, cold look, the Piltie finally looks afraid.

“I hate you.”

It’s simple, calm, and true—and for whatever reason, it seems to surprise both of the women before her. That’s fine, too, means she can just keep going, get it all out there.

She’d so hate for there to be any misunderstandings.

“The only reason you’re down here—that you’re suddenly pretending like you give a shit about what happens to anyone in the undercity—is because I forced you to care. You didn’t just magically grow a conscience, Piltie—you’re here because I stole something that you value more than the lives of every single trencher in the whole ‘a Zaun,” her face scrunches up at that word, but Jinx doesn’t bother explaining: she’ll get it soon enough—they all will. “So you can fuck right off with this high ‘an mighty bullshit act of yours—‘cuz I got a bit of a secret for you,” she looks from side to side conspiratorially, laughing when, as she brings her free hand up to cup around her mouth, they both flinch away, “I don’t care about stopping this war; the second it stops, you’ll all just go right back to pretending we don’t exist, say it's fixed even while we starve and wither and burn. Now, why don't you go ahead and do what Pilties do best and get the fuck out of my city.”

The enforcer stares at her in shock—she’s still a little freaked out, Jinx can tell—but mostly, she just seems…well, put-in-her-place, she guesses.

Good. Made the next part easier.

Jinx lets her face fall back to its steely, blank one she liked so much and turns to leave again, not stopping even as they both try ‘an call out to her…’cept, then the Piltie says something that gets her to pause:

“—swear on the Kiramman name that—”

Jinx falters, absentmindedly repeating it to herself as she considers the word in her head—where the heck had she heard that before?

When she hears Vi start movin’ behind her, she shakes herself out of it and takes off, ignoring the increasingly desperate way that Vi calls out the name of a dead kid, of a person that had ceased to exist the second Vi’d turned her back on her in that alley, her blood dripping off of those wrapped knuckles. Soon enough, she's lying on a rooftop, staring up at the smog where the stars might be if they could afford to shut the factories down for more than a few hours every week.

Hah.

Hahahaha!

She did it. She did it!

Now, whatever happens, it’s not her fault. It didn’t matter if dad took care of it anymore—Jinx’d given her a chance, which is a fuck of a lot more than Vi’d given her, all those years ago. For once in her life, this wouldn’t be on her, and it’s fucking amazing!

Finally, finally, she can let Powder die.

Her and dad and Isha, all of ‘em were gonna see this shit through, change the world—their world—and then?

Then, finally, it will be enough.

Chapter Text

She doesn’t waste any more time after the meeting, heading back to the workshop as fast as her legs can carry her.

Then she works.

And works.

And works.

No one’s stupid enough to bother her right now either (not that many people really know where their workshop is, anyways), so she has absolutely no idea how much time passes by, only that her eyes are red and bloodshot and her movements more jittery than they are even on her worst days—the days the boys won’t leave her alone, where the mean one picks on her and neither dad nor Isha are around for her to hold onto, to help remind her of where she is, of who she is.

That everything was OK.

Kinda pathetic you need a kid to make everything better, isn’t it, Pow?

“No, no no! You don’t get to call me that—”

Hah! Why not? You let Vi call you that.

Her face twitches and she shakes her head. Just gonna ignore him. That’s it.

Oh really? An’ how’s that working for ya?

So that last rune didn’t work…maybe she should try this one—

Really? I like the one on the next page, personally—looks a lot better up close, though, plus I know it works.

She sets her jaw, closing her eyes because she already knows where this is going—

You do too, remember Pow, his voice gets louder, meaner, grate-ier, After all, we were your trial run: just copied that little picture you remembered from that heist workshop we robbed.

She’s vaguely aware she’s sitting, or kneeling—her knees hit the metal below where she’d been standing and she grips her ears, desperately trying to shut him out—

Aw, come on, he taunts, his smile sharp and cutting despite the fact that she can’t even see it with her eyes screwed shut like they are, don’t be like that—it won’t even matter what runes you pick: you’ll fuck it up anyways.

She’s shaking, her forehead’s presses to the floor. This was a stupid idea—why couldn’t she have stolen, like, anything else?! Why the stupid rock?!

Stupid Pilties, not letting go of their stupid hextech or whatever the fuck this was called…she wouldn’t have had to nab this if they hadn’t scared dad so much, if she hadn’t freaked out at that stupid Firelight—

Stop blaming others for your fuck ups, Powder.

Something’s digging into her forehead, now, and she can’t open her eyes to see what or else he’ll be there and that laughing is hurting her ears and—

Hey, if you’re not sure of which one to draw next, just go fetch that kid you like so much, her eyes fly open at that, a fear shooting through her core like a bolt of electricity, making her bit her lip so hard it bleeds.

What is it those topsiders always like to say? ‘Practice makes perfect’?

They flicker in and out of her peripherals and she clasps her hands tighter behind her neck.

Wouldn’t want to kill the wrong family, right?

Jinx takes a breath. Lets Silco’s words play on repeat in her mind. Nothing’s there, Jinx, she pushes herself to one knee, takes another breath. You haven’t done anything wrong, she places her hands on her leg and pushes herself up. Isha’s safe, sleeping in the other room, she laughs to herself since it’s not really true at the moment, but she’ll take what she can get right now.

She wipes an arm across her face before making her way back to the workbench. A half-finished game of…chess(?) still sits where they’d left it, a few of the pieces knocked on their sides from the gem’s stupid instability. She moves to right one, only to find it’s been broken into two, the horse’s pink head severed from its body thanks to, presumably, a bolt of pure blue light that’d shot from her last attempt at shrinking this fucking gem-holder thing.

She stares at it, more than a little unnerved to see that bite mark from a long, long time ago had been separated from the rest of the horse…

It…makes something uncomfortable pass through her, goosebumps rising up to the surface if her skin and she pulls back from the piece like it’d burnt her—

Except in reality, she’d burnt it.

Aw, what’s wrong, Pow? She shoots at his stupid doll in the corner and he only gets louder. It wasn’t on purpose, right?

He chuckles at his own joke—one she didn’t find funny at all before he leans in, making her shiver as his loud words reverberate throughout her skull like cathedral bells after a funeral:

It never is with you, is it?

She runs a hand through her hair, letting her fingers spread in her bangs as she turns towards the machine she’d been fiddling with, ignoring his voice entirely as she slips Claggor’s goggles back over her eyes. She had to finish this soon—dad’s counting on her and…and she can’t bring Isha back in here with this thing anywhere near her.

She can replace a game piece…but she can’t replace a kid.

You sure about that?

She picks up her crescent wrench, loosening a bolt near the center of the stand mechanically as she lets his words pass by her to go haunt someone else.

You already did with Vi.

She slides one of the brackets up the metal arm, confining the rock to a smaller box before she flips the switch to turn it on again. It rattles the table, forcing her to duck as it shoots out into the air once again and—for what must be the hundredth time in the past hour—it shuts itself off, the gem making a little clack as it settles back into place.

Jinx shakes her head, flipping through the Pilties’ notes for something actually useful, but the problem with Pilties is that they didn’t usually do much stuff with weapons, so it’s all just…

Hold on. What the heck is that?

As she pours over the page, a little grin starts forming on her face—it’s just a stupid little section about some dumb claw thing or whatever—because in the margins closest to the book’s binding, there’s a quick little note scribbled that Jinx hadn’t seen when she’d skimmed this all earlier:

”Remember to scale up Rune A21 proportionally to B36 on the Z axis—must lie perpendicular to each or system failsafe will activate!!!”

“Failsafe, huh?” she chews her lip, accidentally reopening the wound there as she thinks. That’s fine: that metallic taste helps her think…and reminds her to maybe go find something to eat after this. Settling in her desk chair, she raps her knuckles on the wooden surface, humming in thought. “’S that why it keeps shutting off?”

Maybe she’s thinkin’ about this the wrong way—maybe it’s not her downsizing that’s the problem, here. Maybe it’s a quality of the rock…and if that’s true…

She cracks her knuckles, flipping back a few pages to the list of runes so she can scribe the one onto her stand, scribbling the stupid math on the blank space on the bottom so she knows exactly where it’ll have to go.

When it’s all set and done, and the stupid little tear-drop like rune is etched onto the stand, she flips the switch and ducks, too in the zone to hear Mylo’s jeering or Clag’s panic. Just as before, the beam of light shoots and crackles into the air, and she watches through squinted eyes as it fades just as before…only this time, nothin’ shuts off and as she looks around her, rings of blue, zappy energy in all sortsa shapes float around her, the gem humming with energy now that it’d been turned on properly.

She spins around in her chair, takin’ it all in with a grin before she reaches up and unchained Fishbones from his hangin’ place before she slaps the stand into that spot she’d carved into the back of it, listening excitedly as the hum makes his eyes sparkle with energy.

Oh, dad’s gonna fucking flip!

She slides the cover over it to hold it in place, slightly annoyed when she can’t find her tiny screwdriver to tighten the tiny pieces meant to keep the cover attached to the back on. It’s not like the little gem holdy-stabilizy stand would pop out if it were exposed or something…but the gem might, and that would be sorta bad if she was gonna fire this baby off. Her thoughts absentmindedly wander to earlier, when Isha was helping her with this part…with the tiny tool in her tiny hands…before she’d tucked it into a tiny pocket. Oof. Maybe the cover doesn’t need to be tightened?

Jinx swings it off the bench, smiling wide as she clips it to her back—

Clink!

—and then immediately frowns as cover falls to the floor and the gem pops out the side, rolling across the propeller before it stops in front of her.

“Well…shoot,” she murmurs, scratching her head with one hand as she thinks. She didn’t have a lotta space to work with back there, so trying to use anything else to keep it on wouldn’t work too good. She could try and design something else, but it'd take time, and frankly, she just wants to be done with alla’ this. Her shoulders slump in the annoying realization that the fastest way to fix this little issue would just be to go grab the tool from her sister.

Jinx huffs, setting the rock back inside of Fishobones before tying a bit of rope around the cover to keep the damn thing in place—she does not feel like running almost the way back her just to tighten a few itty bitty bolts. She’ll bring it right to dad after, and then her and her sister will lie low for a while, and then that’ll be that.

“OK, kid,” she starts, tucking Zapper in its holster as she heads for the exit, Fishbones securely slung over her back, “time to finish this up.”

It doesn’t take too long to get to Sevika’s—lady lived way out in bumblefuck for some reason, but she’s quicker than most people, so within a half an hour or so, she’s swinging herself up the fire escape, bein’ as quiet as she possibly can with the big lump ‘a metal slung across her back like it is.

She pries open the lock on the window with her knife, pulling the glass pane up so she can slide inside the lady’s living room all quiet-like—

And then she’s knocked backwards by a little blob of kid, nearly makin’ her laugh as tiny arm wrap around her.

It eases her nerves a bit, seein’ her ok like this. It’s not that she doubted Sevika or nothin’, but she’s had a weird couple ‘a days, and part of her kinda felt like if she let the rugrat outta her sight, somethin’ bad would happen to her—

It’s funny, considering she’s prolly safer with anyone else, huh?

She sets her jaw, stiffening a bit at his voice. Isha looks up at her curiously, cocking her head when Jinx forces a too-fake smile. She’d maybe be a bit more convincing if she had some more sleep to work with, but she doesn’t, so this is just gonna have ta’ do, she thinks.

“Hey, kid—you still got that screwdriver?”

Isha blinks, rubbing at her eyes sleepily. She nearly rolls her eyes—here the kid is, with eyebags so deep ‘a purple she wouldn’t mind painting with ‘em, and she still refused to sleep until she saw Jinx again. Stupid kid…

Her smile becomes a little more real and eventually, Isha’s hand clumsily digs into her pocket and produces the most beautiful thing her sleep-deprived eyes think they’ve ever seen:

The tool.

“Heh,” she ruffles the kid’s curls, and Isha huffs at her as Jinx whips Fishbones off ‘a its sling, fixing it right then and there. Isha’s face lights up at the same time Fishbones’ does as she pops the gem in place and screws the panel on for good. The three of ‘em share a grin, and Jinx pats her sister’s shoulder before climbing out to the stairwell again—

Or at least, she tries to—the kid stops her before she gets too far, clinging to her pant leg with a hurt look on her face.

Jinx frowns, turning back to face her once more.

“What’s up, pepperbox?” she asks, already kinda havin’ an idea of the problem but not really liking it, either. It’d be better—safer—if the kid stayed here.

”Can I come?”

Damn. She was really hopin’ it’d be somethin’ else.

Jinx scratches her neck and Isha dials up the puppy dog eyes, her hands already flashin’ away even before Jinx can open her trap.

”I wanna be useful, too.”

Ouch. Ok. Uh….

She falters, chewing on her lip as she thinks it over. It’d probably be more dangerous out there, but if she’s with Jinx…

“I dunno, kid,” she says, toning down her sincerity when she sees the hurt grow, “I mean, it’d prolly put Sevika in a mood…”

She pretends like she’s reconsidering her own statement and Isha raises a playful eyebrow. They exchange a grin and she kneels down by her side, laughing at the way the girl struggles to share her limited back space with a weapon almost as tall as she is.

“Heh. Well, c’mon then,” she whispers, glancing at her over her shoulder even as a unique, scary kinda dread settles in her gut. “Let’s go bring this to dad.”

You shoulda left her here, Jinx, he cuts in, his voice playful and sinister at the same time:

No one’s safer with you.

They make it to the Last Drop a while after that, and Jinx is pretty proud to say she’s only kinda slowed down by the pipsqueak weighing her down.

Heck, that could just be from the exhaustion, honestly.

It’s pretty late at this point, but she don’t pay it any mind as she pushes herself into the still-suspiciously quiet bar.

At least she had an idea of why now, though.

She winks at Chuck on her way up the stairs, and Isha gives him the stink eye when he turns his back on ‘em, his hands movin’ just a bit faster to clean the mug he’s got.

She doesn’t bother knocking—that’s for his people, and they’re his kids—before she pulls the door open, letting it swing shut behind her as she saunters over to the desk where he’s turned around in his chair, probably trying to look menacing or somethin’.

Jinx thinks that’s sorta funny: if he really wanted to look scarier, he should just, like, use a different eyeshadow, maybe not cover so much ‘a that scar.

She lets the kid down, ignoring the way he sighs as she shrugs the blaster off ‘a her back, excited to show him its glow-y face…though it’s not like he’s turned around to see it or nothin’.

“Jinx, I thought I told you to work on the weapon,” he says, finally spinning in place as she and Isha settle on the desk. “And is that Isha I he—”

He cuts himself off, his eyes widening as he takes Fishbones in in all of his glory, not bothering to say much ‘bout the way she’d waggled her eyebrows at his reaction.

He’s silent for quite awhile ‘fore he says anything, and his mouth splits into a small smile before he glances up at her.

“I take it you’ve completed it, then?” He says, lookin’ like he already knows the answer. That’s ok, though—she’d worked real hard for this part, so she doesn’t mind basking in it…just had to get one little, pipsqueak-sized detail ironed out first.

“Actually, she did—had to go fetch her before I could finish it, ya’ know?”

Isha looks up at her from her side, and Jinx subtly bumps into her. It was a team effort, and Jinx is a team player…eh, when she wants to be, anyways.

And she’d always want that with Isha.

“Hmph,” he brushes his hand down the side of Fishbones fishy-face, lookin’ so lost in thought that she can’t even tell if he bought that or not. “Sevika won’t be pleased to wake up to an empty couch…,” he eyes her knowingly and she pretends to look guilty, makin’ the kid next to her huff a laugh that she tries to pass off as a cough, “nor any broken locks that I’m sure you left behind.”

Well, in her defense, she hadn’t actually broken it this time…just, Sevika prolly wouldn’t care about that, considerin’ the whole missing kid thing.

“But I suppose you’ve accomplished what Piltover thought us incapable of, and that’s an achievement all on its own,” she smiles despite a part ‘a her not really likin’ the way he’d said that…luckily, Isha doesn’t seem to notice the way he hadn’t really included her in that statement.

He waves her off, brushing the dust they’d stirred up (stirred up, brought in on their dirty ass boots, what’s the difference?) as Jinx and the kid hop off the desk, returning to his paperwork.

“Go home. Get some rest…but drop Isha off on your way,” she frowns, not understanding where she’d gone wrong here (‘specially ‘cuz his apartment wasn’t really on the way back, bein’ on the opposite side of the Lanes)—but he takes one look at her face and starts explaining before she can even ask. “Tomorrow will inevitably be a rather busy day now that we have a tangible bargaining chip, and I don’t need my second in command distracted trying to pin down her charge just because you decided to spirit her away during your escapades.”

Jinx’s eyes flicker back down to Isha, who looks like she’s trying to keep the disappointment from her face, Dad sighs. “There’s also that…other matter that I’d rather avoid getting her involved in…you understand, don’t you?”

Oh. He meant…

Her shoulders slump as she looks away, but she nods, and dad turns back to his papers…but just as they’re about to leave, he stops them with a hand.

“Take the weapon with you.”

She blinks, cocking her head in his direction as she turns back towards him. He doesn’t look up as he answers.

“The Doctor is stopping by later tonight, and I’d rather avoid some of his more…insistent inquiries regarding its power source,” oh…he doesn’t trust him with it. Made sense: guy could be a bit of a creep, sometimes.

She steps forwards, slipping the strap around her arm as she glances at the papers he’s looking over…but a symbol catches her attention, makes some dots that still need connecting in her stupid head get just a little bit closer together.

“Hey, what’s that symbol, anyways?” She asks, pointing to one of the eight neatly drawn pictures on the document he’s lookin’ at. Looked real official like…and she remembers thinkin’ the same thing back when she’d found it there, too.

He continues reading, answering her almost absentmindedly as he reaches for an inkpot (they had regular old pens, but whenever he signed somethin’, he liked bein’ all fancy with it). “It’s the House Sigil of the Kiramman’s.”

She very carefully doesn’t react too much to that, her brain stuttering a bit at his words. One more dot to go…but should she…?

Her mouth kinda does it for her. “Oh…I feel like I’ve heard that name before,” she says, only tacking on that last part because he’d glanced up at her after she’d paused. He eyes her for a moment before shaking his head, looking as tired as she felt.

“A member of that House currently holds a seat on Piltover’s Council,” he says, a certain something to his voice as he continues his work. “It’s nothing to concern yourself with—soon enough, we won’t even have to deal with them at all.”

She nods at that, forcing a lighthearted expression on her face even as her insides struggle to take that information in…’cuz, the thing is, that’s not where she’d seen that symbol before, and it’s makin’ her feel…uncomfortable.

He looks up after he finishes signing his paper, raising an eyebrow expectantly—and makin’ her realize she’s just been standin’ here all awkward-like for a minute or so now.

She laughs, spinning on a heel as she makes her way towards the door, looping her arm around Isha’s as they get goin’ for realsies.

