Perfect and blue.
She peered adoringly into the wonderful magical cosmos swirling around within the tiny, blue orb she held delicately between her fingertips — it reminded her of the fascination she'd once felt all of those years ago, discovering some proto-form of the very same gemstone in a Piltovan well-to-do's workshop.
Jinx cradled her head in her other hand, cushioning it against the thick wooden beam she lay upon. Her body-length braids of hair dangled down into the space below, but she lay high enough that she remained concealed.
"—Wasted a perfectly good night of gambling, though," a hoarse female voice spoke, "I was up for the second time this week."
An older male voice grunted disinterestedly in response.
"Kid held his own, though," she continued, "only cut the crap once I'd stepped up on him. Guess he didn't feel like finding out where that would've gone—"
Jinx rolled over lazily, gazing down at their conversation. Sevika sure did like to talk her boss' ear off. She held her gemstone up in front of her, placing it over Sevika's head; given the forced perspective it appeared roughly the same size.
'What an improvement that'd be,' Jinx thought, to entertain herself.
She looked over at Silco, who appeared to be penning a letter of some sort while he pretended to listen to his second-in-command's tale.
She cast her mind back to the previous week, when she'd been sitting up here, lamenting to him about how certain she was that she couldn't endure it… that she wouldn't be able to overcome the frightful memories which had prevented her from tapping into the little stone's power — her head had been a maelstrom of noise that it seemed nothing would be able to make quiet.
She remembered the cold sting of the river waters caressing her face, of holding her breath and being submerged in their murkiness. But she'd trusted him in that moment — it had felt like they were going under together. And when he'd lifted her back up and she could see the night sky again, her mind had felt clearer… as though the louder parts had simply washed away…
He could've convinced her it was that easy, at least…
Sometimes, when he looked at her, it almost seemed as though her own experiences were being reflected back at her through his eyes — both his natural one, and the piece of glass replacing the one he'd lost.
Neither of them were strangers to loss…
It did ease her mind, a little — the thought that she might at least be understood by somebody…
"—Anyway," Sevika went on, "we should probably think about doing something about the riff-raff bothering the workers in the smelting district—"
"On the contrary," Silco declared, turning in his chair to face her for the first time in the conversation, "those sorts of petty domestic matters are hardly of concern to us right now."
He gazed upon the letter he'd finished writing, holding it decisively before his own eyes, as though admiring his work.
"Our world's about to change," he continued. "Our foremost priority at this moment is to ensure that we aren't spread too thin."
It amused Jinx to see Sevika's expression ping pong between faith and doubt.
'He knows what he's doing, you troglodyte,' she remarked internally.
"I trust you understand what needs to be done," Silco reiterated.
Sevika's conflict remained present on her face, but she nodded with an affirmative grunt, and left to go get done whatever it was that he'd impressed upon her to do.
After a moment, Silco closed his eyes and let out a kind of meditative exhale.
When he opened them, his eye immediately found hers. He silently outstretched his hand toward her, beckoning her down from her hideout in the rafters. His expression was warm; inviting. She couldn't really remember the last time he didn't looked stressed sitting in that chair…
She acquiesced, lowering herself slowly until her toes hovered a few feet above the surface of the desk which filled the centre of the room. She dropped down the rest of the way and sat cross-legged before him.
He merely looked at her for a moment.
"Would you show it to me, again?" he finally asked.
She anxiously nibbled her bottom lip while she presented the gemstone to him.
He accepted the gift from her once more, and it was apparent that he was now fully convinced of its value.
"Mm," he hummed in approval.
A small part of her felt that only now was he fully convinced of her value, too — no more reassignments, no more encouragements to take a break from action, no more getting benched in favor of Sevika. No, it was as he'd said — now that she'd cracked Piltover's prize for him, the playing field was finally even. She'd been the one to give that to him.
He glanced back at her, and it was almost as though he could read her thoughts. He moved his chair closer to the edge of the desk and reassuringly gave her fingers a squeeze.
"How we proceed from here will decide the fate of Zaun, Jinx." He spoke in a soft tone. "We cannot afford to overlook anything…"
He delicately brushed a stray blue hair from her face, while she simply looked back at him.
"Which of your ideas do you favor the most, as far as the design of the weapon?" he asked.
She experienced a burst of energy in response to the question.
"Well," she began excitedly. "First, I was playing around with the idea of some kind of laser beam, because why not? It's magic, right? Plus, I could totally carve their dumb, fancy Capitol into a giant picture of a monkey face or something!"
She cackled to herself and Silco returned a small smile.
"—But then I thought, actually, that seemed like the kinda thing that some poindexter from up there would invent, so instead I'm stuck choosing between trying to build a flying-machine I can use to rain Chompers down from above, ooorrrr a big ol' rocket-launcher with a magic-infused payload," she concluded proudly.
Silco leaned back, giving her conundrum some genuine consideration.
