Chapter Text
Fuck.
This was all what Vi could think about when she heard noises in the hallway and this was all what she could think about as she got up to her feet after being thrown on the floor by an explosion. The sudden rush of adrenaline in her system commanded her to move, not even allowing her to think about the ‘how’ or ‘why’ there was even an explosion in the first place. The booty still secured on her shoulder, she blindly raced through the thick clouds of smoke toward the balcony and was soon rewarded by a much needed breath of fresh air.
Still disoriented, Vi took in her new surroundings with frantic eyes. The annoying blue sky of Piltover? Check. Claggor? Check. Mylo? Check. Powder?
…
“Where’s Powder?”
The silence she received from her brothers was the only answer she needed to rush back inside, letting the sack fall from her shoulder. They had come for it, yet, the booty didn’t seem that important anymore.
“Powder!!”
When the smoke finally subsided, Vi noticed her sister laying unconscious on the floor. A cold dread set in her heart as the grim memory of her mother’s body on the bridge came to overlap Powder’s unmoving figure. She rushed to her, trying to ignore it, as she immediately let herself fall on her knees and gently took her sister in her arms. Surely enough, Powder was breathing. But she wasn’t waking up. Vi inspected her body, trying to find an injury, but beside the soot on her face, she failed to notice anything different. Why wasn’t she waking up?
“Vi, we gotta go!” She heard Claggor’s voice pressing her from behind.
She shook her sister once. Twice. Thrice. Nothing. As Powder remained unresponsive, Vi felt her mind spiraling down in panic. What if… What if Powder never woke up? What if she died, just like that? Gods, they shouldn’t have come up here. This whole thing seemed so silly now, her sister unconscious in her arms. No amount of gold was worth Powder’s life.
When she noticed her knuckles turn white on her sister’s shoulder, Vi forced herself to swallow down the ball of anxiety in her throat. She couldn’t afford to panic. Not now. She tore her gaze from her sister and scanned her surroundings, trying to find the slightest clue regarding Powder’s condition. For a moment, her eyes fell on the Piltovan girl in the hallway. In other circumstances, Vi might have found her charming, but the urgency of the situation prevented to even process her as she broke the eye contact, and the girl continued to attend her own unconscious body—probably the young inventor they had raided.
“Vi!” Claggor pleaded a second time.
“I’ll be fine! I’ll… figure something out,” she responded, trying to keep her voice as convincing as possible. “Go!”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mylo immediately interjected. “We’re not going without you!”
“I can’t leave her here.”
The moment his eyes fell on the unconscious body in her arms, Mylo clicked his tongue.
“Fuck…! I knew this would happen!”
And he did. Sure, he hadn’t predicted the explosion. But he knew things would go wrong the moment Powder joined the party, because they always did when the girl was here. Powder had this… talent to bring troubles with her, whether she wanted it or not. Wherever she went, chaos was sure to follow. And up here, in Piltover, this was the last thing they needed. He had tried, oh he had tried to convince Vi not to bring her. But although he trusted her judgment with anything else, when her sister was involved, there was no more room for negotiations.
He could have told her that he was right and that this was all on her. In other circumstances, he might have. But this was not the moment nor the place. Besides, he was pretty sure Vi was already beating herself over it, so he simply joined her side. And when he took a better look at Powder’s unconscious face, all the annoyance he felt died down, replaced by worry.
Although he would never admit it out loud, Mylo didn’t actually hate Powder. She was annoying, sure. Incompetent even. But she was still one of their own. And as Vander taught them, they needed to stick together and have each other’s back. This was the one thing the Undercity was good at and the one thing that allowed them to survive this long: loyalty. So despite everything, despite all the misfortune she brought, Vi was right: they couldn’t leave Powder behind.
But how were they going to get out of this situation? They couldn’t leave the way they came, climbing and running through the roofs of Piltover no longer being an option now that Powder was unconscious, and the streets were crawling with enforcers. But they need to make a decision quickly. The sirens outside indicated that they were running out of time.
