Chapter Text
* * *
Silco didn’t trust anymore. He’d been betrayed by the man he trusted most. Felt the hands, hands that had always protected him, instead wrap around his throat and push him under the water as Vander tried to kill him.
Silco didn’t trust anymore. Except for one person, and she was nearly dead. He had no idea how she survived -that she did was a stroke of luck so great and mind-boggling that she should really rethink her name. But she had, and now she was deep in Singed’s lair, strapped to a table and mewling in pain.
Silco didn’t trust anymore. So though Singed was behind him, Silco kept a keen awareness of what he was doing, and when he got too close, Silco whipped around and grabbed his arm -right before the syringe could plunge into his flesh.
“Why?” Silco demanded, his voice cold with rage.
“I, too, once had a daughter,” Singed replied simply.
Silco narrowed his eyes.
“If you linger here, you may object to what must be done -may disrupt the process,” Singed warned. “May ruin the chance she has left.”
I can’t leave her. She is my daughter, I must be here.
Yet . . . those were his wants, his needs.
Hers were more important.
And so the decision was simple and damning.
“Fine,” Silco growled. “Heal her.”
“She will live,” Singed promised. “The operation should be done quickly. Return in three hours.”
Silco nodded once, then strode away angrily.
He would not waste the time.
* * *
Silco returned in three hours. Well, two and three quarters, but who was counting? Silco was, of course. Every single damned minute.
Yet he’d made use of his time. The story of Jinx’s assault on the barricade was spread as far as he could manage. Everyone feared Jinx, and most covered it with anger, yet all were generally happy when Jinx made fools of Piltover instead of them. More than that, the barricade itself was a focal point of Zaun’s anger with Piltover’s oppression, making it impossible to even step foot in Piltover -while Councilor Jayce’s partner violated it freely.
It’s destruction was quite a victory for Zaun.
Unfortunately, even most of the chembarons were less intelligent than Silco would like. Jinx had blatantly attacked the barricade, killing numerous enforcers and the Sheriff -who’d been instrumental in preventing an ‘enforcement action’ from Piltover. The Council were cowardly, but Silco suspected that the combination of such an attack and the loss of the Sheriff meant that they would finally act.
In truth, Silco had expected them to act much more quickly. Seven years ago, four children had stolen something rather unknown from someone relatively unimportant, killing a handful of nobodies in the process, and that had been enough for the enforcers to flood into the undercity. Of course, it was the arcane that was stolen, and Jayce Talis did have an important sponsor . . . but in comparison to the theft of the hexgem?
Now hextech was known and critically important to Piltover. Now Jinx had killed not just anyone, but enforcers. Now it was a terrorist attack in an important area on Progress Day.
And the Council had been too scared and too weak to order Marcus to take decisive action. Instead, they sought a diplomatic solution -which really meant that they were doing nothing, as neither Silco nor anyone of any importance of the undercity had been contacted by the Council. So how they planned to reach such a solution, Silco didn’t know -but the Council certainly wasn’t willing to act against the undercity.
Silco was proud of that. Under Vander, substantially less inflammatory action had brought a swarm of enforcers down on their heads. Under him, though, Zaun was strong enough that the Council hadn’t dared.
But Jinx blew up the barricade, so that may change.
Silco had sent orders for his other informants in the enforcers to keep an ear out, and pneuma him once they heard anything. He had other spies, too, scattered amongst the various Councilors’ staffs. Most weren’t in any important positions, but it was enough that he generally got the gist of each Council meeting not long after it happened.
But Silco wasn’t waiting for their word. He ordered Finn to mobilize the Slickjaws -his army of chemthugs. Meanwhile, Sevika was organizing shimmer users and chemtanks. She was even calling up the poor, destitute souls who lived in the tent city at the bottom of the fissure -they’d do anything for shimmer, after all.
If war was to come, Zaun would be ready to scare them back across the bridge with their tails between their legs. Perhaps it’d even be enough for Piltover to fear what a war to continue to oppress Zaun would cost. Victory may come without even needing a hextech weapon.
Those thoughts were left behind, though. What was ahead was far more important.
Singed’s treatment room was much unchanged. Gray stone made the floor, walls, and ceiling. A large desk was to one side, filled with chemvials, scalpels, syringes, and other, more esoteric tools. Glaring chemlights shone their harsh illumination from above.
Strapped to a wooden table in the center of the room, Jinx looked small. She was never very big, but usually there was an energy about her that made her loom. There wasn’t at the moment . . . or rather, it wasn’t the right energy.
Her veins were swollen pink, and raised as she thrashed against the bindings -yet they held. Her eyes were glaring as they darted from place to place . . . and they were pink. Keening wails issued from her throat, and most of them were familiar to Silco. He could just make out the ‘Don’t leave me! Please! Vi, please!’ in the soul-wrenching screams.
“The shimmer is at work,” Singed informed Silco. “Time will heal her, or kill her.”
Silco wasn’t listening. Last time, Jinx had rushed to him like a blue-haired bullet . . . this time, he rushed to her, and clung to her. Tears trickled from his eyes, one clear water, the other mixed with black ichor.
“Fight, Jinx,” Silco ordered, but his voice was weak. “You . . . you are just underwater, that is all. All you must do is surface! You have not had enough! Fight!”
Jinx thrashed in his hug but Silco would not let her go. Not even when her left arm punched him in the side, making him gasp in pain.
“You are strong, Jinx,” Silco encouraged her. “You will survive this -no, you will win this. You will triumph over these injuries.”