As the door opens, dad speaks up again, his voice soft, gentle (or at least, as much as he can even get):

“This will be over before you know it. I’m proud of you,” he pauses, and she turns to see him look directly at Isha as he continues, “both of you. Just lie low for now, alright? I’ll take care of the rest.”

She knows what he means, and she doesn’t want to think about it anymore—she’s had her chance—so she nods pretty much immediately, but she doesn’t miss the way Isha lit up like he’d made her year with a single sentence, and Jinx offers him a little wave over her shoulder as they leave for real.

Outside the tavern, Isha clings to her side again, and she huffs a laugh that’s huffed right back at her as they slowly make their way back to Sevika’s place.

“Ya’ know, if we walk like this the whole way there,” Jinx grumbles, pretending to strain with the effort it takes to move the side Isha’s currently clinging to for dear life, “we prolly won’t even get back before dawn.”

Isha only clings to her tighter, so Jinx lets it go for a few blocks longer…only, then, she hears some people yellin’ a street or so away. Her eyes narrow as she turns, one hand already on Zapper as she turns towards the noise. Yeesh, had Sevika woken up already?

Listenin’ a bit more, she grimaces as she recognizes some of their voices…yeah, those were her guys, alright.

“Oops. I think we got busted…buuuut we might as well mess with ‘em, right?” She shoots a sly grin to the kid at her side, and Isha pumps a fist into the air, her hand motioning for Jinx to get down. She laughs as she indulges her, letting the squirt climb onto her back next to Fishbones again before she scales the nearest building, hopping up onto the roof before she overlooks the area…only trouble is, that’s when she spots another problem.

Sevika’s dudes are pretty thorough, digging through the trash cans and reaching into tiny spots that Isha could (mostly) fit into…’cept, an alley or so down from where two or three of ‘em are currently searchin’, Jinx spots the Piltie—Vi’s Piltie—trying to scale a rusty ass, broken fire escape that Jinx already knows won’t be able to support her weight.

Her fingers itch towards Zapper…but she doesn’t pull it out.

Jinx hates this Piltie…but there’s one thing she hated even more than her, at the moment:

Unpaid debts.

Chapter Text

“Damn it,” she hisses, scowling at the sight even though, objectively speaking, the topsider falling on her ass for the second time in the last like fifteen seconds was pretty fucking funny. It woulda normally made her laugh…just, ya’ know, not now.

“Hey kid, I gotta do something kinda stupid. You in?”

Isha presses further over her shoulder, looking into her eyes with a raised eyebrow before she nods, and Jinx sighs before leaping to the next rooftop…and the next. And the next.

And then, she crouches, motioning for Isha to wait before she skitters to the back of the building, releasing the latch to force an old, folded-up ladder attached to the roof to extend the rest of the way (five or so feet, maybe?) to the ground below them. To her surprise (a good one, for once in her life), the ladder doesn’t make much noise as it slides down, letting out a soft thump that’s easily covered by the ever-nearing shouts of the ogre’s people. That done, she creeps back over to the side and jumps down to an old signpost about halfway down the building and leaps behind the Piltie, her hand curling around her mouth to muffle her cries before the lady’s even got the chance to spin and see her as she pulls them both around the bend, shoving the Piltie into a wall before leaning over her shoulder to harshly whisper her piece:

“Try anything stupid—run, scream, even look at me funny—and I kill ya’. Nod if you understand.”

The Piltie nods, her eyes wide and indignant as Jinx pulls away, nodding towards the ladder she’d just released leading up to the building she’d just climbed down from with an impatient, no-bullshit jerk of the head. The Piltie hesitates only long enough for Jinx’s gaze to harden and the voices unknowingly pursuing her to get closer. Some ways away, Jinx nearly curses her own fucking luck as she hears Lefty herself growling out orders to her people, sounding none too pleased to have been woken up so late in the night.

Jinx doesn’t bother climbing up after her, instead opting to jump up to a windowsill, then to the awning on the opposite building. She pulls herself up to the deck above her head before propelling herself to the rooftop, quietly skidding to a stop there as her knees rattle with the force. When the voices draw closer, she kneels by the entry point to the ladder and hauls the Piltie up the rest of the way, cursing her lack of sleep as she backs up a step, glaring harshly at the topsider when she tries to stand as she cranks the pulley to pull the ladder back up as she re-latches it in place, sneering at her when she backs away from the ledge.

Stupid fucking Piltie.

Jinx crooks a finger, beckoning her away from the ladder as she stays low to the ground, hoping the cement roof cresting would be enough to conceal them as long as they’re far enough away from the edge. The Piltie looks at her likes she’s mad (hehehe), but when Sevika’s voice draws even closer, she sets her jaw and follows along, and they both settle near some kinda huge chimney thing. Jinx’s skin crawls from breathing the same air as an enforcer without, say, shooting her or anything…but.

Her hand twitches as she thinks about the kid, about how messed up she’d looked after…and she doesn’t let her fingers curl around the grip of the pistol at her side.

The Piltie’s staring, but Jinx doesn’t pay her any mind, her head tilted slightly as she listens. She’s too far out to make out the exact words, but she can hear enough to tell that they’re heading away, and that’s honestly good enough for her. A bit later, after she can’t hear ‘em at all, Jinx pushes herself up, ignoring the Piltie in favor of finding—

The kid barrels into her side, and Jinx’s shoulders sag in relief as she wraps an arm around her shoulders. Isha glances at the enforcer with wide, curious eyes before she turns back up to Jinx, the question apparent on her face even before she finishes asking it.

”Why’d you help?”

Jinx scowls at the thought, but answers nonetheless, ignoring the Piltie’s little gasp (“That’s sign language!” Yeah, like what the fuck else would it be?) as she answers Isha without the actual words, not really in the mood to let the Piltie know any more than she needed to.

”Long story.”

It actually isn’t that long, but Jinx doesn’t fucking trust the enforcer any farther than Isha could throw her, and that meant she wanted all ‘a this over with as quickly as possible.

The girl doesn’t look very satisfied with that answer, but she thankfully lets the subject drop as she turns back to eye the topsider with obvious distrust.

Jinx turns back, too, getting a look at the conflicted, mostly-confused/a little hostile look on her face before rolling her eyes. The bridge was still a ways off, yet, and Jinx does not want to spend all night on this.

“Stand up.”

“I—what?” The topsider blinks, looking overwhelmed and (Jinx notices with no small amount of irritation) making no move to stand.

That’s ok, Jinx could be helpful…plus, if she answered the wrong way to her question (and Janna, but Jinx hopes she does), she wouldn’t hafta’ be deal with her anymore, anyways.

Nobody would.

She reaches down to grab her hand and the Piltie starts thanking her outta reflex, prolly…only, that quickly changes to somethin’ less polite-like when Jinx wraps a hand around her arm and yanks.

“I—hey! What are you—explain yourself!” Jinx wonders if she knows how dumb she sounds, her voice gettin’ all shrill like that when she’s tryna command her around.

“Hey,” Jinx says instead, a sharp frown on her face as the Piltie rights herself, “You said you’re a Kira—somethin’, right?”

The Piltie’s gaze snaps back to her, and Jinx has really gotta focus not to just put one between her eyes. “It’s ‘Kiramman’—and yes, but I hardly see how—"

“Got any proof?”

Jinx crosses her arms so her hands stop itching for Zapper, and the Piltie gives her a look so incredulous it could rival some ‘a dad’s.

“You don’t need any proo—“

Jinx cuts her off with a hateful stare. “Yeah, look, my temper is runnin’ kinda thin right now, so let me make this real simple for you: you can either prove it, or I’ll haul your shitty head back to Silco and leave the rest of you up here for the crows. So, what’s it gonna be?”

The lady watches her for a moment, a more careful look on her face as she reaches into her jacket pocket to pull out some kinda broach (yes, she knows what that is—dad has some)…and there, damningly laid out in intricately shaped metal sits that stupid fucking symbol from his office…and the vents.

The vents that Ms. Babysitting Wonder had lost Isha nearby, that her kid sister had crawled around in, gettin’ sicker and sicker ‘til Jinx’d figured out how to reroute ‘em. The ones that—had somebody’s family not built around and paid for them to filter out the worst of the smog from all the factories down here, Isha wouldn’t ‘a come back out from because she’d been right in the industrial district at the time. The exposure in such a concentrated exhaust pipe woulda killed her a couple ‘a decades ago.

And it didn’t, ‘cuz after she’d slid down the inside of one of the shafts, she’d found her, curled in a little ball with her face swallowed up in an emergency gas mask someone’d left in a kit that her grubby little paws had managed to pull from the wall…bearing the same symbol on it as this Piltie had on her stupid piece of jewelry. It hadn’t taken much diggin’ to figure out that they weren’t made by a trencher…it’d been one of the very few times in her life as a jinx where she’d started questioning things…

Thing is, though, is that there are a whole boatload of Pilties up there who were all much better off than any ‘a them down here: what’s it matter if one of ‘em did one nice thing one time? Dad’d called it performative. Jinx had mostly forgotten about it.

But that symbol hadn’t ever left her stupid head.

Jinx rolls her eyes to the sky, cursing every fucking god that’s an asshole for paying attention now of all times as she kneels, letting the kid up on her spot next to Fishbones before waving the stupid Piltie along.

“Get moving, Piltie, we got a lotta ground to cover and I ain’t known for my patience,” or for not killing enforcers, either, but hey—she’s gotta keep her bullshit up or else they’ll start callin’ her somethin’ else, right?

“I will do no such thing, Jinx,” she says, shoving that broach back into her jacket pocket (not the enforcer one, she notices dully…Vi musta had her change). Jinx raises an eyebrow at her and she thinks for a second that the Piltie’s about to snap at her…but she doesn’t. She takes a real good look at the probably dangerous kinda expression on Jinx’s face and evens out some, visibly cooling off before she speaks.

Jinx hates it, gets too reminded of the way dad’s stupid kid doctor (like, the real kind) used to look at her when she came to poke around at Isha all those years back.

“Can you explain what it is that you’re doing first?” her voice is calmer now, but there’s still an edge to it that the enforcer can’t quite hide away—and with Isha so close by, Jinx starts debating with herself about whether to take the knife the Piltie’d picked up from somewhere from her before she inevitably did something they’d both regret.

Jinx forces a faux-calm to her own voice, too—and she’s a bit irritated with herself when she realizes how much softer it’s become.

Stupid Piltie.

“Takin’ you back topside—unless you’d rather become the ogre’s mincemeat. She does like using that arm ‘a hers.”

Isha makes a face, staring at her like she’d just swallowed a bucket of screws or somethin’, but Jinx doesn’t react as she waits for the lady before them to respond.

The enforcer stares, her mouth gaping a bit like a fish.

Hah. Like Fishbones.

“I…you’re trying to help me?”

Jinx flattens her gaze, her hand curling at her side (which the Piltie watches—smart) as she moves to the edge of the building. “Really thought we were past that part already—or are you just that slow?”

The enforcer glares at her…but her eyes flicker at Isha when the kid laughs, and Jinx’s glare hardens so much that the Piltie stops wasting all ‘a their time and resets the ladder, starting back down it with clumsy, unpracticed steps. When she’s about halfway down, Jinx sets Isha down and jumps, heading back the way she’d came, holding her arms out for Isha when she gets to the bottom. Isha jumps despite the Piltie’s concerned cries for her not to, and they both stare at her like the dumbfuck she is after Jinx catches her, helping the kid swing to her back as they start off.

The Piltie keeps her distance, and Jinx snorts when Isha points between her and her eyes as if to say ”I’ve got my eye on you”.

They make it only a block or two before the Piltie clears her throat, and Jinx’s eyes flatten at the sound of her stupid voice that follows.

“What…is that thing?” she asks, her eyes uneasily drifting to the weapon draped over her back.

Jinx gasps in mock-offense, placing her hand not wrapped around one ‘a Isha’s leg on her hip. “She’s not a thing, she’s a child!”

Isha laughs and Jinx ignores the enforcer’s lingering stare. She obviously has more questions, but that look on her face said she wasn’t gonna ask ‘em. It pissed Jinx off—like, it’s not like she was gonna bother answering her for real anyways, but if Jinx were some other asshole down here she knows that the lady would be pepperin’ her with ‘em right now. It’s the same look as that stupid doctor, as Vander’s had been when she’d flipped out at him once, as Vi’s had been back on that rooftop. She’s not some glass-fucking-dish that’ll shatter into a gazillion pieces if people talked to her like she’s a fucking human being, so why—

She’s pulled outta her thoughts by Isha, who knocks her head into Jinx’s own to get her attention. She glances back at the Piltie outta reflex (if she so much as touches that kid, she’ll skin her prissy ass alive), her eyes taking in the…she wouldn’t call it concern, exactly, but it it’s something like it. Jinx turns back to Isha so she doesn’t have to look at that expression anymore.

People never looked at Silco like that.

“What?” she asks, her voice soft as she scans the alley ahead of ‘em. Isha points to her free hand, and when the bit of pain hits, she starts to maybe get the issue: apparently, the stupid enforcer was gettin’ under her skin a little farther than she’d thought, because her hand’s balled into a fist, a couple ‘a drops of crimson sliding down her fingers. She releases it, mentally slapping herself for not paying more attention—Isha didn’t need a protector who couldn’t keep their head on straight, ‘specially during a crisis like this.

You shoulda left her behind.

She grits her teeth, forcing herself to relax as the kid rests her chin on her shoulder. It helps more than she’d care to admit, that constant, physical reminder that she’s OK. Makes it easier to keep it moving…’least, ‘til the Piltie starts yammering again.

“Jinx,” that tone’s back in her voice, that same one from the arcade—like, her hands aren’t raised or nothin’ physically, but in a way they still are given that sound. “I can help you—”

Oh brother.

“Cut the crap, Piltie—I ain’t in the mood.”

Isha picks up her head and turns to look back at the enforcer, but Jinx can’t read her expression what with the way her face is positioned behind her neck. Damn, they were gonna have to stop this, soon—Isha’s gettin’ too heavy for it, and her arm’s killin’ her, so unless the kid stopped growing or Jinx started working out for 25 hours everyday, they’d have to figure somethin’ else out .

The topsider sighs, but it’s so quiet Jinx wonders if she was meant to hear it at all.

They walk in silence for a while after that. She can see the Piltie open and close her mouth a couple of times out of her peripherals. She starts wondering why the lady hadn’t asked her why she’s playing follow-the-leader yet, but the most likely answer only irritates her even more. Stupid asshole prolly just thought it was for funsies or somethin’—wouldn’t be the first time an enforcer thought her only motivations were shits and fucking giggles.

Isha knocks their heads together again and Jinx loosens her fist…something the topsider watches with a carefully blank expression as they turn the next corner. Her grip on the back of one of the kid’s legs tightens—not enough to hurt her, just…just to remind herself that everything’s ok.

Maybe dad was right? Maybe she shouldn’t have brought her along, it’s just that Jinx can’t resist her puppy dog eyes—

You’re too selfish for that.

She screws her eyes shut for a minute, not wanting to agree with him…but he was right: she just wanted to see her, to hold onto her—use the kid like a fancy Piltie weighted blanket, see her smile and her big ol’ eyes and ruffle her curls.

You wanted that even more than her safety—

She clamps her jaw shut when the stupid part of her brain opens it without permission to respond to him, and she subtly shakes her head. Not now, not now, not now.

“Is everything alright?”

There it is again, that tone, that caution, that softness! All of it—even when Jinx could snap her neck like it’s a fucking twig, even after all her stupid enforcer buddies got exploded all to hell, even when she’d almost shot her like a dozen times on that rooftop.

It’s pissing her off!

She should fear her—they all should! They fear Silco, and he’s her dad—so why?!

What is she doing wrong?

Everything. You’re a Jinx, remember?

“Shut up!”

“I wasn’t trying to upset yo—”

She clenches her teeth, barely hearing the words at all before she snaps back, her wors coming faster than she can even think about them.

“I wasn’t talking to you!”

She stiffens almost as soon as it’s outta her mouth, and she watches the Piltie’s expression change into something that—somehow—makes everything even worse:

Pity.

Isha hums into her ear pulling her gaze away from the Piltie who just messed everything up because now Isha’s gonna think she’s crazy and the Piltie will never be afraid of her, now the topsiders will all think she’s just as weak as that dead girl she’d gotten rid of in the fire and—

Isha hums at her more insistently and she turns to actually lock eyes with her and the kid bats at her nose, startling Jinx enough that she stops, blinking at her in a confusion that lasts only long enough for the kid to shoot her a gap-toothed grin. Some of that ugly, growing ball in chest eases up a bit. Isha must not have noticed anything wrong if she’s bein’ all cool about things like this.

Janna, that’s a relief.

Her shoulders slump a bit and the kid presses her cheek into Jinx’s shoulder, closing her eyes like she’s too sleepy to stay awake. Jinx starts a moment later, ignoring the Piltie when she tries to say somethin’ else…

And that’s when they hear them.

“—ave any idea how much is riding on this?!” the woman hisses from far around the next bend. “If we don’t find the kid before his other brat finishes that weapon—” the Piltie’s eyes flicker to Fishbones, and Jinx grits her teeth, “—then she’ll fuck this whole plan up, and this’ll all have been for nothing. Now, I don’t care if you have to tear apart every house in the Lanes: find that girl or they’ll still be digging pieces of you out of the gutters next fucking spring!”

There’s some grunts of affirmation, the pounding of boots, but a quick glance at her stupid topsider charge has her rolling her eyes again. Great—if Sevika got ahold of her, that would be that, and Jinx’d never get outta her stupid debt.

Sighing, she drops to a knee, and a confused Isha obediently hops off of her and looks between her and the enforcer nervously.

“Hey…so can I ask you for a favor?” she puts on her most winning smile and bats her eyes at the girl, and Isha scowls, already apparently knowing where this was goin’. Jinx itches the back of her neck, glancing down the alley where Sevika’s people would no doubt appear in a minute or so. “I’ll…clean the workshop for you? Don’t think I don’t remember you skippin’ out on that.”

Isha crosses her arms, lookin’ away with a playfully irritated expression that—while obviously adorable—was exactly not the time for it to be on her face. Jinx glances down the alley again and the play drops from the kid’s face as she follows the motion with her own eyes, her arms dropping back to her sides. Finally, Isha grumbles, her entire posture drooping as she signs:

”You owe me one million.”

Jinx reaches forwards and pulls her into a hug, the smell of the same faintly fruit scented shampoo that Jinx uses wafting in her face from the brown, boingy curls now tucked into her shoulder. Jinx wraps one hand into the squirt’s own, locking their pinkies together as they shake on it.

“One million forever, pepperbox. Now, go on. Give ‘er hell for me,” she waves the girl off as she pulls away, and Isha turns over her shoulder and shoots her with her finger guns. It’s something Jinx had come up with forever ago: this way, if they were ever too far apart to do their handshake, they could still be together…because family never leaves family.

