Chapter Text
You'd die for the cause, but you won't fight for one?
Sevika drums her fingers against her metal arm, debating whether or not to take a dose of Shimmer right now. The battle, if it could be called that, is very much over, she considers. No need for a power-up. She’s sitting comfortably in Silco’s office, after all, and the usual chatter of the Last Drop continues downstairs, a little loud for her tastes, but comforting. But damn it all, she’s shaking like a leaf. Short breaths rattle in her chest. Perhaps if the situation was a little less… shitty, she would reminisce. She hasn’t felt this way since…
The day I grew my armour.
Well, her armour had taken a considerable dent today. She grits her teeth and presses the purple vial into the mechanism, letting power flow through her veins. There’s a pulsing pain, somewhere, but it all melts into relief, and she stops shaking long enough to confront her most pressing thoughts. Or, thought. There’s only one that matters right now.
Silco is dead.
Dead. Dead. Dead and gone. She’d taken him to Singed, but not even the mad doctor could save him. A bullet through the brain would do that.
And fuck, what a way to go. That idiot enforcer - he’d been a shitty investment from the start - shot Silco, and then himself. Sevika wishes he hadn’t, because right now, she’s dreaming about crushing his windpipe herself.
Pathetic, it was all pathetic. Silco fought for the cause, for Zaun. Sevika knew his days were numbered, as were hers, everyone’s - but she always imagined them both dying in a blaze of bloody glory at worst. Of old age in a comfortable empire, at best. But no, fate would never be so kind. Only a couple years into her alliance with the man, and it was all snuffed out by a misplaced investment.
Sevika wants to laugh, and she does, a little. Just imagining how she’ll break the news to everyone - the ensuing chaos will be far worse than watching her boss get his brains blown out. And little Powder - no, she goes by Jinx these days - would be absolutely destroyed. Sevika hates the brat more than anyone, but, being one of the only ones left that knows what she’s been through, it’s hard not to feel bad. Her parents, her sister, her adoptive family, and her second adoptive father too? She fumbles with another vial. She is absolutely not going to deal with these thoughts sober. She’s cleaned up enough messes to know when to back out. For now, at least. Someone would have to put out this fire. Someone would have to tell the girl her third dad is dead.
Before Sevika can insert the vial, something rustles in the office rafters, and she can feel her own pupils shrink as she glances up. Bright, blinding blue stares down at her.
“Congrats, you found me. Wondered how long it was going to take,” Jinx says, fiddling with Silco’s eye-injector.
Sevika would be perturbed that the girl climbs up there so effortlessly, but she still remembers the early days - once, Sevika was having what she assumed to be a private conversation with Silco, that was unceremoniously interrupted by Powder- Jinx, falling from the ceiling.
But Sevika doesn’t laugh at that memory now. Doesn’t say anything at all. She waits.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Jinx says, eventually.
Sevika bites. “Why not?”
“Silco’s supposed to be back soon. He said we could talk about my new bombs.”
Great. The last thing we need. Bombs and traumatic news.
But Sevika’s more shocked by the lurch in her heart at Jinx’s words. The poor brat, blissfully waiting for her dad. Sevika knows that feeling. She knows the ensuing disappointment.
No use in delaying the inevitable; that tactic never worked. Sevika pockets the Shimmer vial again and looks back up to Jinx.
“Come down. I need to talk to you.”
The words feel so unnatural. She doesn’t even talk to Jinx if she can avoid it, and even then it’s usually bickering. Jinx clearly senses the shift in atmosphere, and furrows her brow as she stares down at Sevika. But she doesn’t move.
“Can’t you tell me from here?”
She’s being difficult on purpose. Sevika shrugs. Really, she doesn’t want to deal with Jinx’s unconscious body if she faints in shock, but if she won’t comply, it isn’t Sevika’s problem right now.
But then, before Sevika can start talking, Jinx lowers herself to Silco’s desk, and perches there. Still seated higher than Sevika, looking down on her like a crow on a wire. An omen if Sevika’s ever seen one. She pats the Shimmer vial tucked in her belt, keeping it to hand, just in case.
“Are you ready?” Sevika asks. More strange words. But this is new territory for Sevika. What the fuck do you say to a kid in a time like this anyway?
“Why wouldn’t I be? Spit it out,” Jinx says, but she’s rocking on her heels.
“Alright,” Sevika breathes, and pinches the bridge of her nose, “As I’m sure you know, Silco went out to talk to that enforcer today. Marcus. The one he’s bribing.”
Was bribing. Don’t drag this out.
Jinx doesn’t speak, so Sevika goes on.
“We met in some Chem-Baron headquarters. He was… antsier than usual. Then… shit, I don’t know what to tell you. He had a pistol on him. He… fuck. He shot Silco. Killed him. Then himself.”
There, the hard part. Sevika doesn’t look back at Jinx, instead takes a moment to wonder if telling her now was the right idea. It was bound to come out eventually. Better to come clean than face her wrath later on.
The Shimmer wears off all too quickly. A phantom pain seizes Sevika’s missing arm, then her legs shake for a second before she forces them to stop with a deep breath. Only then does she remember that she just told a child her dad died and remembers to look at Jinx.
Her eyes are wide. Staring, unnervingly. She’s seated now, not perching, and her hands find her braids and pull. Hard enough to hurt, by the looks of things. She’s whispering something.
“Shut up. Shut up. Shut up. He wouldn’t. He’s not. I didn’t even…”
Then she laughs, hysterically. “Good one, Sevika.”
She’s in shock. Sevika maintains eye contact, hoping the exhaustion she feels is plain enough in her face for Jinx to get the idea.
“...no. You’re lying to me.”
Now Sevika really has to repress her laugh. “What in the fuck would I have to gain from that?”
“You’ve betrayed people before,” Jinx says, voice growing louder with each word, “What wouldn’t you have to gain?”
Sevika’s foot taps involuntarily. “I turned against Vander for Silco. I staked everything on his dream. You know what I have to gain from this? A fucking mess. Another mess to clean up. My boss is dead. The Lanes will riot. And you-”
Her next words die in her throat as Jinx springs from the table and lands in Sevika’s lap, smacking her across the face with the barrel of Silco’s eye-injector.
Sevika shoves her to the floor effortlessly. Jinx lays there, breathing heavily, tears welling up. She’s not strong enough to do anything to Sevika like this, and they both know this. It doesn’t stop her from sitting up and punching Sevika’s leg, hard.
It annoys her more than it hurts. It would be so easy to slap her, Sevika thinks, and her metal fingers twitch as if reading her mind. She wants to.
Sevika grabs Jinx’s wrist in an attempt to stop the aimless punching, and crouches down to her level. Then she wraps her in a hug.
It’s the worst. Jinx thrashes for an uncomfortably long time, screaming, crying, violently. Then she goes slack and sobs into Sevika’s shoulder. Sevika holds on, gritting her teeth. She holds on, as much as she wants to hit the brat. She holds on, silently. Even when Jinx is crying so hard she pukes down Sevika’s back.
Fuck my life. Another mess to clean up later. Sevika moves to let go, but Jinx is actually clinging to her now, and that just makes everything worse. Not just because she can feel the vomit seeping through her shawl, but because she gets it. When you’re so broken you hold on to anything. It’s terrifying, because Sevika hasn’t felt that way since her father didn’t come home, and she hates the idea that she and Jinx have something in common now.
I’ve got you. She’d never say it, but she thinks it, for now.