"The latter does sound simpler to engineer, no?" he offered, "less moving parts…? In more than just the literal sense…"
She contemplated what he'd meant by that. She supposed he was being protective over her, or something — invading Piltover alone by air put her at a higher risk of being captured, or whatever, than simply firing a missile from a distance.
She figured she'd be a good daughter, for once.
"Okay, Fishbones it is!" she agreed.
Silco raised an eyebrow, curious of her meaning.
"Oh," she giggled, attempting to lower her energy for him, "the scheme I'm kinda going for with this one so far has a set of metal jaws at the opening of the firing canister 'cause I thought it'd look scary, which ended up sorta turning the entire design shark-themed… I call him Fishbones."
Silco let out a wisp of a chuckle. "Well, it's very you, isn't it?" he said.
She bobbed back and forth, in satisfaction.
Silco raised the gemstone up to his eye-line once more, perhaps in admiration of the possibilities it afforded him. She noticed him begin to drift back into deep thought, as he often did, but she didn't feel like leaving his company just yet. Searching around his desk for something to stimulate her attention, she noticed the letter Silco had been writing. She picked it up and gave it a skim-through.
"Your big ultimatum to Topside?" she pestered.
He hummed in agreement.
She continued down the page. "You've got spots here for the Chem-Barons to put their seals too, huh?" she added.
"Well, yes, I'd like to quell the potentiality for the first page of Zaun's history to detail a hair-trigger civil war between factions," he explained. "I'd daresay that at least half of them will be opposed to the path we're about to take, but securing some form of agreement from them will save me a future headache…"
"Hm," Jinx mused. "…I can tell you were using your scary voice when you wrote this," she giggled.
He appeared to grow disconcerted by the manner in which she was handling the document.
"Please don't crease it that way, Jinx," he said, plucking it from her fingers.
She impishly pouted at him in response.
"It's true that in recent years I've become romantic toward the notion of a nation birthed from fire," he said of her previous comment, while she clambered over to sit on this edge of his chair. "Frankly, I think that resilience is born that way," he went on, "instilled by moments of consequence; those that shape one's destiny… I believe that whatever manages to emerge from such an experience will have attained the ultimate form of agency — a true freedom from any would-be shackles..."
Jinx's gaze had dropped down toward her boots by the latter half of Silco's monologue, as she connected his words to some of her own experiences.
He must have noticed her shift in disposition. "…The past can only hinder you if you let it, child," he reassured her.
"I know, it's just…" she faltered, "what if it just makes you weaker, and… you can't—"
"You," he took her by the shoulders, "are stronger than I could ever have imagined you to be."
She didn't feel convinced.
Despite his conviction, and the hundreds of times he'd repeated such a sentiment in the past, she failed to feel adequate against his persistent idealization of her. She couldn't help it.
She decided not to let him know it this time, however.
She fell on top of him and squeezed tightly, hoping to prevent him from continuing his speech to her. He seemed to reluctantly get the message, and hugged her back.
"Think you'll come down to the bar tonight?" she wondered, without moving away from him.
He thought for a moment.
"Perhaps," he replied. "I do need to arrange a communication with our Topside friend, however."
"Oh, sure," she said.
"Is Thieram no longer good company…?" He slowly lifted her away from him, apparently deciding that their embrace had come to its natural conclusion.
Part of her wanted to correct the record on the affable bartender's name, but she figured he'd only look at her strangely. She instead hopped up and headed toward the door.
"He's fine," she grinned. "Well, if you come on down later, I'll buy you a drink…!"
"Sure," he half-chuckled at her tongue-in-cheek remark.
She giggled and skipped out of the room, shutting the door behind her.
~~~~~
Useless.
It's all he could find it in himself to feel. Part of him didn't even want to look at his own reflection, as he tossed down his set of brass keys. He always felt compelled to anyway. The badge was the first thing to catch his eye, after tearing himself away from looking at the defeated look in his own face. He unclasped it and slammed it down onto the table top with ire.
Sheriff…
Marcus pinched his nose between his eyes, trying to imagine another path. Trying to imagine what the sheriff of Piltover should look like. He already knew the answer. It looked like the woman whose grave he'd visited just days ago. She'd never have found herself in this situation.
No…
He opened his eyes again. He still had leverage in this situation. Silco had relied on him too often. Why was the man so adamant on protecting his most troublesome miscreant? Attempting to predict who he'd be willing to sell up the river, versus who he'd be sentimental about… Marcus was better off flipping a coin.
His daughter's portrait sat facing him. He sighed, somberly reminding himself that he was all she had.
His mind was pulled away by aggressive rapping on his door.
"What is it?" he demanded, to the sight of three of his officers standing urgently at attention outside his door frame.
"Sir!" the highest rank of them implored, "a foot-chase has developed outside the training barracks — eight officers down!"