Jinx shoots her back as she gets back up, and they both mouth the “Pew!” together (though only Jinx says it) as she takes off in the direction of the ogre’s wrathful voice.

Jinx slips into a little alcove between a dumpster and a few discarded crates, waving the Piltie along as she crouches down—and after a moment’s hesitation with the funniest expression ever on her prim an’ proper face, she settles as far from her as their position allows…which is to say, like, not even half a foot between their knees.

The lady opens her mouth to say something, but Jinx cuts her off with a hand, too interested in hearing how this went to deal with her dumb topsider nonsense for the time being. Eventually, they both hear when Lefty finally nabs the kid, and she sounds so fucking pissed that Jinx is starting to think she’ll actually owe the kid forever:

“You stupid fucking—what were you thinking?!” the lady hisses, a pregnant pause following as Isha presumably signs a reply. For all of the lady’s issues, understanding Silco’s youngest had never been one of ‘em. When Jinx had first found her with the book that she’d learned it all herself from, she’d feigned surprise at her ability to read and had the damn thing chucked at her head for the trouble…but Sevika’d become almost as good at understanding the kid as Jinx had within a couple of years.

And now here she is, using that understanding to just tear into her.

Jinx suppresses a wince as the volume of her tirade only grows, rolls her eyes when she refers to Jinx as “Silco’s loose-fucking-cannon that’s bound to blow up in his face sooner than later” and frowns when she mentions getting new, “brat-proof” locks on her windows…

The last thing either of them hear as she finally gets too far away to understand is something about the both of them driving her to an early grave and also being the bane of sleep’s existence (which Jinx kinda gets, actually)…and then, they’re in the clear. They’re also still pretty far from the bridge, though—and considerin’ dad probably has half the undercity scouring the place for her plus-one, they’d have to take a little longer with this than she’d like. They’re about to come into some heavily populated areas, and populated places meant people, people meant eyes, eyes meant seeing things that she’d rather them not to for the moment…and that meant they’d hafta’ take a bit of a detour.

She grimaces, sulking at her luck. She could be sleeping right now…

Ugh. Better not waste any more time then.

She stands up and turns around, but when she spins, the Piltie gets a look at the clear casing over the stupid gem and Jinx curses herself for not coverin’ it up or something after the kid’s stupid knee stopped bein’ there to block it from her shitty, topsider eyes.

“Jinx, is that the hex—”

She rolls her eyes, already walking away with an unfriendly smile plastered on her face so the sleepiness doesn’t leak through. “Lady, if you’re so dumb you gotta ask to know for sure, then they really sent the wrong Piltie down for this job.”

For some reason, that makes the enforcer shift from behind her, but while Jinx finds it curious, most of her doesn’t actually care. She’d wash her hands of the Piltie soon enough—and if she was smart (which Jinx now knows she’s not), then she'd stay far away from down here.

She already knows too much for Jinx’s taste…’specially ‘bout Isha. Doesn’t need even more people messing around with the kid than she already has.

The Piltie clears her throat, apparently trying to get her attention. Jinx ignores her before taking yet another turn to avoid the stupid people poorly hiding in the stupid alleys. Most people aren’t stupid enough to get in her way, but some of the Shimmer addicts just don’t have enough brain cells to care anymore…and some people attack her knowing that they’ll get more holes blasted in ‘em than a practice dummy because it’s a quicker death than whatever’s killin’ ‘em.

Her hands twitch at her side. She hopes, when all ‘a this is done, that people won’t hafta’ do that anymore.

“Jinx,” the Piltie says, a newfound calm in her voice that isn’t as overtly irritating to her as it had been when she’d tried talkin’ before. She still doesn’t answer—why would she, when they’ve got nothin’ to talk about?—but she doesn’t cut the stupid Piltie off, either. ‘S long as she keeps her damn, accented voice down, Jinx doesn’t really care what she says.

Unless, of course, she tries talkin’ ‘bout Isha again...but when she continues, that's not who she asks about at all.

“What do you want?”

Jinx raises an eyebrow at the unexpected question, the lack of…well, anything in her voice catching her attention as she starts down a stairwell. The Piltie seems to get that she’s not gonna answer, though, so she keeps going, her words just as toneless as they’d been before.

“I already told you what I wanted,” well duh, “but I never took the time to hear you out before,” she speaks slowly, and Jinx can feel her irritation starting to surge a bit at that before she continues. “If we can, I’d like to come to some sort of agreement so neither side need resort to violence, but in order to do that, I have to know what you want, too.” Jinx sets her jaw, the oversimplified explanation grating in her own ears. Did she think all Zaunites were idiots or somethin’?

“But what if I want to resort to violence?” she glances back at her, lettin’ her smirk cut a little more than it maybe should with how sharp she lets it be. The Piltie looks her dead in the eye when she answers.

“I don’t think that’s true.”

Jinx maintains her smile, but it twitches on her face. What’s she doin’, here?

“Had you wanted to do that, you could have simply shot me in that alley, or in the arcade; you obviously know who I am—but you didn’t. You could have shot that,” she gestures to where Fishbones is still strung across her back, “off the second you created it, but so far as I can tell, you haven’t. You don’t strike me as the type to perform violent acts for violence’s sake—regardless of what you'd have everyone believe—and that means there’s something you want, some purpose of sorts to your actions. So, what is it?”

Jinx’s smile has since fallen from her face, the Piltie’s explanation annoying enough to make her think about things. She should prolly just ignore her…but, well, they’ve got some time to kill here…

…it’s not like it’d hurt anything, right?

“…I want Silco to get what he wants,” she says carefully, her eyes a little more piercing than they had been before. The Piltie’s lips thin for reasons she doesn’t get—she’d asked, and Jinx’d answered, so what’s the problem?

“Help me understand, here: what does Silco want?”

Jinx’s grin returns, lopsided and half teeth. “I could bring you to ‘im and you could ask yourself.”

The woman frowns, her expression morphing into one of caution. Good; she must be doing something right, then.

“Does that mean you don’t know?”

Jinx tilts her head, her posture and expression easygoing…’cept her eyes. “Sure I do, Piltie…buuuuut why would I tell you that? You’re just, like, someone’s dumb kid or somethin’, pokin’ into places you probably shouldn’t. What’s the point in a negotiation or whatever with someone like that?”

Whatever she heard in Jinx’s words, she musta’ liked, ‘cuz her eyes light up even while her expression stays blank. It puts Jinx right back on edge, even while she speaks.

“Does that mean you’re open to negotiations at all?”

Jinx raises an eyebrow at her before turning back around, looks at a building to get a feel for how much longer they’d need to go this way. “I dunno. Ask Silco.”

The Piltie sighs, shakin’ her head. “Your sister—”

Jinx stops, slowly turning over her shoulder with a real serious look on her face and the Piltie’s words die on her lips. “Vi’s not my sister. I was right when I was eleven—she gave that up when she walked away.”

The topsider nods, a look of discomfort flitting across her features before it evaporates like Shimmer on a furnace. “Well then, Vi said that he isn’t someone you can negotiate with—”

“And you took her word for it because….?”

The enforcer blinks, looking briefly taken aback. Jinx rolls her eyes and starts moving again. This whole thing’s just been a humongous waste of time.

“Lady, every time you open your trap, you somehow get dumber,” she grumbles, looking around at the next intersection before they continue. Something’s…

“I beg your pardon?”

Jinx snorts. “Nah, Pilties don’t beg…yet,” she huffs another laugh, briefly wishing her sister was here to huff it back before she continues. “Lemme see if I’m understanding this right: you let this rando outta jail whose been there for the last million years and head with ‘em on this magical quest into the undercity and you just take everything she says as, like, 100% completely factual information?”

“I…she…didn’t seem like she was lying,” and it’s funny, ‘cuz now the Piltie sounds sheepish.

Jinx lets herself laugh at that, and only like 30% of it’s ‘cuz she’s trying to be a jackass.

“Oh man, the Pilties really know how to choose ‘em,” she wipes a fake tear from her eye, genuinely pleased with the way this conversation was going for the first time since she’d found her. "How the hell would somebody in jail for that fucking long know jack shit about anything going on down here? Sounded like she didn't even know I was alive! She wouldn't hafta lie to tell you somethin' wrong."

“…does that mean he’s open to—”

Jinx waves her down another alleyway, cutting her off as they go. “Probably? Bet you didn’t even ask him though, did ya’?”

The silence speaks for itself. Hah! This is awesome.

As they continue on, the dumb Piltie keeps tryna’ talk to her ‘bout deals and the whatnot, but Jinx’s long stopped listening. If the topsiders wanted to mess around with that, they could chat with dad. Otherwise? They could maybe send someone who had some more brains rattlin’ around in their fat skull...Jinx wouldn't subject dad to this Piltie unless he asked her to.

Still, she thinks idly as they step around a puddle of some kinda acid, night’s not going so bad after all.

Chapter Text

Vi’s spent the last seven years of her life rotting in a prison cell. She’d expected to spend the rest of her days there, asking about a kid who wouldn’t really be a kid anymore but whose shadow haunted her nightmares like one, never getting answers, always losing hope.

That’s the funny thing, actually—that hope. It’d been eating her alive, flaying her from the inside out, spurring her into restless pacing and punching, into hundreds of sleepless nights staring at the stone ceiling because she’d fucked-up so bad she’d started believing she’d never be able to make up for it. Hope was a fire—it flickered and waned, it flared dangerously when tendrils of doubt threatened to smother it, it lit her darkest nights when it didn’t seem like there was any way out…and yet, just like a true flame, it dimmed over time without the necessary fuel to keep it going.

And one day, without notice, it went out—snuffed under the sudden realization she’d had that she could no longer remember the right shade of blue in Powder’s eyes.

The voice, she’d never forget—how could she, when it served as the ambience to her every waking thought, itching like a scab broke open one too many times under nails bitten to the bed so far they bled?

She’d spent the rest of that day slamming her fists into the dingy cell walls with too much force to call it practice and yet not enough to break them, caught between going out in a blaze of glory like she’d wanted to when she was fifteen and so, so angry at the enforcers, at Silco and society and the world or just going back to sleep with the intention of never getting back up, of truly and utterly rotting because it’d been seven years and not a single fucking one of Silco’s shitty henchmen had known a thing about Pow…and then?

Then, she’d heard the footsteps of a guard, and when she’d turned to greet them, she’d seen someone new: fresh, pressed uniform, uncomfortably tense posture, nervous hands tightened around some notebook in her hands…and as they spoke, as this prick started prattling on about some bullshit case or another and she’d shown her the notebook, something happened.

It's like her candle had burnt to it’s end, fizzled out until this topsider brought a new wick, and when that fire suddenly sparked back to life, all that wax that’d melted away before coalesced around it and reformed into something less messy—something real and warm and unbroken.

That’s hope: that feeling that gets you up every morning, that blazes during the cold when you can’t feel your fingers anymore, that pushes you to take just one more step even whilst you’re bleeding out and your body begs you to stop.

And Vi had it again.

It hadn’t gone away—not when Sevika’d nearly shocked her into an early grave, not when that flare’d gone off and the wisp of a woman her sister had become had nearly blown her fucking brains out, and not even when she’d rejected her in their old arcade…but it had dimmed some.

It hadn’t helped, of course, that the enforcer who’d busted her out of prison and saved her life had been using her the entire time.

Part of her thinks that’s a little unfair: rationally, she should have known Cait wasn’t planning on befriending the person who’d drawn the pictures on her precious Piltie crime scene—and after the little stint on the rooftop, she did have a talk or three with the woman about who Powder really is and why she wasn’t going to let her get arrested and tossed in prison just because she’d offended some rich schmuck’s sensibilities—and yet Cait had listened, interjected, pointed facts out about the scene of the crime and “Jinx’s erratic disposition”…and never told her a damn thing about what her sister’d actually done or why finding her was so damned important.

Up until Powder’d called her out on her bullshit, Vi hadn’t even really thought to ask—and after she’d left them alone and Vi prodded her for information, she got the truth…and the truth was that Cait was actually only here to arrest her sister, that she really had stolen something so important that Piltover was up in arms about it…and that the woman hadn’t ever been down here before now, either. Vi’d known that, too, judging by the way the woman reacted to every little thing down here, but she hadn’t really put two and two together until her sister’d hissed out the answer in the plainest terms possible:

In the simplest way she can think to put it, Cait was down here on a topsider errand to retrieve some magic fucking rock with the potential to make a weapon and arrest the thief who stole it so the Piltie’s didn’t get so butthurt about it that they finally came down here to wipe them all out. In other words, Pow was right.

After hearing all of that, Vi had nodded, looked away, mumbled something about cooling her head, and left Cait there without another word.

She didn’t abandon her, and some extremely reluctant part of her didn’t necessarily disagree with her, either, because Cait is about the sweetest person she’s ever met (hence, cupcake) and Vi genuinely believes she means well…but to be perfectly honest, if these were normal circumstances and not whatever batshit crazy hell ones that Vi’d more or less stumbled into here, she’d probably have knocked the Piltie flat on her prim and proper ass for even suggesting they should lock Pow up for good, and then she would have joined her sister no matter what strange, nonsensical quest she was on just because that’s what you do.

Powder’s family, and Vi’d already fucked this up once. It should’ve been that simple.

It’s not…and that’s because of Silco.

When Sevika’d said Pow was like a daughter to him now, she’d hoped it’d just been something meant to throw her off balance, to distract her from the fight—something so outlandishly false that it’d throw anyone who’d heard it spoken aloud.

It wasn’t—Vi could see the truth there, written in the bags under her sister’s eyes, the sharp way she smiled, the ruthlessly effective way she fought…but she also saw Vander in her, too. The way she protected the kid, the gentle way she spoke and checked her over for injuries, that significantly less wild look in her eyes when she held the girl close…

And well, that brought her to her last, most important point: the kid.

Who the fuck is the kid?

She’s really, really hoping it’s not Pow’s: if the kid was as old as she looked…

God! Even thinking about the implications of that is making Vi’s skin crawl.

…whoever she is, though, she’s important to Powder, that much had been made abundantly clear the second she’d left Vi behind on that rooftop. She still regrets how she’s handled both of the interactions she’s had with her sister. She’s obviously unstable, still very much acts like she had as a kid when she gets scared about something…just, Vi never used to be that something…and that kid kinda made her act a bit more normal. It’s not as if her presence fixed anything, exactly—hell, the kid had been just as cutthroat as Pow had with that pistol (or, well, she’d tried—Vi’s pretty sure she hadn’t actually hit anything she’d aimed for)—but in a fucked-up kinda way, it sorta reminded Vi of her and Pow when they were younger.

Vi used to get into all kinds of trouble, and usually, the only reason she’d stop is because having that smaller person there looking up at her, depending on her…it always made sure she remembered not to push too far. It’s like having something to protect meant you had to keep your shit together, even if it tore you apart.

In a way, the girl was like Powder’s own fire in the flesh, burning bright and steady and held close enough that she could physically stop the rain from putting it out.

And Cait seemed to know it, too…as did the Firelights.

Part of Vi wonders if that’s why they were up there, poking around on that rooftop. The shock on Pow’s face when Vi’d pulled her into that first embrace told her that she’d been honest when she’d said she hadn’t been the one to shoot the flare off—but the only other person up there still alive had been that lite kid…surrounded by the dead bodies of Firelights that Pow’d obviously killed just moments before her arrival with that suped-up gun of hers. The fact that more of them had come, the fact that they’d mostly been focused on the kid or on Pow herself…

Well, it makes Vi think the kid’s relationship with her sister…maybe might be kinda like their own—and maybe the Firelights had noticed that, thought they could…use it, in some way?

She’d pretty quickly discovered that they’re no friends of Silco’s—and while Vi would like to say that means they’re friends of her’s, she can’t because they’d attacked Pow, had come out swingin’ instead of trying to talk things out. Maybe that’s because Pow had killed a few of their own (more than that, if Cait could be believed about what had apparently happened on that airship)—but Vi gets the sense that the reason that flare shot off had something to do with that, too. Maybe if they’d left the damn kid alone, they wouldn’t have gotten killed.

Vi doesn’t get what they want with the kid, can’t see a real use for some random brat unless she’s somehow not as random as she’d like to believe—but she can say she’s happy the girl exists. Pow was already fighting at a much higher level than last Vi’d seen her, but she also hadn’t been overly zealous about anything she did. She fought with a singular purpose: to keep that kid safe—and she hadn’t really initiated any of the actual fighting besides when those hoverboard riding dipshits got close enough to cut. Maybe that’s because she just couldn’t, what with her giving her ranged weapon to the kid like that…but Vi’s not so sure that’s the case. She’d looked too focused for that…which is good, because had that kid not been there, had she had to watch Pow get any more deadly or frenzied or into it than she had on the rooftop? Vi had already lost some of her focus when she’d noticed her kid sister didn’t cow away from the brawl like she’d used to…anything more than that, and Vi’s not so sure she’d have been able to keep herself from staring—not something you wanted to do in the middle of a fight, and especially not when the pricks you were fighting with seemed equally as likely to kill you as they were to keep you.

Vi’d seen the ropes they had, the blunt weapons most of them used, the way their leader never seemed to go for the throat even on the undercity’s most dangerous criminal—one who had absolutely zero issues killing some of them herself.

It makes her think—it all makes her think, and she’s tired of thinking. All Vi really wants is to pull Powder into a hug, to hold her close and never let her go, to escape this fucking hell hole and apologize until she loses her voice and know with absolute certainty that when she closed her eyes her sister’s ghost wouldn’t be there to torment her in her dreams because she’d be alive, because Vi would have tucked her in with that stupid stuffed rabbit and sat by her bed and hummed that old song until her breathing evened out, just like she’d used to do when Pow couldn’t sleep.

And fuck if she could do any of that with Silco’s claws sunk so deep into her like they are.

Vi would do a lot of things for Pow. A lot—but she’s not going to work with the same asshole who’d put them all into this mess to begin with. She doesn’t really understand why Pow had, but she also can’t find it in herself to blame her for it. She’d been a kid. He’d apparently been more of a creep than Vi had thought, or maybe he’s just into kidnapping people.

Her nostrils flare as she takes another turn, her eyes flitting to a nearby rooftop when she hears yet another sound—too out-of-place to be ignored. It’s got her nerves fraying even further than the week’s events already had them going—because the first time she’d noticed it was right before Silco’d nearly fucking killed them in her old house…someone was definitely following her, and judging by the silent way she seemed to carry herself now and the blatant way she’d dismissed her a couple days ago, it isn’t Pow.

Whatever. If Silco wanted to fuck with her right now, she’d almost fucking welcome it—needed some way to vent her frustrations before she went back to talk with Cait. The woman had tried getting her attention before she’d left, but Vi hadn’t been receptive to it at the time, couldn’t be if they were actually going to talk and not fight.

Vi stops, tenses as she hears voices—one infuriatingly familiar—coming from far down the block, just past a bend she couldn’t see just yet.

