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"It's a dumb name."
"No it ain't. It's memorable."
"There's no dignity."
"It's a… an idiom. Everyone knows it. It'll stick in their heads."
"It's an idiom that implies hopelessness. And collapse. Is that what our base should be named after? Hopelessness and collapse?"
"Ahh you're thinking about it too much."
Silco stood with his hands on his hips, staring up at the hand painted sign above the building they had just bought. Eventually, with a lot more work and supplies either bought, stolen, or donated, it would be transformed into a pub. A real one. One that functioned to bring a community together, both in the front where regular socialization was free to society, and in the back where trades and plans took place.
Having a business and a headquarters was a huge deal. No more hiding in attic bathrooms to sew up stab wounds - those could be handled in a bathroom they owned. Silco had been nervous about purchasing the place, as it would be a massive investment that would need constant maintenance and stock replenishing. If it failed, then all the money they’d risked their lives for would be gone. If it succeeded, then they would have steady income. They could settle down at least a little and not have to travel into Piltover to pay their bills.
There were added bonuses, of course. They both had developed a taste for alcohol that was higher quality than engine fuel filtered through toast, so having a variety of safe drinks in stock was a lovely prospect.
Vander was excited to have a respectable place to socialize. Always the extrovert. Always so good with people. The real face of their organization, smiling and waving, inviting people with open arms, a huge teddy bear of camaraderie.
Silco would sit behind the counter, meticulously going over their accounting records to be sure no one stiffed them on merchandise and they stayed out of the red, small, silent, and ignored. No one noticed him there. In some ways he preferred it that way. He didn’t particularly like socializing - if there was no goal in the conversation, he’d rather be spending his time productively.
However…. seeing Vander laugh so hard his belly would shake, slapping patrons on the back, having them call his name, smile and wave to him… it hurt. It didn’t feel good to see people lean across the bar and only address Vander, behaving as though he, one entire half of the operation, wasn’t there at all.
He wanted people to call his name and wave to him. He wanted friends. He had accepted that he just wasn’t good at the whole ‘friend’ thing and likely never would be. He never spoke to people unless he needed something, or if they were irritating him. That wasn’t a good impression to make.
He’d tried being like Vander a few times, forcing his face to smile the way he did, making eye contact, but one time someone winced and he never did it again.
"It should be something invigorating."
"Oh yeah, smart guy? Got anythin' in mind?"
Silco considered. He held his hands up, waving them over the sign as though new letters were appearing.
"The Voice of Zaun"
"Whatt??" Laughed Vander.
"Don't laugh. You know, a voice. For US. What about: The Unforgotten Ghosts."
"Too many syllables, mate. And it's spooky."
"But it's got the right theme, right? Remembering those who died to build a revolutionary spirit."
"But yer drawin' attention to what we're up to, mate! We gotta be low. Unassuming. The Last Drop is a perfect name. No one would suspect a thing, see?"
Silco pouted and crossed his arms.
"I guess."
"You're just mad because you didn’t come up with it."
Once while looking over another stack of expense reports, focusing so hard that his knuckles bore red marks into his cheek, three especially loud friends of Vander’s arrived and all sat at the bar directly in front of him. They ignored him completely, leaning onto his papers, shouting in his face. He couldn’t believe it - they genuinely weren’t aware of him, all loudly calling for Vander, wondering if he was in the back - they had some crazy escapade to tell him.
Silco yanked his papers from their elbows and stormed to a booth as far away from the bar as he could, pressed into a corner and hunched himself over his work, fuming in silent rage and humiliation.
He did his best to drown out the jovial voices around him, nursing the wound in his heart. These were his people. He loved them, just as much as he loved his city. He saw the brightness and the beauty in every stone but the love was not returned. He dedicated his life to its prosperity, but the city and its people found him too unpleasant to give thanks.
He asked himself, not for the first time and certainly not the last: ‘Why do you keep doing this? They don't appreciate any of it - neither your gifts nor your sacrifice, leaving you with nothing but an empty suffering shell. Why help someone - or a city, or a community - who doesn’t love you back?’
‘What are you even doing with your life? Why do you care?’
A few minutes later, one of the loud, repulsive patrons approached his booth (he curled further at their presence) and set a bottle of whisky and a glass with ice in front of him. The patron, already drunk and smiling stupidly, said -
“The gentleman up front sent you this.”
From across the room, Vander smiled and waved.