Marcus did his best to compartmentalize the staggering casualty count in his mind, as he reached for his badge and re-pinned it to his chest. He finally began to hear the low wail of the city alarm in the distance.
"Send orders for the bridges to be raised, immediately," he ordered, "and I want every officer on duty with a rifle in their hands this time."
"Yes, sheriff!" the officer complied.
Marcus nodded, hurrying along with his subordinates.
"Do we have descriptions on any of the culprits?" he asked.
"All we've received reports on so far is a male in foreign attire and light colored hair," the officer replied.
"Weapons?" he demanded.
"…Nothing reported, sir."
Marcus looked on in bewilderment. Surely Silco wasn't foolish enough to have let one of his monstrosities loose to wreak havoc on the citizens of Piltover?
An elevator led the squad down to the ground, where they met up with half the Council Guard, who didn't look eager to have been called into action.
"Everybody fan out!" he barked. "Apprehend anybody who matches the description!"
The enforcers fastened their helmets, and set off after their phantom target.
A few moments later, his junior officer returned with rifles for the both of them.
"Thank you," he grunted, loading a bullet into the chamber.
His eyes bolted up at the sound of a winded shriek, followed by the sight of one of his officers skidding across the pavement and landing on his side, as though he were fired out of a cannon.
"Behind me!" he ordered the junior officer, raising his firearm and stepping out from cover to investigate.
The wailing alarm had mostly cleared out the civilians doing their evening shopping, leaving only empty streets. Marcus moved promptly toward his fallen officer, keeping an eye out for whatever assailant could have inflicted such damage.
"Is he breathing?" he demanded of his junior officer.
Marcus didn't hear the answer — down the barrel of his gun, he observed a slender figure at the other end of the street, standing with their back to him and holding something in their hand.
"Drop that, now!" Marcus yelled with authority.
The figure straightened up, and turned around. It had tall, spiked hair jutting out on either side, almost like horns.
"You won't be warned again — drop the weapon!" Marcus desperately ordered.
The cackle he received in response sounded like it came from a young man, maybe even a teenager. The kid began moving forward to where Marcus could make him out more clearly — his attire was as strangely foreign as had been described, though the skintight black upper garment revealed an intimidating level of musculature. The object in his hand appeared to be the helmet of the officer laying next to Marcus.
He drew in a series of short breaths as he prepared to fire his gun.
Marcus again heard the kid snicker from a distance.
"This is the 'weapon' you're afraid of, eh?" he taunted, an uncanny grin creeping across his face.
The crack of the gunshot rang out through the emptied streets, as he pulled the trigger without hesitation — Marcus had no appetite for any type of back-and-forth with this creep.
Perhaps his arrangement with Silco had simply run its course — the very fact that the rabble from the Undercity were becoming this bold as of late was proof of it. He knew well that the Council would only tolerate so much before demanding Trencher heads for all of these crimes.
The thoughts bounced around in his head as he snapped into action, recoiling from the shot he'd just fired. But, something wasn't right…
He heard his junior officer's gasp before he realized what had happened. The pointy-haired kid remained standing, holding the officer's helmet he'd somehow used to catch Marcus' shot. He dangled it before him, plucking the collapsed bullet from the dent it had made on impact.
He'd aimed for the head, though…
Marcus released the spent shell and prepared to load in another round, breathing quickly.
"Shoot hi—" he began to yell at the junior officer, who promptly fell backwards with a thud, as the dented officer's helmet ricocheted off of his face.
It all had happened in the blink of an eye. Marcus almost couldn't bring himself to turn again and look upon his advancing adversary — a baser instinct within him was telling him to run.
The fear began to compound. By the time he'd managed to load a new round in and peel his eyes back toward the attacker, he felt like a prey animal waiting helplessly for its predator to complete the kill.
This amused the devil-haired kid to no end. He flashed a smile that only heightened his menacing aura.
Marcus mustered all the fortitude he could to raise his rifle once more and attempt a shot, but the outcome felt predetermined — the moment he made a move, the kid was upon him, without even a moment to blink.
'Has to be one of those Shimmer-infused abominations,' he thought in resignation, as he was knocked to ground, the air leaving his lungs.
He felt utterly powerless — the kid sent the weapon careening across the pavement and deftly pinned down Marcus' limbs.
He leant over his fallen prey, as though to gloat.
"This is all the welcome party I get, eh?" he snarked. "Even if all of you had ganged up on me, you couldn't kill me."
Marcus wondered for a moment whether he could be reasoned with, whether there was any way for him to make it out alive.
"Who… the hell are you?" was all he managed.
The kid flashed his unpleasant smile again.
"I don't know why you all call yourselves peacekeepers…" he snarled, ignoring his question. "There ain't ever gonna be peace until you've all got somethin' real to fear…"
Marcus' ears pricked up to the sound of voices heading their way. It must have been his backup. If he could only…
The kid reacted in an instant, his poised hand appearing where it wasn't before.
Marcus' vision turned black.