“—eah, fine, we can get you some coloring books,” that bitch’s voice sounds, blunt and low and annoyed in a way that sounded almost domestic instead of deadly, “I’ll have someone run out and get them…along with the new locks—anything that’ll keep you outta trouble, we’ll do.”

There’s an edge there that’s hard to read given the distance, but as Vi starts getting closer and they finally make it around the corner, she stops trying to figure it out, anyways, the shock forcing her to pause as she stares at the scene before her:

Standing with that metal arm of hers in a sling is Sevika, flanked on either side by another burly woman and a lithe looking man…and then, holding her remaining hand, the girl watches the older woman with a grimace.

Yeah, that girl.

Now, rationally, Vi knows a few things. First, Sevika and Pow work for the same guy, and that probably meant they didn’t hate each other like Vi and this woman did. Second, if Sevika had agreed to watch this kid—and their relaxed body language suggested that this wasn’t an unusual situation for them—then she was the brat of someone important down here. A chem baron, maybe?

And lastly, Pow adores that kid, had taken several hits for and given her weapon up for and had stroked her hair and cheek of this kid…and that meant she’d be coming back for her eventually.

And Vi still hates Sevika, and the kid probably knows all about her sister, now…

Honestly, with the way Sevika’s arm is all messed up like it is, this isn’t a difficult choice to make.

You have to understand, here, that Vi isn’t interested in threatening the girl, or blackmailing Pow—she’s not going to hurt her or anything, and she’d give her right back when Powder returned—but Vi’s fire is getting battered by the wind blowing all around, changing her world as she moved through it, and if this girl meant Powder would actually speak with her again, she’d have to take this fight. Hell, maybe Cait had been right: maybe that girl would be the key to swaying her to their side (and by “their”, she really means Vi’s; no one would be arresting Pow if she could help it), maybe her sister wouldn’t—or couldn’t—leave without her.

If it meant Powder would come with her—and leave Silco far, far behind—Vi doesn’t mind having another mouth around to feed. She could take care of all of them.

Maybe that’s why the—

“Shit!” Sevika’s curse startles her back into herself…but she isn’t looking at Vi, “Firelights!”

Vi’s gaze immediately snaps to the floating assholes gliding overhead, appearing all out of nowhere in a fashion that’s too organized to be coincidence. Part of her is shocked to see the man who’d obviously been acting as their leader amongst them, keeping high up in the air as he directed his people with quick, jerky hand motions and a clipped, warped tone from behind his cowardly fucking mask. Too much of a little bitch to show his face, it seems.

Either way, their appearance had obviously come as a surprise to Sevika, because in a second she’d shoved that kid at her subordinate and barked an order for the woman to go, and luckily for Vi, neither of them were looking in her direction—not even when the woman who struggles to find a way to haul the girl around while still being able to access the pool cue she was carrying in one hand as a weapon starts booking it in her direction.

The woman only really gets a good look at Vi as she finally turns her focus ahead of her, but she doesn’t even have time to cry out before Vi’s fist carves a dent into her cheek, knocking the woman out cold with one hand as her other loops around the girl’s waist, tugging her closer before she turns on a heel and runs, ignoring the frantic squirming of the kid until she’s back around the corner—

And when half-a-dozen Firelights intercept her there, weapons all held at the ready, it finally clicks into place that maybe it wasn’t Silco’s people that’d been tailing her.

She sets the kid, down, ready to fight the masked fucks off if need be…but to her surprise, as the six of them slowly get closer, that same, distorted voice sounds from behind her:

“Enough,” it’s calm, and when she turns her head to look she’s not shocked to watch him descend to the ground, flipping off his board and throwing it over his back in one fluid, practiced motion. Her eyes narrow, and she nearly startles when she realizes how close the girl presses into her side, like she’s scared of the newcomers and sought Vi out to defend her regardless of the fact that Vi’s basically just kidnapped her…from Silco, yeah, but still.

Huh.

Nevertheless, the kid’s reaction makes a surge of protectiveness flow through her and she shields her from the leader’s view almost subconsciously, eyeing the man with increasing hostility even as he slowly holds his empty hands out in a gesture of what’s probably meant to be goodwill, but what Vi mostly interprets as fucking stupid.

“You don’t work for Silco,” he states simply, though there’s something underlying his voice even through the mask that makes it feel like a question. Whatever; it’s not like she wouldn’t have retaliated to that even if it hadn’t been there, anyways.

Stupid fuck.

“No shit, genius,” she spits, her eyes flickering down to the kid at her side as a little hand balls into the fabric there. Janna, but something about him must really scare the hell out of her…that, or she has absolutely no sense of stranger danger. Vi certainly doesn’t think it’s due to anything Powder’s told the kid—assuming she’d told her anything about that encounter at all.

Maybe she just trusted her implicitly because she knew her and Pow were related?

It didn’t really track with the rest of her sister’s behavior up until now, though. Vi decides she’d rather stick with her enemy of my enemy is my friend theory as she eyes the clown in the bird mask before them, who stops before getting close enough to punch. After what seems like an eternity of silence, he sighs, sounding almost defeated as his hands come up behind his head—and as he reaches back to take off his mask, Vi’s thrown so far off her game that she doesn’t even try and get closer like she really should given his current distraction.

When he removes it, she freezes as she finally gets a good look at his face, her mouth falling open in slack shock as her hands fall limply to her sides…a motion that isn’t unnoticed by the girl hiding behind her.

“You look good for a dead girl.”

"...Little Man?!"

Chapter Text

Ekko’s had a fucking week—and the worst part is that it ain’t even halfway through yet.

It’d started with the disaster at the airship up topside, got worse with news of Jinx’s heist, continued with news of Vi’s miraculous return from death only to find her giving out free tours to an enforcer, then there was that stint on the rooftop that left another four dead and two injured…and now…

Now, he’s staring at the solution to his biggest problem from where she’s hiding behind his newest one—and ain’t it fucking funny how they’re both tied to Jinx herself (not that Vi probably even knows that).

Honestly, he’s pretty sure these sisters will be the death of him…and he doesn’t mean that figuratively.

Vi looks half-caught in the past—a past that Ekko doesn’t have the luxury of ruminating in himself—and that hesitation ultimately falters when he clips his mask to his belt. The hug surprises him. It shouldn’t have, maybe—wouldn’t have, a decade ago—but it definitely catches him off guard anyways.

“I thought you were working for Silco,” he half-whispers even as his arms come up to return the embrace. It’s stupid, how he feels the need to defend himself here. Shit isn’t like it used to be: Vi isn’t the one in charge anymore (Vi wasn’t even here to be in charge), and Ekko’s…he’s not sure what to make of her anymore, but that childish urge to explain his actions wins out over his anger for a second.

It's the shock, probably…and the longer this drags on, the more of his people that shift around him, the faster it returns.

Vi snorts, but it’s too soft to carry much of the heat that’d she obviously still had in her, given their earlier brawl. He grits his teeth at that—it could have gone so much better had the kid not been there. If they captured Jinx (and they had the numbers for it), she’d have to at least hear him out…and even if she wasn’t keen on the idea of sticking around, well, Ekko’d prepared for that, too. He’d seen how shocked Vi was at her old kid sister’s ruthlessness, but that petty knife play on the rooftop wasn’t even close to how dangerous Jinx could be, how ruthless she’d become. Had she not been holding back, he’s pretty sure Vi would have gotten distracted enough that they could have knocked her questionably-traitorous ass out—and Jinx would have to cut the bullshit if they had one of her sisters at knifepoint.

Ekko wouldn’t hurt either of them (truthfully, he probably wouldn’t even be able to point a weapon at the child, either…nor would even try to), but given how their last real interaction had panned out, Jinx wouldn’t know that. It’s what he’d been counting on once she’d revealed the kid’s existence a few years back, what he’d sent his people out to do once he’d discovered Jinx was out (and therefore not at the kid’s side) running collections…

He hadn’t counted on the flare. He hadn’t counted on the kid’s weirdly high dexterity or cleverness as she successfully avoided the three adults that had interrupted her and Peyton’s play.

And he especially hadn’t counted on Vi or her Piltie sidekick.

It fucked things up. All he’d managed to do that night was piss them all off and get even more of them killed…and it hadn’t made Jinx any more popular with the Firelights as a whole at all.

What a fucking mess this was…but at least now he can maybe salvage it.

“We can’t stay here, Vi. Kid’s coming with us,” he jerks his head towards the girl now frantically searching for a way out of this mess without breaking eye contact with his old friend. “What are you gonna do?”

Vi eyes him warily, a conflicted look passing across her face as her eyes flicker back towards the kid.

“Why do you want her?”

Ekko glances around him, too-aware of where they are right now, so close to the bridge and the edge of Silco’s territory for comfort. “Not here,” he says carefully, keeping his voice low. When she starts arguing with him again, he cuts her off brusquely, his tone (hopefully) non-negotiable. “It wasn’t a question, Vi, and just because you’re not working for the boogeyman doesn’t mean you ain’t some kinda hit man or some shit, either—he isn’t the only piece of trash that Vander’s death left festering down here. I can’t trust you right now without figuring out where the fuck you’ve been all these years, and we don’t have time for that right now because if we hang around here much longer, we’ll be mincemeat in Roy’s next stew.”

Vi scrunches her face up at that, her stubbornness preventing her from just agreeing to anything he said out of hand. “I was in prison, dipshit—kinda hard to assassinate people through steel bars in the middle of the ocean.”

Ekko’s scowl twitches on his face, but he motions a pair of his guys to grab the kid. Predictably, Vi steps between them and Scar growls a warning from behind him.

“The fuck you want with her, anyways?”

Ekko sighs, weighing his options before shaking his head.

“Same thing you seem to want—to talk to Jinx without risking a bullet to the brain.”

Vi's hands pop and Ekko watches the girl duck back behind her.

“Didn’t seem like you were doing a lot of talking back up on that rooftop,” she challenges.

“And whose fault was that?” He continues when she raises her eyebrow at him. “You want me to apologize for not letting her blow your head off?”

VI closes her eyes, looking pained, but she continues on anyways. “I…I know how it looks, Ekko, but she—Powder’s still in there, I know it, and—”

“Yeah, I know.” She blinks at him in shock and he sighs, allowing just a fraction of his own exhaustion shine through on his face as he continues. “She’s still got a lot to answer for, and it’s definitely not how I used to see it, but…,” he shakes his head, trailing off as he mulls it over. Apparently, he stays silent for too long, because Vi cuts in yet again, sounding doubtful.

“But…?”

Ekko rolls his neck with his free hand, pursing his lips a second before he answers. “But I was wrong." How the hell was he supposed to explain all of that in like two minutes, though? How would Vi even take it? How could he spin any of this in a way that would actually make any fucking sense? What's he supposed to say, hey, I'm real glad you're alive and all of that, funny story, the last time I went to go hang out with your sister I pulled a gun on her and almost shot her dead and for some reason instead of killing me after she knocked my ass out I woke up in a warehouse like nothing happened? No, that would sound insane. It is insane, the rest of his people think it's crazy that he even wants to help her after everything she's done...but some of them understand. Some of them see her with that kid, and some of them notice the way shes never hurt their own every time she finds the two of them out together. Jinx ain't stupid: she knows why Ekko had the kid befriend her sister, and she could easily have stopped him from ever coming back.

But she hasn't...she'd even helped him on a few occasions. And Ekko might be an optimist, or maybe he's a little too blinded by the past to see the present for what it is, but he'd like to think all of it means something. It'd have to, to justify not killing her for everything she's done.

"You wanna get into all that, we can do it later—but now ain’t the time.” He knows Vi won’t just accept the answer, but it doesn’t make him any less irritated when she continues (though the look on her face suggests she might understand at least part of it).

“You think returning the kid to her will make her willing to chat with you?”

Ekko hums in dissent. “No—and it ain’t what we’re doing, either,” when Vi's face screws up in more hostility, he waves her off, “we do that and she’ll just run right back to Silco—is that where you want the kid to end up at the end of all this?”

Vi shifts and the girl’s eyes widen from behind her. Scar tilts his head to the side and he nearly curses—they really don’t have the time for this right now…but he does have one more question that probably can’t wait, either.

“If all you wanted was to talk to her, though, why didn’t you just tag along with your new Piltie friend?”

Vi cocks her head at him, her hands finally unballing at her sides. “Huh?”

Ekko gestures for her to follow him, and after a moment, she’s at his side, the kid shaking like a leaf as she eyes all of his people around them trailing just behind her. “You didn’t know?” he asks, his voice quiet as he sets his hoverboard on the ground. “She’s heading somewhere with Jinx as we speak.”

He gets his answer more from the way Vi stumbles than her strained, one word response:

”What?!”

Ekko explains what little he apparently knows about it, and it’s not very much, because the second his scouts reported seeing Jinx separate from the kid—Isha, he’d called her—they’d apparently high-tailed it straight to Sevika. All Vi knew for sure now was that Cait and Powder were traveling together without killing each other and that Jinx had some huge, deadly looking cannon or something hanging off of her back. She'd tried asking the girl what was going on, but Ekko’d cut her off: if the kid could talk, he’d said, he’d never heard it himself.

In hindsight, it was a stupid question, anyways: Vi wouldn’t sell anyone out to the people trying to kidnap her, either.
Is that what they were doing? Is that what she was helping them do?

She doesn’t have a clear answer…and even then, she’s not sure she’d feel too bad if it turned out to be a “yes”, either. Ekko still hasn’t told her who the hell she is, but Vi supposes it might not even matter: Jinx liked her, they had her…

And that was that.

Vi doesn’t want to leave him or the kid, but there’s this undercurrent of terror she’s yet to shake ever since he’d told her what Cait had apparently been up to this entire time. God, but she had some fucking explaining to do—what part of the undercity isn’t safe for a lone enforcer or Pow’s little homicidal warning speech up on that rooftop had been unclear to her?! Vi wasn’t going to leave her at the arcade forever, she’d just been afraid she wouldn’t be able to contain her anger enough to not deck the officer into the next fucking calendar year…and the memory that brings to mind threatens to smother the little fire she’s still got burning away inside.

And Powder.

What the fuck was Powder doing with a enforcer?!

It doesn’t end up mattering, because after Vi finishes her story about the stolen Piltie rock and the upset it’d caused topside, he’d explained the newly placed enforcer barricades on the bridges and suggested they intercept the pair before they arrived there.

His mind must have went to the same place as her own: that Powder plus a bridge full of enforcers plus a questionably functional cannon-thing was a disaster waiting to happen…but he’d put his foot down when she’d asked to bring the kid along, mumbled something about “Jinx never fucking forgiving him” if anything happened to her. Vi wanted to argue—had tried to, actually—but there were a lot more of then than there were just her. The girl had stood stiff as a rod as a couple of Firelights escorted her away. Ekko’d been oddly gentle when he told her about “her little friend” that was waiting back at their base to play with her, but the kid hadn’t seemed too comforted by his response.

Honestly, Vi wasn’t, either—the last time people she was trying to protect split up like this…

She shakes herself out of her thoughts, biting the inside of her cheek to avoid bringing the issue back up. What’s done is done, and soon enough, they’ll all be heading back there with Ekko, anyways, and the details won’t have mattered…but when her and Ekko and the rest of his people all jump at the sound of some muffled boom coming from a few blocks away, the little leader sends the other four off to get Sevika off their trail.

Vi doesn’t ask him, as he angrily grumbles something about “how much time they’d wasted”, how he knows it wasn’t Powder who’d caused it…she has a feeling he’s got an answer to it and an even larger feeling that she doesn’t actually want to know it…but it leaves her wondering what Sevika had that could make a noise like that. Last she knew (which, seeing as her run-in with the woman was earlier today, is pretty recent), neither Sevika nor her underlings even carried any guns, let alone any explosives…

There’s this pit in her stomach again, this strange sense of foreboding, but she shoves it back down. It’s just her nerves, just the stress of everything that’s happened since she’d been released from Stillwater. It doesn’t mean anything.

Right?

Both her and Ekko tense as they finally round the corner to the last block before the drop off between topside and the undercity—and sure enough, these obnoxiously giant lights sit parked near the center of the nearest bridge and the one in the distance, effectively barring anyone access to the richer side of town. Ekko had landed a couple streets back, said he hadn’t wanted to draw any attention (or fire) from the enforcers standing guard on the bridge…Vi might not know all the details, but from what little she’d managed to piece together from what both Cait and Ekko had told her, the Firelights took most of the blame for the investigations Cait was looking into even though Cait knew they weren’t at fault.

It didn’t really surprise Vi, considering Silco’s bitch was the new fucking sheriff.

Still, it isn’t the sight of Marcus standing guard far down the bridge that gets the two trenchers’ attention.

“…atever you say, Piltie,” the high-pitched, oddly humored voice drawls from far down a nearby alley, the words followed and broken up by the click of footsteps sounding from not one, but two sets of feet.

Powder!

“—on’t think you understand the implications of this, Jinx!” a pleadingly posh voice replies, letting out an irritated little huff at the graceless snorts that follows, “if you could actually set up a parley of sorts, I’m sure the Council would—”

“Pfft! ‘Parley!’ Ain’t no way that’s a real word!”

“I assure you that it is,” comes the next grumble, the words sounding louder than they really are as the sound reverberate off of stone walls and the crumbling brick road below their feet. “If you’d just listen to me—”

Vi stops listening when Pow emerges from the alley, and Cait is just a few steps behind her. Ekko had since put his mask back on, and Vi doesn’t quite know what to do, what the best way to stop them might be. A fight between the rest of the enforcers and them probably wouldn’t go very well, so it’d be better to get their attention before they got too far down the bridge—they might sound like they’re getting along now, but Vi had seen just how close her sister’d been to killing her before, and Powder harbored almost as little love for the enforcers as Vi did…

If they got too close to the other enforcers…

Ekko waves her along and she bites back a curse as they get closer—but to both of their surprises, Pow stops before actually setting foot on the bridge and they’re both forced to stop. Her sudden halt seems to throw Caitlyn off guard, too, if the bewildered look on her face is anything to go by.

“What are you—”

Powder cuts her off with a vague flick of her wrist, shoving her hands into her pant pockets as she shifts her weight between her feet. “Time for me to go, Piltie—got things to do, y’know? I’d say it’s been a pleasure or something if it actually was, but honestly this has been super annoying and I hope we don’t meet again. See y—”

Cait cuts her off, taking a step closer that has the shorter woman tilting her head to a dangerous degree—but whatever words Cait had mapped out in her head die on her tongue as she inadvertently locks eyes with Vi. Her eyes widen to an almost comical degree, and Vi curses her own shitty luck because this was not going to look good, she doesn’t know what she should say yet—

“Violet?!”

Powder spins on her heels, going stiff as a board as she spots the pair of them in the shadows.

Well, fuck.

Jinx has been having a pretty good, but pretty weird night.