His words probably fell on deaf ears, yet . . . he couldn’t take the chance that they wouldn’t. If Jinx could hear him at all, feel him at all, then she would hear and feel love and encouragement.
He could do nothing less.
And . . . through his efforts or happenstance, Jinx began to calm, her struggles starting to cease as her wails became softer. As that happened, Silco’s tone shifted from anger and defiance . . . to pleading.
“Please, Jinx,” Silco murmured. “Live. That is all I ask of you -live. You are the strongest person I know.”
Jinx gasped something else –Vi.
“Don’t leave me, Jinx,” Silco begged. “Come back to me. Please. Please.”
He continued pleading, with all his heart and soul, as Jinx closed her eyes and her heart calmed.
But her heart didn’t stop.
And her eyes opened again, staring at Silco.
“You . . .” Jinx whispered, her voice sounding like sandpaper.
“I’m here, Jinx,” Silco replied, softly.
Singed came to them, offering a canteen of water. Silco took it, then grabbed something from a pack he’d brought. It was an old and worn cup, painted a dull blue with stars and the moon on it. Silco poured a measure of water in, then threw in a straw before putting the straw to Jinx’s lips.
Jinx drank, and drank greedily. When she drank it dry, Silco refilled the cup, and she emptied it again. She nursed the third cup, though.
“Thought . . . thought I was dead,” Jinx murmured.
“You aren’t,” Silco assured her.
“Thought I went somewhere bad,” Jinx continued, as if she hadn’t heard him. “Vi was there . . . her enforcer girlfriend was there . . . they were hurtin’ me.”
Silco tensed.
“The procedure is trying,” Singed said. “And Jinx has always been prone to hallucinations.”
“Then . . . it was good,” Jinx shared. “Vi was tellin’ me to fight . . . huggin’ me . . . but it wasn’t her . . .”
“I wish I had been with you the entire time,” Silco murmured. “Singed would not allow me.”
“You came back,” Jinx whispered, as if it was all that mattered.
And to her, it was.
“I will never leave you,” Silco promised. “Never.”
Jinx’s lips twitched weakly. “I’ll never betray you . . .”
That was their promise to each other. Simple, but it meant the world to them.
“She will not be this calm for long,” Singed warned. “The shimmer is much expended in healing her, but now . . . it would not be inaccurate to say that she has blood in her shimmer stream.”
“Vi . . . Caitlyn,” Jinx hissed, anger making her eyes glow.
“What of them?” Silco asked gently.
“She was walkin’ away,” Jinx growled, though it made her throat hurt. “It was a long hug, but she was walkin’ away. All she needed to do was keep walkin’. Back to me. She . . . she got ‘em to the barricade, that’s all that shoulda mattered . . . but she went back.”
“To the barricade?” Silco questioned, confused but going with it.
Jinx nodded, her eyes flashing as Singed began to undo her bindings. “Back to them. Ekko, an’ Caitlyn. An’ the hexgem. She went across with her. To Piltover.”
“I see,” Silco realized. “She has turned her back on you.”
“I came to her,” Jinx growled. “I even sang the song. I was gonna talk to her, after I killed Caitlyn an’ Ekko an’ everyone else an’ grabbed the hexgem, but . . . she was pickin’ Caitlyn up. Rescuin’ an enforcer. An’ . . . an’ . . .”
Jinx trailed off, because . . . it wasn’t right. One moment, Vi had been holding up Caitlyn, then . . . it was like Vi wasn’t even there, it was all Caitlyn, with sharpened teeth and devil’s horns and a mocking, vicious expression. A monster, and Vi wasn’t there to chase her away so Jinx opened fire and then-
Vi was back, jumping aside.
Jinx shook her head. It didn’t make sense.
“What is it?” Silco asked gently.
Jinx prodded herself in the temple. “Playin’ tricks on me.”
“Ignore the voices,” Silco said. “Listen to my voice, not theirs. They don’t matter.”
Jinx nodded.
“I’m proud of you,” Silco murmured. “You took care of the barricade, and you did it with flare. Piltover will surely send their enforcers now.”
“The hexgem,” Jinx realized.
Silco shook his head. “It doesn’t matter. Not compared to your life.”
“No . . . no!” Jinx exclaimed, shaking her head. “I have it!”
She reached into a pouch at her waist, and pulled out the glowing blue marble.
Silco’s eyes widened.
“You assaulted and destroyed the barricade, and managed to retrieve the hexgem in the process?” Silco said, deeply impressed. “You are a wonder, Jinx. You are strong.”
Jinx smiled as Silco’s pride washed away some of her fears, and drowned out the voices.
“What now?” Jinx asked.
“I suspect that Piltover will want some retaliation after what you did at the barricade, and frankly speaking, there are three targets: the two shimmer factories, and the Last Drop itself,” Silco shared. “Of them, the shimmer is far more important -I will leave the Last Drop far in advance of any enforcer attack. So you will guard one refinery, and Sevika the other.”
Jinx nodded slowly, more like her head lolling that anything else.
“But first, I think you need some rest,” Silco said. “And your braids are a bit, well, disorganized.”
Jinx reached back, and felt them, then looked at Silco hopefully.
Not thirty minutes later, they were back in the Last Drop, and -after Jinx washed herself- Silco was brushing her long, blue hair. Then, with the utmost care, braiding it . . . all while Jinx sat with her eyes closed, and tried to make a choice. It should’ve been an easy one. After all, Silco was there for her, helping her, he made her strong. While Vi . . . Vi abandoned her, tried to leave her over and over.
Why was it so hard to choose?
And all the while, the voices growled . . .