Or, well, maybe good ain’t quite the right word for it. She’d had to ditch the kid again, and Sevika hadn’t sounded real happy to find her out ‘n about like she had…and Vi’s little Piltie knew about Fishbones, now, which wasn’t great (or maybe it’s not that bad? Dad’d said he’d wanted a “deterrent”, and those don’t generally work so good unless the thing you’re tryna’ shoo away knows it exists). Plus, Isha’d seen her lose her cool, which wasn’t cool ‘cuz it made her look all floppy an’ weak ‘n stuff. But maybe she hadn’t noticed, either. That’d be ok: she knows the Piltie had since she’d started talkin’ to her like she’s some fragile topsider artifact…’course, maybe that ain’t such a good analogy considering that, according to Silco, the Pilties stole most ‘a those from around the world.

Ugh, ok, point is, Jinx’s doing pretty alright given all the shit that’s gone down in the past several days—zombies and Pilties aside.

‘Cept now, it seems like she’d spoken (thought?) a bit too soon, ‘cuz just like she’d been a little worried about back on that rooftop, her ex-sister and her not-friend are standing side by side down the street a ways, one frozen like one of the Doctor’s pet projects and the other cracking his neck under that stupid mask.

It looked cool, once, back when it didn’t mean danger or hard choices or dumb thoughts that made her head hurt.

It shouldn’t have meant anything at all—but that’s just like you, isn’t it? Indecisive little baby who can’t pick sides anymore than she can save lives.

She grits her teeth, the part of her brain not focused on the people in places where they shouldn’t be and the stupid asshole jabbering away in her mind drawn instead to the way that Piltie shifts nervously behind her.

Vi opens her big old, lying mouth (does it hafta’ be Vi, or could she be someone else?) and that voice modulator crackles behind that dumb mask of his, but Jinx is more aware of a couple of other things that pull at her fraying sanity more than the numskulls in front of her. Whatever they try sayin’ to her, Jinx doesn’t hear it, the sound of the enforcers voice-enhancey megaphone thingamajig almost enough to overpower the slap of boots somewhere in the distance…but with everything goin’ on, she can’t quite pick out where it starts. On reflex, she starts turning towards the wall of blue pigs all lined up behind her, turning over the opposite shoulder than the one the Piltie stands behind even as Vi an’…and him draw even closer.

This, she realizes soon after, is where she fucked-up.

There’s this one lesson Vi had tried ‘n instill in her (or however the heck you say that) this one time after the enforcers caught all four of ‘em and searched them after comin’ back from practicing parkour all day. It was super important that she never, ever forget it: Vi had even said it just like that ‘cuz the asshole who’d tossed her against the wall had nearly dislocated her shoulder with the amount of force she’d used.

“I’m sorry,” the Piltie half-whispered from her side, causing Jinx to start twisting in alarm.

It’s only now, at this moment, that Jinx remembers what Vi had said to her then—she wasn’t ever supposed to forget, she’d promised Vi she wouldn’t…but Vi wasn’t supposed to leave her, either.

Never trust an enforcer.

Jinx doesn’t know how she’d figured out the latching mechanism so quickly, but it’s like one second, her mouth’s opening to ask her what the heck she was on about (or maybe to tell Vi an’ him to fuck off to the hole they’d apparently crawled out of, or maybe ti tell the fellas in her head to give her a fucking minute so she doesn’t accidentally kill a whole shit ton of enforcers and make Silco all crabby again) and the next she’s gaping at the gem in the Piltie’s hand, shocked at how absolutely suicidal that was…at least, ‘til she thinks about it.

“Cait! What the hell is—”

“Jinx, listen to me!” Jinx doesn’t know when or how she’d gotten ol’ Zapper out, but it’s there like a comforting weight in her hand and trained easily on that stupid fucking face of hers. “Give yourself up now and I promise you we’ll help you and that child accompanying you earlier. Come peacefully and the Council can be persuaded to—”

“Are you nuts?! What did I tell ya’ at the start of this, Piltie?”

A quick glance around says Vi is still a ways out, but that he has gotten a lot closer, thanks to his hoverboard…and then there’s that pounding—

No! Stop getting distracted!

The Piltie seems conflicted about whatever look’s on her face, now, and that makes her laugh because finally, finally she starts acting like Jinx is a threat.

Janna, but that made things easier in her head.

The taller lady swallows. “Jinx, I know you don’t want to hurt me—“

”What did I tell you?!”

The fear in her eyes just makes everything better and worse all at once—because the dumb topsider’s right: she doesn’t wanna hurt her or nothin’ ‘cuzza the debt, but it’s not Jinx’s fault if the idiot pulled some dumb stunt like this and just expected her not to retaliate. She’s practically begging to get shot!

But you owe her…

She winces, the smile faltering on her face. Vi gets closer, then stops and she nearly turns to see why before she closes her eyes, a stupid, stabby kinda pain making the spot between them ache something fierce.

You owe the family, not the person. Just shoot the dumb bitch and pay back someone else.

Yeah…yeah, that could—

But you don’t know of anyone else! What if she’s the only one?

Vi’s shouting something, but it ain’t at her…the words are too distant, too fuzzy to hear beyond the veil of her own head. She think that maybe the enforcers are getting closer, wonders if it’ll be like a reunion for ol’ Marky-Mark and them.

“—inx? Are you alrigh—"

Someone puts a hand on her shoulder and she flinches back without opening her eyes, her trigger finger shaking dangerously on the boom button.

Sure there is: ‘member? One of ‘em is a Councilor an’ everything! Just pay her back and leave this one to rot!

Oh, right! There is another one! She can—

Her eyes snap open when someone grabs her arm, and when she spots him there, she sees red.

Why, why, why was he always here to screw everything up?!

He’s stronger than she remembers, and he nearly has her hoisted onto his stupid hoverboard, halfway through saying something like we have to leave now if you don’t want to get arrested or some other shit, which is absolutely insane considering that the last time they really said anything to each other he’d been trying to do far worse than just arrest her (and isn’t that kinda what he’s doin’ now, just to a different prison?)—but Jinx is fucking done with this shit, with all of it and all of them, so she stomps her foot on the board like she’d seen him do and they both go flying off of it, only she lands maybe half a foot in front of the Piltie.

Grace was never really her strong suit—and now, as she’s tackling the lady with all the rage in her body, that sure hasn’t changed.

There’s shouting now, from lotsa directions (an’ Vi’s calling out to her: get outta there, kid! like she’s still fucking eleven), and Jinx does her vest to tune all of it out as she pries what she was lookin’ for outta those stupid long fingers—but it doesn’t last. The Boy Savior lives up to his fucking name when that hoverboard smacks into her side and she’s sent sprawling towards the still-distant yet quickly-encroaching wave of enforcers, the gemstone nearly falling from her hand. He's on her in the next second, ignoring the Piltie’s surprised questioning (she still didn’t know him, ‘least what she can gather from the muddled words oozing from her mouth like oil) as he starts bearing the tar outta her ‘fore she can even sit up, keeping most of the blows to her head so everything gets more distant…and she makes a decision then that makes her smile and him freeze:

If she’s gonna go out anyways, why not make it on her own terms?

He yells in surprise when she pulls the pin at her waist…but it isn’t at her—and too many things—too many horrible, terrible things all come crashing together all at once:

The muffled footfalls, the way Vi’d stopped, then went faster at the kid comment…and the words Ekko says now:

“—sha, get BACK!”

BOOM!

You shouldn't have left her behind.

The edges around her vision start to blacken, the image of the curly brown hair she’d seen appear over his shoulder enough to keep her conscious for a few more seconds as the smoke and the fire fades enough to see the area around her.

It's no use. There’s nothing close to her save some of the rubble from the bridge. One of her shattered fingers curls around a broken bit of stone, painting it red as her limbs get too heavy for her to lift.

She’s gone.

Chapter Text

For a long, long time…after…there’s nothing.

Sure there’s the pain, but it’s really distant—like her head knows it’s there and some part of her feels it, the rocks and metal and burns that get progressively harder and harder to notice as time passes her by…but mostly, everything is too far away for it to matter. It’s like she’s only feeling echoes of sensations, like she’s watching some horrible fucking play of someone else’s life and experiencing anything they do secondhand.

Yet through it all, there’s this one, critical thing that keeps loopin’ about in her head—cycling through over and over again just like the first fires had in her nightmares a million years ago on the night Jinx was born.

It's kinda like that, now—only, she’s not sure what you become after being a Jinx. There’s probably no one in the whole freakin’ universe that could fuck up being a fuck-up.

But she had.

She sees that neatly dyed white hair, the way it splatters in some places with her blood as his fist comes back up again, she feels her hand twitch at her side as it finds its way to her belt. The way his head turns, the look of something like horror on his face as she offers him a smile…only to see, in the last second after the pin’s already halfway out the door, those big brown curls appearing over his shoulder.

And then there was nothing—not the pounding of boots behind her, not Little Man with his rope and savior complex, not Vi or the Piltie she shoulda let burn when she had the chance (though it’s super possible that she’d fixed that little problem)…and especially not Isha.

Just ashes and blood and fire.

Always with the fire.

The worst part is that it doesn’t change in her head, doesn’t get any worse or more messed up even stuck on repeat like it is, and she’s pretty sure that’s ‘cuz everybody livin’ in there all agree that there’s nothing that coulda gotten worse.

No one talks, no one laughs at her—hell, Mylo doesn’t even taunt her. It’s just vague feeling and that memory she can’t shut off (wouldn’t want to, even if she could).

That, of course, doesn’t last.

It takes a much longer time (relatively speaking…it could be seconds for all Jinx knows, what with the blood loss and the dipping in ‘n outta consciousness thing she’s got goin’ on) before she can piece together bits of what'd happened, and it’s more guessing than it is certainty.

There’s the eye, damaged by the pollution in the water, the Doctor, the feeling of being carried that she hadn’t felt in a long ass time, then cold metal beneath her, some frantic, garbled voices and a much too calm one…and then…

“I understand that what you’re experiencing must be rather painful,” she’s pretty sure she’d pulled away then, but something stopped her and he has no trouble at all lining up a needle somewhere on her face, “I’m afraid it’s only going to get worse.”

Whatever that was, whatever he’d done, it seemed to remind all the nerves in her body that she hadn’t died quite yet, and it’s like the explosion, like the fire, only now, she feels that burning everywhere. There’s blood pooling in her mouth, sloshing rapidly through veins that seem to rewire parts of her as it goes, carving through the screwed-up corridors parts of her insides have become like tiny liquid knives, and some nasty lookin’ pinkish liquid dripping down her face and bubbling out of her eyes like tears. It’s too hot, too painful, too much—and even though she wants nothing more than to be put out of her misery, the shit flowing through her and the Doctor don’t allow it. She doesn’t even pass out afterwards, far too aware of every little stabbing pain or prickling touch, of the way her own skin starts forcing itself back together, of the way the Doctor hums some quiet, pleasant tune in the background as she screams and he prepares more shit to pump her full of.

He only stops once she manages to rip her arm out of the leather straps that’d bound her to the bed and she grasps his wrist and squeezes just enough to make him let the next syringe go, and it shatters once it reaches the hard floor below them. He’d clicked his tongue, but she hadn’t understood anything that came out of his mouth because she’d been too busy staring at her veins, the discoloration easily visible thanks to her pale skin. She might have been speaking, then, but if any words escaped her lips, she isn’t able to recall them later because the next thing she spots is dad, slumped over in a nearby chair.

When she catches a glimpse of the thing hanging from his hand, she went numb, and after that, all she’d wanted was to get away.

So that’s what she did.

She doesn’t know exactly where she’d ended up after that, only that it shoulda taken her longer to get there than it had, that the way she’s movin’ now ain’t normal even for a Jinx like her…and when she finally stops to think, panting from all the runnin’ around she’d just done, she drops to her knees.

Why did he have her screwdriver?

I think you know.

The laughter that comes now is worse than it had been the night he’d brought that baby home, the night she figured out she still had a family and she’d promised to try not to screw it all up.

You failed at that, too. You fail at everything you do.

“Shut up! I don’t—”

Her hands dig into the sides of her head and she coughs this nasty, bloody phlegm into her own lap.

Yes you do. If you didn’t mess this up, then tell me somethin’, he pauses, then gets real close, too close, settles right next to her ear like some kinda bird on its perch, where is she, Jinx?

She doesn’t answer—can’t, when she remembers the curls from that looping memory, the same ones from all those years ago that Jinx thought were stupid, the ones that belonged to the kid holding onto that screwdriver—

WHERE IS SHE?!

The screwdriver dad had now, the one her sister wouldn’t have let go of until they were back at their workshop so she could put it away.

You can’t just say it like it is, can you? The pity in his tone is mocking, the fingers on her shoulder cold and prickly as he leans in closer, guess that’s her fault for trusting you. She’s gone, Jinx…and its all your fault.

Static and heat and poison fill the air after that, burning and corroding through her fervent denials of the accusations because they weren’t true—they couldn’t be true—

She’s gone.

Gone. Your fault.

She lets her head fall to the crumbling stone before her, the looming building in the distance grabbing her attention, calling, mocking, beckoning her, and suddenly, she knows exactly where she’d ended up.

There are plenty of places Silco’s told her an’ Isha not to wander into throughout the years, but there’s only ever been one place Jinx had told her kid sister to avoid…and now, kneeling in the ruins of the hellhole where her first life had gone up in flames, Jinx’s fingers curl and uncurl around the better part of a decade’s old ashes, tiny fragments of glass and stone and nameless debris shifting under hands too numb to really feel any of it. Nearby, a crow caws out into the open air and she hisses as the sound forces a sharp, stabbing pain deep into her already throbbing skull.

She grits her teeth and shakily rises to her feet, the motion too fast for her eyes to follow as she surveys the area around her with a deep frown.

She…she didn’t know for certain that Isha had…but then why would dad have that…but then there had been a lotta other people—

She jolts at the thought, the movement dragging another spike through her muddled mind. Right! There were other people!

Maybe…someone had seen where she went?

Doubt anyone could follow the kid to hell ‘n back, Pow—

“STOP CALLING ME THAT!”

Her voice echoes into the open air, and she hears the crow shift in its perch. Reaching into her pocket, she twirls her pointer finger around the gemstone, some vague irritation at its presence quickly replaced by a fury too intense to control as she remembers how she’d gotten it back.

Her hands twitch up to her temples from her sides, her eyes screwing shut as the people who aren’t really people argue around her over what to do next and of how she shouldn’t bother and of how she’d screwed up. Then she forces herself to tune them out as she gets an idea of her own:

The Piltie had been behind him when all this shit had gone down…her and Vi and apparently Silco, if his presence at the Doctor’s lab had been any indicator. They could know, right?

They’d know where she went—

You should listen to Mylo on this one, Pow, the nervous one starts, itching his arm in her peripherals, I really don’t think she’s coming back from that one—I mean, look at us.

The other one snorts, the sound more malicious than it normally is (and it ain’t normally real fuckin’ friendly, neither.).

’Course not: we’re dead, remember? Just like Ish—

“Shut up, shut up, shut up!!”

They laugh, and it sounds like the groaning of metal bearing just a little too much weight. Fuck this, fuck them! She’ll just figure this put on her own. Then everything will be fine.

It had to be.

What happens when it’s not?

This won’t work it won’t work she’s gone—

She grits her teeth without responding to the stupid question. She can’t accept that answer. She won’t. Jinx will gather up some stuff, invite a few guests, and have a nice little dinner in the process.

And that meant she had a little hike to make.

“Quit yer squirming, Piltie,” she grumbles, shifting to adjust one of the straps that kept the topsider immobilized. She just had to be taking a shower when Jinx came knocking!

You ever try dressing an unconscious Piltie when you don’t even know which closet they store their stupid Piltie clothes in? It’s not fucking fun!

And apparently, Jinx hadn’t hit her hard enough to keep her out, ‘cuz here she is now only halfway to the party and here not-so-little miss topsider is freakin’ the fuck out, screamin’ as loud as her gag’ll let her, pulling as much as she can against the makeshift carrier Jinx’d made outta the scraps of one of Silco’s old coats. He unfortunately hadn’t been in his office when she’d gone to look for him, but she’d left him a nice little note letting him know where she’d be just in case he came back again while she was out…it would be much easier for her if her guests RSVP’ed.

The Piltie jerks on her back again and she growls in response: she was trying not to hurt her too badly—can’t do much with a dead lady—but she was makin’ it real difficult.

When Jinx starts getting so angry her temper gets the best of her, she abruptly swings the still-wet topsider over her shoulder, surprising even herself with the show of strength (mostly ‘cuz she’d had to hold herself back from tossing her face-first into a nearby cement wall). The Piltie, for her part, looks terrified…fucking finally!

Ain’t it kinda funny how you were worried ‘bout bein’ too weak to carry the kid around and now that she’s gone, you could do it with one hand?

“Shut it! She’s not gone!” Jinx spits, her eyes a violent magenta that she hopes will be scary enough to force the boys back to whatever hole they’d crawled out of. The Piltie she now effortlessly holds up under one of her arms with a single hand tries to pull away from her, but Jinx rolls her eyes and fixes her with a glare, allowing her grip to tighten so much it starts to hurt her fingers.

“Knock it off already! Do you want me to knock your dumbass back out?”

Mylo cuts in before the topsider finishes shaking her head, his stupid laughter digging under her skin as she grinds her teeth together. The Piltie looks like she might start hyperventilating, and Jinx forces her own gaze away, nearly shivering in the cold night air due to the large wet spot a certain not-dry Piltie had left behind after hanging over her back for so long.

You can’t kill her if you want to hear what she’s got to say, he goads.

“I know!”

The topsider is shaking and for some reason it pisses her off, and she can’t stop herself from looking into her stupid, Piltie eyes as she hisses out a retort.

“This is all your fault, you know?” she snaps her eyes shut at the stab in her head, her other hand coming up to harshly rub at her temple. Why did everything have to suck so bad?! “You shoulda just went home like I told you to, but you just couldn’t fucking help yourself, could you?! Just had to find one more way to fuck us over!” Her voice cracks and Jinx freezes when she notices a tear fall from her own chin.

Wow, you get her to be afraid of ya’ and immediately start bawling: way to screw it up! he pops the “p” and she knows by the way the Piltie stills in front of her with a re-evaluating gaze that he’s right.

…why had she stopped here, again? There’d been a reason…she thinks…

She shakes her head, forcing the Piltie closer to her so she can throw her back over her back again…and this time, the Piltie doesn’t try to pull away.

Thinking about it makes her laugh, and she keeps it up all the way back to the party.

Vi turns out to be a lot easier to handle than the Piltie, but that’s prolly ‘cuz Sevika’d roughed her up pretty good beforehand.

It’s a good thing Sevika hadn’t been conscious herself when Jinx’d got there, because she ain’t in the bestest of moods and—and—

And she was supposed to watch the kid—

—can’t be mad at her when this is all your fault to begin with—

Miss her miss her miss her miss her where did she go?

Jinx falls to her knee as the surge of thoughts that weren’t really all hers tears through her dumb head, and once she realizes she’s making this pathetic little noise to go along with her stupid hissy fit she cuts herself off, shaking her head as she makes her way to one of the empty chairs she’d dragged here for her get together. She has to force herself to ignore the stupid Piltie’s stupid trailing eyes, cursing herself again for not just knocking her out already to be done with the staring—

But when the Piltie abruptly averts her eyes, Jinx realizes she’d been saying that all out loud and she raps a knuckle against one of her temples. Now wasn’t the time, she had to focus…

What was she doing again?

Why are you here? The other boy presses, his nervous voice sounding strained and too close as it sounds directly into her ear, it’s not like this is going to change anything—

“You don’t know that!” She spits, though the words come out a whole lot more pleading-like than she’d meant ‘em to. The Piltie shifts and Jinx’s head twitches in her direction, but the anger she’d felt peters out into something more frantic (frantic good, or frantic bad?) when she hears the sound of shifting rock and rubble from outside of the ruined remains of the building.

Must be…

“Jinx?” Silco calls out, his voice carrying enough that it pricks her ears like the sound had split into tiny little accusatory knives, and she reaches up to cover her ears before they leak out of her head—they could do that, she thinks, if they got too screwed up.

And what better way to screw ‘em up than ta’ have your guests show up too early an’ spoil the surprise, ruin the conversation meant for the main course?

What are you doing why is this helping—

—not helping why does it all hurt so much we should just go back to being dead—

We’re not supposed to be here, we’re not supposed to be here, we’re not—

She grits her teeth and moves before she can think too much about it, and soon enough he’s slumped over across the table from Vi and she can keep setting everything up even though the dumb Piltie keeps stealing these little glances at her when she thinks Jinx ain’t looking…but Jinx is always looking, she sees everything now, hears it all: the way the wind ominously blows through a ruin nearly a decade in the making, the way Vi keeps snoring in the shitty not-sleep Jinx’d shoved her in (she made her choice she made her choice it’s not our fault—), the way the Piltie keeps shifting, the slow, even breathing from Silco’s side of the table…so much.

Too much.

Jinx shakes her head and stands, fastening Vi to the chair she’d shoved her into whilst the dumb Piltie (stupid, stupid Piltie) watches in mute horror. Jinx likes her better like this, unable to command the conversation through the gag, unable to do something stupid like take the shiny rock that her an’ Isha had stolen together (we do everything together, an’ if we weren’t such a coward we’d go join her—)

Everything. Ev-r-y-thing. Not this, though…where would Isha sit?

She’s not coming—

Should Vi have a gag, too?

Can’t. Won’t be able to tell you where Isha went—

Vi won’t be able to tell you…

Jinx sets up the decorations, the stuff she’d made, the food, the dessert…and then, she waits. She mostly tunes things out after that, occasionally shooting the Piltie a sharp glare every time she got too fidgety and loud for Jinx’s taste.

It's a damned shame that it’s so clear outside, the night sky easily visible from the perch her monkey bomb had blown out of the building all those years ago—

Among other things. Other people.

She grits her teeth, tired of that half-concerned look the dumb topsider keeps fixing her with whenever she forgets to be afraid, of the words she can’t stop from drowning her in her mind or falling from her lips, of the pained way Vi sometimes shifts against the ropes fastening her to the chair in her sleep…and eventually, when she’s had enough from everyone—alive and dead—she cuts the lights, content to hang out in the rubble a bit further away.

In earshot of everything , but not close or light enough to make anything out.

It only spurs the boys on further.

Not close enough for you to mess it all up, either.

Where is she where is she where is—

Guess you already took care of that though, huh?

Jinx ‘til the end, right?

She bites her lip until she tastes copper, squeezes her hands together until she can’t feel anything except the pressure as her knuckles pop, until all that she should know is that nice, soothing pain that’d always helped her remember where she was and what she was doing.

Until things felt real again.

But this time it doesn’t work. This time, she’s all alone and not alone all at once, her screwed-up head’s endless fucking company always chattering in the background until the only thoughts left rattling around there is the background…and it never stops.

It could be seconds or hours later when she finally checks back into reality, the sounds of this…this husk pretending to be a dead girl seven years in the grave stirring against all those ropes, of her voice calling out for anyone, of the topsider’s muffled mewling the only answer she gets besides the stale scent of death and dust that’s stuck in the air like a curse for all this time, besides the creak of rope on solid wood.

Just that, and the darkness that came with it.

You wish it’d stay dark for you, too.

It’s dark for her, now. For the kid.

Her arms curl tighter around her torso from where she lies in the rubble—

Dad never got back up after he took his little dirt-nap here.

She tucks her chin to her chest, hoping the motion will drown them all out.

They never stop, they never stop—

You wouldn’t want us to, he spits, suddenly too close to her ear, little baby doesn't wanna be left all alone.

She clenches her jaw til it aches, then presses harder.

But you know, if that were really true…

He leans in closer and she gasps when his not-breath tickles the hairs on the back of her neck.

Then you shouldn’t have killed her, Pow—

She slams her head against the rubble below her, hoping the motion would be enough to startle him into silence. It doesn’t work, doesn’t shut out his words any more than anything she’s ever tried has, and she has to stifle a whimper at the way he laughs.

“Powder?”

She presses her head further into the ground—maybe if she tried hard enough, she could force it all to just…go away.

It doesn’t make his laughter stop, doesn’t stop the way the Piltie shifts in her seat, the way she can hear dad start to stir from further down…and it definitely doesn’t stop the way Vi keeps calling out to someone even as she silently begs her not to.

Everything's messed-up, just let it all end—

Not until we save the kid—

They get hysterical, now, and she forces herself to a sitting position even as he jeers at her from every direction all at once.

Save her? From what? decomposing?

She mechanically reaches into her pocket and pulls out the lighter she’d borrowed from Silco, pushing herself up even though every bit of her body tells her to stay down. She can’t stay down, now, can’t give up…

Can’t or won’t?

They cackle as she ignores them, as the whispers steadily increase in volume when she silently pushes herself off the cement outcropping she’d been resting on, as she tosses the lighter in a precisely straight line even as the world—her world—shatters and burns around them.

That’s the thing about Jinxes: they’d tear everything apart just to turn around and make it worse.

And here you are, thinkin’ this time’ll be any different…

>She swallows at his words, privately pleased he didn’t seem to get it. This time would be different than all the others, because this time, if she really did screw it all up again…then she’d…she’d finally—

“Powder!”

“Jinx!”

—finally—

“God, you’re ok!”

Let go.

“Jinx,” he starts, sounding like he’s in control of the situation despite bein’ literally tied to a chair, “what are you—”

“Where is she?” Hah. Hahaha! Her voice is so brittle! It’s like she’d been munching on rocks or somethin’—

Stopped the kid from doing that, once, he reminds her from where he’s chillin’ in his seat—one that Vi watches in a sad sorta horror (could she hear them, too?) when her eyes catch on his not-so-real hair, saved her from a tummy ache, but not from your own explosive?

He tuts at her even whilst the others gasp or call out to her (getting hard to keep track ‘a who’s doin’ what) as her hands curl around her head, tryna’ block out his dumb voice from saying all these head-stabby things that kill part of her with every syllable that oozes from his ghost like tar.

You really gotta get your priorities straight—‘course, it don’t matter too much anymore, huh?

The other one nods, his tone absolute as it tolls in the air like a cathedral bell. Nothing matters anymore.

She tightens her grip and one laughs as the other sighs, but she doesn’t quite catch the words the not-ghost and the drug lord say as she tries to shut it all out.

That’s right, his voice is almost gentle—he’d always been the nicer of the two, just give up.

“I can’t,” she breathes, aware she’s panting too quick to be real healthy. Silco’s good eye widens as he watches her, and she nearly whimpers again when this uncertain, but regretful look colors his face just as sure as the two of them had colored those chess pieces.

She tried eating those, too.

She laughs, but it comes out all wrong, all sad!

Not fit for a party at all!

She turns on her, then, the zombie, the ghost, the traitor wearing the skin of the dead.

“That kid,” she forces out from teeth that won’t stop chattering whenever they get too close together. “Where’d she go?”

She hears Silco sigh and watches Vi’s face twist in pain, and her hands finally leave her head so they can ball at her sides.

They don’t seem to like the way she paints everything she touches, but she can’t really bring herself to care right now.

Stop, the nice one warns, his voice a mask of warning as he adjusts the goggles on his head, you don’t want to know—

“Shut UP!” She barks, causing Vi to jolt before she can even spit it out.

“Powder…,” she calls out to her, her hands flexing under the ropes. Distantly, a part of her notes that the Piltie’s hair has dried.

Just how long had it been?

Long enough.

Too long.

Vi shakes her head and Jinx’s stomach turns. “Pow, she’s not…she didn’t…”

Jinx takes a step back, shaking her head: like if she increased this physical distance that she’d somehow be saved from this ugly, bubbling shit that Vi was about to spew everywhere.

Like it wouldn’t have to be real if only she’d walk away.

“I’m so sorry, Powder.”

She keeps shaking her head, slowly at first, but then more frantically as she turns on Silco sitting across from her. “She’s lying,” she states, hoping his words will make it all better just like they had tried to do at this very spot all those years ago.

The whispers in her head grow louder as he answers, morphing into something angry and awful and deafening.

“Jinx,” he starts slowly, either oblivious or uncaring of the way this something in his voice cuts into her soul. “She wasn’t there when I arrived.”

She waits, wide-eyed as he watches her apprehensively. When she doesn’t interrupt him, he continues—looking at her all the while with that same look the Piltie’s been fixin’ her with all night!

I thought he’s supposed to be different…

Maybe he is. But you’re not.

“If I could bring her back, I would, Jinx, but I can’t,” his voice is even and about as apologetic as he can even get. Her hands come up to her scalp again and he watches her with a guarded sort of worry. “I understand you’re upset,” he continues all quiet-like—like the words aren’t enough to destroy his entire world like they are for her. “So just let me—”

“Powder, stop!” Vi cuts in, somehow not feeling the way Jinx’s world has shifted on its axis, the way the bile threatens to crawl up her throat and choke her from the inside out. “You can’t listen to this, this fucker,” she spits, “so just come with—”

Jinx grinds her teeth to try and stop their laughter, but it only gets worse as their words sink in, as they burn like acid and seep down to her bones.

“That’s not—that isn’t true!” she desperately breathes, her hands sticky from all this stuff leaking from all these holes she’d opened wherever her nails painted her denial on her body like her tattoos.

Their tattoos.

Her nails dig further into her scalp. Silco starts talking again before she can pick up where she left off.

“Jinx, you can’t trust anything she says!” His eyes are stern again, worried. “You can’t leave—"

“I wasn’t going to go with her,” Jinx spits, cutting him off before he can finish speaking. Silco blinks, obviously not expecting such a venomous reply. “She left me, you think I’m gonna jump at the chance to reboard that sinking ship? Plus, I told you before: we’re not allowed to abandon her. I wouldn’t ‘a left even if I wanted to—not when she’s out there, somewhere.”

Somewhere alone, afraid…

Didn’t know you could fear anything from the grave…

Dad stares at her for a moment, clearly parsing her words. Jinx shakes her head, staring off towards that fancy fucking Councilor building far off into the distance.

The Piltie tenses at the table.

“Jinx, your sister is dead,” he states plainly.

Dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead, dead dead deadeadeadeadeadead—

“…sister?” Vi chokes out, somewhere far away. The Piltie’s looking at her again, a small noise coming through the gag as she stares—like there ain’t a billion other thingssome rich topsider fuck could find to watch like an animal in a cage—

“But this…whatever it is you’re doing here—”

She cuts him off in her fury, “I just want you to tell me where SHE WENT!!!”

Silco sighs, sounding more tired than maybe Jinx’d thought possible. “—it won’t fix anything. She’s gone.”

Her hands ball and twist at her sides, this sharp, stabby head pain finally bad enough that she can’t take it anymore as she drops to her knees.

Gonegonegonegonegonegone—

“Jinx! What’s wrong?!”

“Powder!”

She cries out when another spike shoots through her, starting at her head and zipping down her spine just like it had when the Doctor—

“Dad,” she whimpers, pressing her forehead to the floor. “It hurts, make it stop!” When he doesn’t reply (or at least, she can’t hear him if he does), she curls her arms around her head. “WHY DID YOU LET HIM DO THIS TO ME?!”

“I-It was the only way to save you!” he answers with a panic she’d never heard from the man before.

"You weren't supposed to save me!" Vi shifts at that, but Jinx can't bring herself to care.

She presses her head farther into the cement, this liquid fire in her veins that she’d just as easily get out than the ghosts in her head oozing slowly through her arms, dripping down her legs, pounding through her skull.

’Course he’d save you, it’s always you.

Gone, gone, gone, dead, dead, dead.

“All of you, SHUT UP!”

“Powder, I…it’s-it’s ok, just calm down,” the not-ghost says, sounding so very far away.

Jinx wishes she could be that far gone, too.

Maybe then she’d…she’d be with her again.

Maybe that’s…

“I’m scared,” she whispers to no one, already knowing what she’d have to do to catch up with the kid and not really diggin’ it at all. The whispers get worse, scratchier, booming in this real final sorta way that she doesn’t wanna fuck with—

But the Piltie’s gasp draws her out of her own head again (she’s still here? Why hadn’t she…?) and as she pushes herself up, her eyes widen as she finally sees why:

“Isha?”

It comes out as a croak, and when the dirty, scratched up kid locks eyes with her from across the ruins that this big ass room used to be, the girl’s face crumples and she darts into her, those big yellow eyes squeezed shut as she shakes in the hug that she’d started.

Jinx’s hand finds her face as everything gets blessedly quieter, as Vi ‘n Silco stop trying to interrupt each other because apparently, despite not being unconscious ‘n all that like she was, they were just as shocked to see the kid as Jinx was.

But for once in her gods-awful life, the shock ain’t all that bad.

She wastes no time after that initial surge of disbelief in pushing herself back up to her knees so she can pull her sister into a hug, and her crying ain’t all that pretty, an’ the pain definitely isn’t gone, but with Isha right here and ok and alive, she finds that she can’t quite bring herself to care.

“How…?” She hears Silco breathe from down the table. Jinx tunes him out—tunes them all out, nothing else matters but this.

But her.

“Are you…real?” She finally feels her mouth asking, the doubt that’d been building up along with the static in the back of her head finally giving voice to itself without her permission. In response, Isha tries to pull away, but—but she can’t just leave again right? “Never mind! I didn’t mean it, please don’t go!”

Isha coughs into her ear as Jinx’s arms tighten around her—she can’t leave, she can’t—but dad’s voice finally reaches her ears, a slightly alarmed twinge to it catching her attention because he can’t be worried right now, everything’s fine—

“Jinx, you’re hurting her—”

She practically shoves the girl away at that in her panic—was that why she’d tried ending the hug, did Jinx mess it all up again?—but as soon as her sister coughs a couple times she walks right back to her, a wobbly smile on her face as her hands come up to her chest.

”Not leaving. Family never leaves family.”

Jinx can feel the tears fall down her cheeks at that, fat and gross and ugly as Isha watches her. It’s only really then that she gets a good look at the kid’s injuries, and she sucks in a breath at the dried blood on her forehead and the gash in her pant leg.

“I-I didn’t mean to—I’m so sorry, I—” she cuts off when the kid figures out what she’s lookin’ at, and the girl sighs before shaking her head.

”’S’ok. I’m tough.”

When the girl grins at her, flexing her muscles like they’re just having a chat in their workshop instead of havin’ the world’s shittiest tea party, Jinx’s gaze softens a bit.

“Yeah, you’re tough. So tough,” Jinx whispers, pulling the kid in closer for a shorter, more careful sorta hug.

When she pulls away, Isha scuffs her shoe on the cement below them and Jinx waits for her to say what’s on her mind.

”How come dad’s tied up?”

She feels the smile fall from her lips and Isha frowns.

“I…,” she starts, then stops. How was she supposed to explain any of this? Was there a way to even do that that would even make any sense? “I…got carried away lookin’ for you, I guess. Thought maybe the other people from the bridge would know more than I did? An’ he had your screwdriver, so…”

Isha hums in confusion, but she quickly shakes it off.

”…what now?” she points between the two women—her other guests at the table—before turning back to Jinx.

“I…I don’t…I don’t know how to fix this,” she admits quietly, a frail quality to her own voice as she ducks her head down. Both Vi and Silco start speaking over each other after that, each one apparently having their own ideas as to what they thought she should do…but Jinx clamps her hands back over her ears in a desperate attempt to shut them out.

Then he kid taps her wrist and she looks up through the haze of pain that keeps pounding through her skull.

”That’s ok. I can help. We can fix everything.”

Jinx’s eyes widen before she huffs a laugh and Isha huffs it right back, and a part of her chills out a bit at that.

“Well…whaddya have in mind, pepperbox?”

Isha hums before turning to look at the table behind them, her eyes catching on the dessert Jinx had cooked up just before fetching the Piltie.

”Feed Isha?”

Jinx laughs again before she stands up, ignoring the Jinxes and the Powders and the Mmphs as she makes her way to the center of the table and picks up the cupcake, eyeing it a second before removing the lone sprinkle and handing it to the kid. She lets the gem roll between her fingers as the kid tucks the cupcake away in her belt pouch.

”You don’t wanna hurt her, right?” Isha points to the Piltie with a cock of her head. Jinx turns away, suddenly uncomfortable because to be honest, she’d forgotten the stupid topsider was there…this probably wasn’t the kinda meeting the lady’d had in mind when she’d asked Jinx to set it up.

Probably not what your old man thought it’d be, either. Guess you’re a disappointment to everyone.

She grits her teeth, unaccustomed to the sharp spike of pain that shoots through her head whenever his laughter gets too loud…but Isha’s frosting-stained hand reminds her of what she’d been talking about as it loops into her own.

”Or her?” This time the kid points to her not-sister, the one who’d been dead and then not, a Zaunite and then a traitor. She shakes her head violently in an effort to will their pointed jabs away—now wasn’t the time—but the kid must read something that Jinx ain’t so sure is there in her face, because a second later, the girl nods like she’s made some profound decision, turning to her with her hands back up to her chest.

”That’s ok, too. Know why?”

Jinx humors her even though she ain’t feelin’ all that humorful, her voice kinda monotone despite her best efforts as she eyes the girl at her feet. “Why’s that, kiddo?”

”Repeats are OK.”

Her mouth drops open a bit at that, and some more stupid tears drip down her stupid face as something like an idea clicks into place in her head. Maybe…maybe the kid was right.

Maybe they just…needed to go back one.

With that decided, she leans down to scoop her sister into her arms and takes a step forwards, lightly setting the girl on dad’s lap even as he watches her like one might a street dog, wary of her next movements. The next thing she does is unhook Fishbones from his ceiling chain she’d set up, and she hands it to the kid even as the topsider makes some panick-y kinda noise at that or when Vi tries to get her attention again. She swings Pow-pow over her shoulder, too…and finally, she makes her way to the topsiders side, far too aware of how it makes Vi desperately tug at those real tight ropes.

The Piltie is practically hyperventilating at this point, her stupid blue eyes wide as them fancy topsider saucers as Jinx slowly pulls out her knife—

And as the Piltie lets out a squeak and Vi starts actually crying for her to stop, stop, stop!, Jinx stabs it—

Into the chair, between the Piltie’s fingers.

The look she gets in response makes her turn away—it’s half like she’s crazy and half in disbelief and somehow also like she’s still pitying her, which pisses Jinx off. She had to get outta here before she did something you can’t just take a repeat for.

Dad doesn’t seem real shocked when Jinx loops her hand around the back of his chair and tugs, and the last thing the topsider and Vi both see is Jinx, clad in all her weapons sans Fishbones and the knife as she drags the most dangerous guy in the city out of the ruins of the cannery…and Isha, one arm wrapped around the cannon and the other holding the remaining half of the cupcake, frosting covering her face.

Elsewhere…

Fuck.

That had been—that had been bad.

He doesn’t know what happened to Vi or the topsider after the initial blast knocked out the sheriff and tossed half a dozen enforcers off the side of the bridge, doesn’t know what happened to Jinx after she’d pulled the pin to end them both…

No, the only thing Ekko knows is that despite it all, he’d at least followed through on that promise he’d made her, but never told her about that day in the arcade all those years ago:

I’ll keep the kid safe.

And he had…but it’d cost him. Fuck, the force that the blast had hit him with had been at least enough to dislocate his leg, and it’d sent him and the kid in his arms flying even on his hoverboard…but he’d gotten her out of there. I mean, fuck, it was his fault she was even there at all.

It meant that they both lived. It meant that once the girl had woken up ('cuz the blast had knocked her unconscious), she'd been heartbroken, that she’d pushed off of him after they’d landed under the bridge, that he was in no shape to stop her as she sprinted off despite the dozes of enforcers and the danger just above their heads.

And now, as he struggles to prop himself up against the cement under the bridge, he only really has one thought:

Where the hell are you, kid?

Chapter Text

Things are kinda quiet, after, and she don’t remember parts of it all, either.

Bits and pieces—important ones—are lost in this new space in the back of her stupid head, this void that whatever the hell was in the shit now flowing through her veins had forcefully carved there. Even now, three days later, it’s still healing, still sending these paralyzing shockwaves throughout her entire body, miniature explosions flashing and booming inside a head that’s too full of all ‘a this old shit to hold anything more.

It shows in the way those chunks stay missing.

Jinx prolly couldn’t ‘a told anyone how they’d gotten back home—it’s like…like one second, they’d been at that dinner party, and she’d had dad tethered to that chair with Isha…and then the next, she’s asleep on that old mattress on the floor of their apartment where she hadn’t slept for ages, holding onto her sister like she’d up ‘n evaporate if she let her go.

Isha didn’t seem to mind, even goin’ so far as ta’ compliment her on her new eyes.

They’re pink, now. Jinx would rather they be pretty much anything else; the boys have so much to say about the color, of the shit day it reminds her of for more reasons than she could count, of what it’d mean on any other person.

But since it’s her that wants ‘em gone, of course they end up staying. Dad says they’ll prolly never go back to normal.

Isn’t that funny?

…

He has this meetin’ with topside or somethin’ on the second day, an’ he might not know it, but Jinx’d followed him to the whole thing, overheard everything that the stupid Piltie guy with a fucking death wish (who the heck’s dumb enough to raid a Shimmer factory with just two people?) says to him…

And later, when her sentimental old man parks it in front of Vander’s old statue (one he’d typically avoid like a street beggar) and chats the guy up like there was still some scrap of ‘im left to hear anything…

Well, it makes her think.

She doesn’t go home after that. Needs some time to think, some time to claw at that still-closing hole in the back of her head where her family wouldn’t be around to ask too many questions…or stop her.

Could they even stop you, now?

It ain’t even said to be mean—she can hear the curiosity plain in his twitchy-ass voice, but it doesn’t hafta’ be for it ta’ piss her off., an’ she don’t really wanna be around any of the people still around that care about her while she deals with it.

Which “it” she’s talkin’ about is something up for debate.

It’s the next day, now, and she’s pacing the length of the propeller tryna’ not answer this dipshit in her head out loud when the door bangs open, and Jinx silently jumps down, catching a rope so she can hang out of sight. To her surprise, it’s not just dad, but Sevika (stupid, stupid fuck-up Sevika) as well that stride into the middle of their workshop like they own the damn place (maybe forget the fact that he kinda does).

“—ought for sure they’d be here,” the ogre growls out, her stupid fat head shifting from side to side as she surveys their space. It felt like an invasion—like, yeah, Sevika’s always known how to get here, but it doesn’t mean Jinx likes her to come here. Not that that should even be the focus of anything right now, though.

Dad sighs, shaking his head with a tired looking frown.

“Hmph. I was worried when she turned up missing, but if they’re both gone, it at least means she isn’t out doing something stupid,” he replies calmly, sounding half-like he’s answering some unspoken question and half like he’s talking to himself. “She wouldn’t drag Isha into anything too dangerous.”

Both? Isha? What’s he on about?

The ogre makes a low noise in her throat, her boots thumping around above Jinx’s head as she keeps up with this half-assed search with an energy the lady didn’t usually show outside of a fight or a card table. “You sure about that? Something’s got those damned Firelights stirred up again…”

Silco shakes his head before walking out of eyeshot. “I’m not concerned about that—their little leader went missing after the incident at the bridge…I’m sure that’s more Violet’s doing than anything else.”

Jinx sees red for a minute before shaking herself out of it.

Just forget it, just forget it, just forget it.

She had to pay attention—and that meant no bullshit, not right now.

“Her again?” Sevika snorts, her boots stopping while she speaks. “Thought she went back topside with the enforcer broad.”

Silco hums, oblivious to the way Jinx’s breath catches in her throat from far below them (it’s fine it’sfinefinefine). “Last I heard, they hadn’t yet found their way to another checkpoint…but there’s been no reports from the good sheriff since his brief stay at the hospital, and she was last seen with their leader before the…event at the cannery. Perhaps she’s simply resurfaced among them. It would be more convenient for us.”

Sevika sighs, sounding as tired as someone of her dumb old age actually should. “Great, yet another person to fuck this all up…,” she trails off before shifting again, and Jinx listens as she moves a bit closer to his side before she continues. “The chem barons called for an assembly.”

“Of course they have…,” she can hear the irritation in his voice, the brooding silence that follows. Then he lets out a long, slow breath, and the two of them begin to walk away.

When the door shuts behind them, Jinx’s head aches, but she still manages to put the rest of the problem together that ol’ Lefty’d started saying out…and surprisingly, for once in her life, she finds it don’t piss her off like it should. Instead, she’s just…

Tired.

“Woah!”

Getting inside this stupid place wasn’t all that difficult—but then, it ain’t like she’d expected it ta’ be.

“Shit!”

“Get inside!”

She’s not a huge fan of all the guns that immediately train on her the second their chump-brained guards remember that they had ‘em, but she also don’t really care about none ‘a that, her hands hangin’ loosely at her sides while she boredly looks around for what she’d came for—

Bingo.

A half-second and some loose rock pellets shot from those little bitch blasters that his people carried around later, and Jinx’s ran over to her side, dropping to a knee so she’s eye-level with the little pepperbox—the one still huddled in a ball next to her “friend”, steadfastly ignoring his attempts to get her to come play with him…

‘Least ‘til he spots Jinx, anyways.

“Heyya, kid,” Jinx utters, her voice more exhausted than she’d like it ta’ be. When Isha looks up, though, her eyes full of hope and tears in equal measures, the ice in Jinx’s stupid dead heart thaws just enough to get a real smile outta her even over the too-loud everything goin’ on around them.

That’s all it takes for the girl to pounce at her, though Jinx has no difficulty at all with keeping them both upright. In another life, maybe she really coulda kept hauling her skinny ass with her for the rest of their lives…

Jinx squeezes her a little harder when his second in command comes (Stain or Skull or something, she thinks) closer with his pointy stick, eyeing her through that shit mask of his like it’s imported Noxian steel instead of, like, wood as he grumbles out a demand.

“Hand over the weapon.”

She tilts her head at him, some part of her laughing a bit when it makes the losers to his sides tense. When Isha ducks away, Jinx pushes herself up, eyeing him as her hand curls around the holster of her pistol, ignoring the way it makes the shaking hands around the grips of the gem blasters all around them level them in her direction—

And then no one moves when, in one quick motion, she tosses the pistol at his feet, rolling her eyes at the wary confusion in the purple man’s gaze before she turns back to her sister. The friend stares up at her through his own little mask, looking all bewildered-like as he swallows nervously (honestly, his closeness to ‘em is prolly the only reason no one open fired…well, that an’ her own scariness, anyways), but Jinx barely spares him a glance as she crouches back down at the kid’s side, not even looking back up when his footsteps slowly draw closer. Apparently the ruckus drew him from his little tree house.

Him, and his guests.

“Hey,” she calls down to her ignoring the frantic way the kid tries to explain (”Didn’t mean to—was just trying to find you—got jumped—took me here—wasn’t gonna leave you.”) how she’d ended up here as Jinx runs a hand through those thick curls of hers. “I’m gonna stick around here a minute,” she ignores the frankly hilarious variety of responses her words get outta the bugs flitting all around them, focusing only on the way the kid’s brows furrowing together in confusion as she presses her cheek against Jinx’s palm. “So why don’t you go play for a bit. Promise I’ll fetch ya’ when I leave?”

She holds a pinkie out to the kid, and after a moment’s hesitation where the ghost, the bird, and the cupcake all of the undercity wanted for dinner draw closer, Isha wraps their fingers together, a small, but genuine smile on her lips despite the obvious confusion this whole thing’s gotten from the girl.

That’s all the convincing the baby Firelight seemed to need, though, and a second later, he’s dragging her towards the ladder to get to the rope bridges swinging around in the breeze, probably super eager to be, say, anywhere other than where they’d both currently been.

Jinx rolls her neck with a hand, watching as the pipsqueak scales the tree with a deftness that could rival the boy’s own even though he’s lived here maybe his whole, small life. When he stops a few feet away, his mouth forming around questions she’s not real interested in answering, Jinx spins on a heel and—before he or anyone else can say otherwise, she scales a different part of the tree herself, making sure he can see where her legs hang out of the window as she props herself up in the workshop’s sill, closing her eyes so she can listen to the sounds of people arguing in hushed whispers or the muffled sound of kids playing in the background, of hoverboards flying throughout the dense undercity air.

It takes them only a few minutes to get up to the place she’s yet to stir from, and she makes no move to go anywhere until the ghost gets a bit too close for comfort. For once in her dumb afterlife, Vi actually stops when she sees Jinx is about to push herself out of her perch (relax, she’d ‘a been fine: there’s a whole bunch places below she could nab a hold of if she needed to break the fall), backing up to stand by where the other two are shifting across the room.

She ain’t surprised when Vi’s the one to break the frankly awkward silence, though Jinx makes absolutely no move to acknowledge she’d even spoke.

“Powder…are you—I mean, how are you feeling?”

Hah. There’s that cautious tone again—though in all fairness, the lady had an actually good reason to be on edge this time. She had kidnapped her, after all.

Jinx keeps her eyes closed, the rhythmic beating of her own heart oddly soothing from where one of her hands curls around her own wrist.

Tha-thump. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.

“…come on, please just answer—I'm not trying to pull anything here.”

Personally, Jinx thinks that’s a pretty dumb thing to point out considering she’s not even the one who’d set this up, but that’s just her.

“…Jinx, please.”

Tha-thump. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.

A breeze blows past her, catching the half of her body hangin’ outta the window in its whoosh, and it’s oddly nice considering how un-nice things were about to become.

‘Course, they’d be pretty shit no matter how this idea of her’s panned out, but that’s just for her: it didn’t hafta’ be for all of ‘em.

He tries, next, his voice carrying an authority he never used to try ‘n use on her…not that it would have worked back then, anyways.

Heck, it doesn’t even work now!

“How the hell did you find this place? Who led you here?”

Jinx snorts, surprised to find anything he says actually funny to her anymore.

“Uh, you did?”

He seems shocked when she answers, if the way he pauses is of any indication. He recovers quick enough, but she can tell he still doesn’t get it.

“What?”

It’s flat. Confrontational. She can’t really blame him, yet she does anyways.

She’s an ass like that.

“Did you really think I let you walk back then just for shits and giggles?”

She still don’t open her peepers, but she don’t really gotta to see that he understands what she’s saying now. The room gets tenser as he steps forwards, prolly pretty angry (though at who is up for debate), but when her eyes open and she turns to face him with a promise more meaningful than anything she’s ever actually said, he cools his jets. Good; it ain’t like she actually needed a gun to kill him or nothin’.

Not anymore.

“…I…Silco knows where we are?”

A hint of panic. That, at least, she can understand.

Jinx turns to stare ahead of her, looking back at where her feet are propped up against the other end of the sill. “If Silco knew where you were, this place wouldn’t exist.”

There’s a silence, after that, but she doesn’t really know what it means. Doesn’t care to, either, but maybe that’s just ‘cuz she ain’t havin’ the bestest of times, here.

“You’ve known where we’ve been all this time?”

When Jinx doesn’t answer, he continues, though it takes a moment for it to really sink in his stupidly thick skull. “I…,” he starts, his voice quiet and uncertain before he shakes himself outta it…though the ghost ends up speaking first.

“Jinx, just—let’s just talk for a while, ok?

She nearly scoffs at that—what the hell else would you call what they’re doing right the fuck now?—but she doesn’t react.

Ain’t why she’s here…and if the conflicted-looking Piltie by her side’s any indication, it ain’t why Vi’s here, either.

“Why aren’t you answering her?”

He’s angry, but not at her, exactly—or maybe she’s reading it wrong again. Who knows, anymore?

Jinx shrugs, holding up her nails in front of her face as she relaxes further into the sill. “We’re not on speaking terms at the moment,” she answers simply.

He shifts whilst Vi watches her in this broken sort’ve disbelief—like that’s somehow surprising after everything.

His next question, though, is fair.

“…and we are?”

She cracks a grin at that, though her words are a hevkuva lot less humored than her face. “Nah, but I didn’t really swing by for a chat,” she shifts to sit up, drawing one hand over her knee as she relaxes into her new position.

“Then why are you here—and don’t bullshit me,” he warns seriously, the conflict in his eyes exchanged for an easier to understand hostility. “If you just wanted to grab the kid, you’d already be gone.”

No shit.

“Have to think about something, an’ I needed a place where Silco wouldn’t be breathin’ down my neck ‘bout it,” she says, blowing her fringe out of her face when the wind shifts it in front of her eyes.

The three of them (including the uncharacteristically quiet Piltie) exchange wary glances with each other before the Boy Savior keeps at it, diggin’ away for an answer she’s honestly not sure if he’ll wanna hear or not. “And what’s that?”

She finally turns back to him, then, her face probably a bit too serious, if the way they all tense and he glares at her says anything about it.

‘Course, the looks all turn into shock when she actually says her piece, though:

“I’m thinking about turning myself in.”

Tha-thump. Tha-thump. Tha-thump.

Chapter Text

Eventually, their shock fades, though Jinx ain’t real interested in any of ‘em as she waits for another reaction.

The fact that Vi’s the first time get over herself don’t surprise her or nothin’: she’s always been real adaptable…adaptable enough to keep the four of ‘em alive ‘s long as she had, back in the day, enough to win fistfights against beefcakes twice her size, enough to convince Ekko she’s not the ghost Jinx still half-believed her to be…

Enough to betray all ‘a their people for some fancy topsider who spoke words far prettier than her face would ever be.

…heh. Maybe time really does heal everything, because Jinx is finding that a helluva lot funnier now than she had a little while back.

Or maybe whatever it is you’re feeling, the nervous one wrings his fingers, his heavy steps creaking loudly on the wooden boards of the Firelight’s lame ass castle as he paces, isn’t actually humor.

Maybe. Maybe not.

Lately, it’s just so hard to tell…

“I—Powder, you can’t turn yourself in,” Vi half-pleads, half-commands even through the incredulous glare the Piltie shoots her.

Silly Vi. It ain’t funny ‘nough that I’m actually gonna talk to you.

She’s still pretty mad about some other stuff for all that. Ekko’s talkin’ before the other two women get ta’ argue, which is prolly better for Jinx’s patience, anyways.

“Why?”

In response, Jinx glances at him almost boredly as she sits back, an’ that kid sister of her’s runs down one of them rope bridges again with her pal—the pal that still hasn’t taken that dumb mask of his off.

It's cute that any of them thought that mattered: Jinx had long since figured out what he looked like—kind’ve had to, if he was gonna keep hangin’ ‘round her sister like he has been. Maybe it wouldn’t matter after this…

Maybe nothin’ will matter after this, her eye twitches at the amusement in his stupidly smug tone, and whatever expression’s on her face makes the nervous one stumble over his own feet when he next gets a look at her…

It takes her a bit longer than it maybe should to realize how quiet they’d gotten, and a lil’ longer after that to realize that they’re all starin’ again…an’ they don’t look real frightened, either.

You’ve never been real good at that, at scarin’ the right people, he goads, his tone mocking as she sets her jaw against that sizzlin’ sound that forces it’s way into her stupid ear, just your loved ones. Maybe your replacement will do a better job.

She really, really likes how her response confuses him into silence. Guess he don’t know as much as he thinks he does if he’d said somethin’ dumb as that.

“She’s not my replacement,” she answers quietly, feeling—for once—oddly content with the way the conversation was going.

I won’t let her be.

“…Jinx, who are you talking to?”

She blinks, then rolls her eyes at Ekko’s stupid question before deciding to answer his first one.

“Silco met with a Piltie—not the dumb one, either,” she nods towards the enforcer without making eye contact, her own gaze once again focused on her shoes. “Like a real, actually important one,” Jinx cracks her neck before resting her head against the window sill again, trying to find some kinda weird peace in all these ambient sounds floatin’ around them. “They got all spooked by the shit that’s been goin’ on down here, so they offered him a deal,” now normally, she’d like the way they freeze at that, but…

“What kind of deal?” Ekko spits, his foot shifting to better angle his body towards her. Kind of a dumb move in Jinx’s opinion: time-boy had a bum leg—she’d seen it in the way he moved, now, in the way one of his feet hit each stair harder than the other on their way up to visit. He attacks her now, with Isha here…

She’d already been nice, once, and it’s cost her a lot: Jinx ain’t down to make the same mistake twice.

She shrugs, her eyes flickering over to him before he got any idea ‘bout gettin’ any closer. “Well, the kind that’d give him everything he wants…all of it,” they shift at that, wide-eyes and muttered curses and stares of disbelief…all of which stop as she continues:

“He isn’t gonna take it.”

“What?” the Piltie calls, her stupid eyes threatening to bulge outta her own skull.

Jinx waits, her eyes shifting out the window to find those little curls. No one says anything for a second (well, Vi does, but Jinx’d decided just to tune her out for the rest of this chat).

“Who did he speak to?” There she is again, the topsider wonder.

Jinx hums, suppressing a yawn as she shifts in place to prop her other knee up. “The guy who raided that Shimmer plant—that pretty boy with a hammer an’ a knack for killin’ kids.”

The Piltie purses her lips. “Jayce…why would he—”

“Why the fuck’d he say no?” Ekko cuts in, apparently the voice of reason amongst all ‘a these fuck-ups (herself included).

Judging by the way their last chat’d ended up, it doesn’t really inspire a whole lotta confidence from lil’ ol’ Jinx.

“Piltie had terms, too…ones that I guess he’s not down for,” she stops once Vi scoffs, though she pays her just as little mind as she has throughout the rest of it all.

“I told you he’s not willing to negotiate,” the pink haired woman spits, her not-quite-hostile gaze flickering towards the Piltie as she finishes. For her part, though, the topsider merely hums uncertainly.

“If that were actually true, he would have simply killed him: I doubt he would have shown up after a request for parley had he intended on refusing any terms that were set before him from the start.”

Jinx’d normally admire that sort of reasoning skill if it hadn’t come from the dumbest person in this whole compound. From a few feet away, Ekko stares at a wall in thought, and for a while, shit’s quiet once more.

She’d rather it not be, all things considered.

She digs one of her nails into her palm to steady her thoughts as the Piltie and Vi continue their dumb, pointless little argument…but they both stop when Ekko turns back to her all angry-like.

It's ok, Jinx knows this face: he ain’t actually pissed, he just doesn’t like when he doesn’t understand something.

He never has.

“I don’t get it,” he spits predictably, “what the fuck kind’ve terms would a bastard like him even say no to?”

Jinx’s stare flattens at her own feet, but she doesn’t answer him. Let the boy wonder figure it out for himself. His words at least make the other two shut their traps, but she finds that the oppressive silence that follows ain’t really any better than their anger, and soon enough she’s gotta force her shoulders from hiking up again. Her eyes drift to the side then, finding those brown curls of her’s as she waits.

In the end, she don’t have to wait all that long at all—or maybe she’d just spaced out that badly.

Who can say, really? Certainly not Jinx.

“They want you, don’t they?”

She huffs a laugh before shooting a finger gun his way, a half-grin on her face that don’t touch her eyes as she speaks.

“Ding ding ding!” She lets her hand fall limply to her lap. “Right on the money.”

He clicks his tongue in irritation, though strangely Jinx gets the sense it isn’t directed at her. The sound of the other kid’s laughter briefly grabs her attention, and she watches as the two of them nearly knock a young couple doing their laundry over as they scamper up a newer looking set of stairs. The first guy hastily yanks his basket away from their little path of terror, and the second stops his partner from fallin’ on his ass with the sudden shift in weight, laughing at the blush on the first dude’s face as they both watch after the kids now racing across the upper level.

I’m never gonna have that, am I?

Huh. That question never seemed to hurt as much when she’d asked it before now. Jinx turns away from them when he speaks up again, his voice low and conflicted…but he’s quickly cut-off by the Piltie.

“What do—”

“How are you so certain of his answer?”

Jinx nearly rolls her eyes at the answer. Her pink eyes—why’d they gotta be pink?

“Guess I ain’t the only whackjob around these parts around these parts that talks to themselves, Piltie…and while we’re on the topic ‘a speakin’ an’ all,” she continues, her glare fully turning to focus on the topsider in question, “how about you don’t. I already don’t like you, an’ this ain’t really meant ta’ be a conversation-type deal.”

The Piltie sighs, but parta’ Jinx can admire Hat Lady’s persistence (if it weren’t so damn annoying, anyways), ‘cuz a second later, she’s right back to talkin’ again. “Jinx, I meant it before when I said I could hel—”

She’s laughin’ before she can even help herself, and either the Piltie can hear somethin’ in it she don’t really care much for or she’d finally gotten it through that fat skull of her’s that it ain’t such a good idea to chat just yet, ‘cuz her trap snaps back shut just as easily as it’d opened.

“’m sorry, do you even know what that word means?” Jinx snorts before turning to fully face her, the smile falling from her lips just as easily as it’d appeared. They all tense and it nearly sends her into another fit—only, she can’t decide if it’d ‘a been a laughing one or not.

Whatever. It probably wouldn’t even have mattered…probably.

“Listen, Piltie,” she starts all serious-like, “I don’t want your ‘help’, get it? I mean, I get what you were tryna’ do here, I do, but lemme let you in on a lil’ secret here—one I learned the hard way: no one cares about what you were trying to do, they only care ‘bout the results…’an I gotta say, your’s were pretty shit here, so why don’t you back off an’ let me think ‘fore the only thoughts in my head are how to remove your’s?”

The Piltie shakes her head, frustrated with the situation. Typical that the topsider doesn’t like not bein’ in control of ‘em all. “You have no idea what I was trying to do here—"

“No, see, I know exactly what you were thinkin’,” she hisses, startling the topsider with the venom in her voice. The part of her that’s less angry and more…resigned, she guesses at all of this thinks it’s kinda funny: like what part of any of the interactions they’ve had in the last ever would make the lady think they’re on good terms? “You thought ‘oh gosh, there’s some people I can totally help out ‘cuz I’m the only one that sees this huge problem with the poor, shitty trenchers in the undercity’, so you waltzed on down here like you owned the damned place and did things your own way despite everybody tellin’ you not to an’ got all shocked when it blew up in your face—an’ I know it’s what you thought ‘cuz I’ve done exactly the same thing,” she cuts the topsider off just as she starts speakin’ to piss her off a lil’ more, though she’s gotta say, Jinx is nothing but satisfied when the hard look she feels in her eyes makes the Piltie freeze. “Here’s some advice for ya’: quit while you’re behind, ‘cuz it’s only ever gonna get worse…or maybe it won’t, for you. Guess that’s the difference mommy’s money makes, huh?”

Yeah, Jinx’d looked into her a bit more—had to, for her own sanity…the idea that she’d screwed up an’ misremembered that stupid symbol from the ventilation shafts had screwed with her sleep that second night, made her take a walk she probably shouldn’t ‘a considering the obnoxiously large bounty on her head…’an she’d gotten her answer, too.

Didn’t mean she was happy ‘bout any of it, but at least she hadn’t jinxed herself yet again…more than she already had this time, anyways.

“Stop pretendin’ like we’re all that different, Piltie: the way I see it, you ‘n your’s got just as much blood on your hands as I do.” she finishes, turning back to stare at her shoes.

She hears the topsider let out a frustrated breath, and Jinx watches in her peripherals as the lady shakes her head. It reminds Jinx of that time her and Vi were walking into the arcade, of the way the Piltie had tried convincing Vi ‘a how screwed-up Jinx was, of how she’d killed a few dozen too many to be, like, worth the effort or somethin’.

Honestly, it’s maybe the only thing her an’ the topsider see eye-to-eye on.

The topsider takes a breath, her hands opening and closing at her sides for a few seconds. Vi’s watching her with as much interest as Ekko’s gaze has mistrust, and the Boy Savior opens his mouth to maybe steer them back on track…but apparently the Piltie’s got other plans.

“…I know.”

Jinx doesn’t outwardly react to that or nothin’—she’s gotten a lotta practice with that over the years, ‘a keeping a poker face or however the heck it’s called so people can’t call her on her bullshit—but in her insides, she’s a lil’ confused about what the hell the topsider’s even yapping about…and also more than a bit irritated she’s decided to open her stupid trap yet again.

Damn Pilties think they gotta be in charge of everything.

“I…I don’t like it, but I’ve been reflecting on the events of the last several days and our exchanges in particular, and I’ve come to a similar conclusion myself,” the Piltie shifts uncomfortably, but when one of her arms comes up to grasp at her other one like Jinx’s do sometimes when she needs to ground herself, she turns a bit more to face her. “This situation is perhaps not as black and white as I’d like to believe it to be, and you’re right: we are similar, in a sense. You’re the adopted daughter of one of the most powerful people in the undercity, and I of a sitting Councilor. I won’t pretend like I could have gotten away with a stunt the likes of which you pulled in Piltover when you conducted that heist…but I likely will not face any serious or lasting consequences for my own reckless actions down in the undercity since then, either. I now understand that what I’ve done isn’t as victimless as I’d thought, that I was terribly ignorant of the hazards your people face on a daily basis, that I myself have significantly contributed to the escalating tensions between our two homes…and though I might not fully understand the reasons behind some of your recent actions, I’ve observed you enough to know that they at least exist, which is far different than how the Council believes the situation to be.”

When the lady looks at her again, Jinx meets her eyes and nearly snarls at the emotion in her eyes—it’s this guarded sorta pity that she fucking despises (how could she still be lookin’ down on her after everything?!)—but the Piltie continues before she can even think of a good retort.

“And since we’re not that different,” Jinx’s stare flattens and the Piltie continues (‘cuz damn, it hadn’t taken that long for her own words to bite her in the ass at all), her tone rushed ever so slightly as the words tumble outta her mouth, “I’m assuming you don’t want to see this result in a war?”

It’s half a question, half a hope.

She feels the skepticism growing on her own face, but ultimately, she deflates, turning back to her shoes with a grumble.

Stupid enforcers and their stupid de-escalation training.

Still, it wasn’t quite right.

“Actually, I still wouldn’t mind that, personally,” the Piltie looks for a brief moment like she wants to curse up a storm, and Jinx knows for longer than a brief moment that she’d love to see that, but…

“Then why are you here?” Ekko’s back in the game (well, Vi’d tried saying something, too, but apparently Jinx ain’t the only one givin’ her the ol’ silent treatment).

That question’s the easiest one they’d given her all night.

Her response is only to lean back fully against the frame, dropping her knees so the distant forms of those two twerps are easier to make out from where the three other losers stuck in her with her still stand. Understanding flashes across Ekko’s face in an instant, but it takes the other two a minute to put the pieces together. Jinx uses that time to watch her as her sister bursts out from a pile of leaves someone had raked together, her silent laughter doing quite a bit to ease her shitty fucking mood.

“But it ain’t just me I gotta worry about, y’know?”

There’s not an answer for a minute, and Jinx starts wondering what kinda mental gymnastics that the topsider must be doing to try ‘n talk her into anything.

Ekko, of course, is much quicker to get to the punchline.

“You think you leaving here will actually change anything?” There’s a lotta judgment in his tone, and she feels her eye twitch at his words as she turns to glare at him. He snorts when their eyes meet, looking almost just as unhappy to see her as he’d been the last time they’d met up…or maybe she should say two times ago, now.

Why’s it even matter—you almost died in either one.

It’s true enough, but Isha hadn’t.

He keeps goin’ without waitin’ for her reply. “They can’t be trusted to keep their word—it’s topside,” he practically growls, steadfastly ignoring the way the Piltie to his side’s turned to stare at him in alarm.

She tilts her head at that, her curiosity getting the better of her. “…you don’t even know what he wants, do you?”

Ekko raises an eyebrow, looking unimpressed (and a little wary, but then that’s probably the healthiest response any of the dummies in here have had since she’d started this little shindig). “I know that if he gets it, my people are as good as dead.”

Oh, well…yeah, probably.

She frowns at that, thinking it over. Silco didn’t really like the Firelights, and he really didn’t like Ekko…if some sorta deal type thing actually panned out for him, then wiping the bug guys off the face of the undercity didn’t really seem all that far-fetched.

“Yeah, I guess they probably would be. What a bummer,” she hums absently, thinking about possible workarounds she probably shouldn’t give a rat’s ass about seein’ as she hates these guys almost as much as Silco does.

Shit, when she puts it like that, why does she care?

The sound of laughter from outside grabs her attention again, and the little growing irritation in her fizzles out at the view before her.

Right. That. Isha’s buddy and all the other people here—the ones Ekko cared so much about protecting, the families and the sick and the few remaining elderly people still left alive that called this dumb tree their home, the people who don’t or can’t fight.

Them.

Jinx rolls her eyes, cutting Ekko off before he gets too twitchy to hear her words. “Ok, so just, like, say he can’t do that or something—add a term or whatever,” she waves him off, though her eyes are probably more thoughtful than her tone had been.

Ekko blinks. “I…huh? We ain’t the ones making the deal with topside, though,” he sounds uncertain again, but Jinx is only half-listening. He gets her attention a second later when he steps forwards, though. “Why is it that you even care, anyways?”

”Do you have any idea how many of us you’ve killed?” That’s what he’s really asking, you know.

She sets her jaw at her brother’s unhelpful commentary.

Oh, we still get to be your brothers, huh? He pokes at her, his voice much too close for her liking. Then why doesn’t Vi count, too?

She’s grinding her teeth together, now, her hands twitching by her sides. Oh, screw off already!

“Jinx?”

She shakes her head, dispelling the image of his gaunt, laughing face. It’s the Piltie again (of course). She forces her hands to relax and her mood not to sour too much at the concern there before turning back to Mr. Perfect.

Stupid Piltie.

“Obviously if I wanted them all dead, they wouldn’t still be here,” she grumbles irritably, trying and failing to force more of that casualness back into her voice and posture.

Ekko doesn’t really look all that convinced, but he presses on anyways before the topsider can cut back in.

“You really think Silco’d listen to some piece of paper tellin’ him he can’t wipe us all out?”

She levels him with the fattest stare she can manage. “If it meant he got the undercity’s independence? Yeah, he probably would.”

They all get real quiet at that—which is sorta funny, actually, considering that none of ‘em had figured that part out yet. The topsider takes in a sharp breath, a thousand thoughts flashing behind those dumb blue eyes as she thinks it all over.

“So that Zaun you mentioned…he means the undercity to become its own nation?”

Oh, brother.

You called?

She purposely doesn’t react to that, and it only makes him laugh.

Ekko grunts, sounding peeved. “Seems like a shit idea to me…I still don’t understand why you’re even considering this.”

She props her arm back up on her knee, drawing their eyes as she shifts to look out at all the people below them, many of which watch her (at least until she meets their gazes).

Great. Now she actually has to spell it all out for them—weren’t two of them supposed to be the smart ones?

“I told you, he’s not gonna take the deal...apparently, the stupid old man’s not as down for killin’ me as you are.”

She never thought something like that would ever seem like a problem to her, but you know how it is. Time tends to change people’s perspectives on shit.

They exchange looks with each other, but she ain’t facing ‘em enough to make much of their expressions out.

Eventually, a skeptical sounding Ekko is the only one who answers. “So the Pilties invade, wipe us all out…but I thought you said you’re cool with that.”

There’s an implied sorta question, there.

“I am.”

She ain’t even fucking with them, either: after that shitshow on the bridge, she’d happily kill as many assholes as they wanted to send her way until it ended up killing her. Heck, she takes out enough, maybe they don’t have enough to protect less important things, maybe some street rats can steal a bit more without getting caught.

Maybe someone could benefit from all of this.

“…but?” He presses.

She sighs, resting her chin on her knee. “But I don’t want that for the kid. It’d paint a big old target on her back, and I’m apparently not ‘s good at protecting her as I thought I was…,” she taps her fingers on her leg, “I mean, I guess I could go out and I dunno, kill all their stupid Council or something—,” the Piltie stiffens and Jinx nearly rolls her eyes, “—but I doubt it’d actually fix anything in the long term. They’d just be like ‘oh no, the poor people are revolution-ing! Quick, kill all their children!’”

Well…it sounded more plausible in her head.

Whatever. She probably made her point…and besides: Jinx can’t protect Isha forever—hell, given all the shit that’s happened in the last few days, maybe she’s never really protected her at all (is that really true?)…but she can at least save her, maybe, from turning out like her.

She thinks that, maybe, she owes it to Powder to at least try.

The topsider shifts again, but Jinx doesn’t really have any interest in watching her. “…I suppose that if Ekko were with us when we went to rendezvous with Jayce, that could be enough to amend whatever agreement he came to with Silco; I’m sure the man wouldn’t try much if they had his daughter in custody—”

“Are both of you insane?” Vi cuts in, her voice loud and frantic enough that Jinx can’t just tune it out as she has been.

Unfortunately.

“We can’t just let them throw her in prison!” She nearly scoffs at that—as if they’d let Jinx live after all of this. “Ekko, you said yourself you still believed Powder was in there,” and wow, ok, way to talk about her like she’s not even here.

Isn’t that exactly what you’ve been doing to her this entire time?

Jinx forces her hands not to clench at that. If she could pull this off, then Isha could just go back to being a kid again and not have to worry about all this fighting…and dad would finally have what he wanted. She’d heard him, at the statue. The only thing in the way was Jinx.

And she can fix that for him. For all of them.

That itchy, cold void swells a bit in her head, but she forces herself to pay attention as they go on.

“Yeah…she is, and I think what she’s suggesting right now, trying to protect all our people instead of letting topside slaughter them? That’s her, Vi.”

She does roll her eyes at that, but they probably don’t see it, turned away as she is. They ain’t got a lotta time for this, so when Vi doesn’t answer him, she nearly tries to get to the details they’d need to iron out to make this all work…only, the Piltie apparently decides she hasn’t heard her voice for too long, ‘cuz she’s talkin’ in the next second.

“Vi, I give you my word that I’ll do everything in my power to get Jinx the help she needs, but right now, this is the only option we have to prevent an all-out war between Piltover and the undercity, and your sister—,” Jinx’s knuckles pop and the Piltie starts talking slightly faster, “—must recognize that herself or she wouldn’t be here.”

“So we just give this asshole his own fucking city?! That’s seriously the solution here?”

For her part, the Piltie doesn’t miss a beat. “If that’s what Jayce believes is the best option to avoid a true conflict, then yes: I trust his judgement.”

But not Jinx’s own, apparently…even though it’s exactly the same fucking thing.

Whatever.

They’re probably just scared of Fishbones, honestly…and they can keep bein’ scared, too. It’s for the best, anyways: had Silco actually refused, well, she’d heard what he wanted to do. That kinda destruction, normally Jinx’d live for it, but…

Well, if things went on too long after that, she’s not so sure the kid would live for it for too much longer herself.

They keep arguing for a while, but eventually, Jinx just tunes them out: they were going to agree because they had to, because none of them really had much of an actual choice to make (well, except for maybe Vi, but she always picked the wrong thing anyways, in Jinx’s opinion), because none of this was ever going to turn out well. She’s been living on borrowed time since the day at the cannery, anyways, but dad ‘n Isha didn’t hafta be.

Maybe if she Jinxes this plan…

Well, maybe it’d be ok.