Vi turned around to exchange a quiet, but meaningful glance to the boys, who nodded in understanding. The streets it was. No matter how risky, it was their only chance. But before that, they needed to exit the crumbling building, and that meant going through the girl guarding the only entrance.
Resolute, Vi carefully lifted her sister up. She didn’t have to say a single word for the boys to come and help her. Claggor took Powder’s left arm and wrapped it around his shoulder, and Mylo supported her right side. Now relieved of her burden, Vi cracked her neck as she took threatening steps toward the entrance.
Caitlyn immediately tensed up, sensing her menacing aura. She abandoned Jayce’s body to rise up to her feet and face the intruders, putting on her face the most intimidating look she possibly could in this situation.
“S-Stay right here!” She ordered, trying to keep her voice steady. “Enforcers will be here soon, don’t you dare move a finger!”
But her threat was only received with a scoff, as the girl in front of her invaded her personal space, forcing her to take a step back until she was against the wall.
“Or what? You gonna tell your parents, Cupcake?”
Although Vi was prone to use violence, she never did so meaninglessly, and certainly not against innocent people. But there was no such a thing as an innocent topsider. Each time they took a breath, a trencher died inhaling toxic gases, and each time they eat to their fill, a trencher kid died starving in the streets. This, in itself, was already crime enough. So if it meant bringing her brothers and sister to safety, Vi could and totally would fight this girl right now, pretty or not.
But fortunately for all of them, Caitlyn had enough sense of self-preservation to avoid the conflict. She had zero experience in fighting and since the intimidation approach had clearly failed, she certainly didn’t feel like taking her chances here, three versus one. She figured out Jayce wouldn’t be too mad at her for prioritizing their own safety and letting his robbers go. She needed to take care of him first. Besides, it was the enforcers’ job to catch thieves, and Caitlyn was pretty confident that they would arrive before those managed to get away.
She bit her lip, settling for a simple glare at the robbers and Vi took the hint. She bobbed her head, signaling for the boys to follow her and they all passed by the powerless Piltovan girl who could do nothing else but watch them leave.
Once they were gone, Caitlyn squatted back down to inspect Jayce. He still showed no signs of waking up and Caitlyn knew better than to shake him. Since he didn’t seem too badly injured, she rolled him to the side and lifted his head to rest it on her tight. And she waited. There was nothing much she could do. Her father would attend to him better than she could hope to once enforcers found them. So in the meantime, she simply replayed the incident in her head.
It would surely be an encounter Caitlyn would never forget. She had never been in the Undercity before, but it wasn’t hard to guess where those kids who weren’t even older than her came from. And that girl… That fierce gaze had burnt itself into her mind, whether she wanted it or not. For a moment, Caitlyn didn’t know if she hoped that they would get away or that they would get caught. In either case, the shouts outside indicated that the chase had began.
“Will it work?”
“We can only hope…”
Jayce pulled the chair next his partner to let himself fall in it as they both contemplated the board in front of them. He was exhausted and his old bones didn’t allow him to pull all-nighters anymore, but finally, their long efforts and hard work would be rewarded. Hopefully. But he no longer had anything to lose, so they figured it would be worth a try.
Years ago, the love of his life died in the Council Bombing which he, himself, barely survived. From then on, everything went south. Piltover demanded blood, which the new council, supported by the Noxian general, was more than happy to provide. The loss of Mel had been too great for Jayce to find the strength in him to stop them, and if he was honest, back then, his heart screamed for vengeance as well. However, the consequences had been an all-out war which never ended, up to this day.
A cornered beast doesn’t hide, it fights back. Zaun had retaliated as strongly as Piltover did and the Piltovan citizens never slept soundly ever since. New threats emerged every once and then, and each time, the Council thought it was a better idea to send armies rather than to negotiate for peace. The spite had grown too strong for either side to consider a truce.
And if he thought he had nothing else to lose back then, time proved him wrong when Jayce ultimately lost his best friend. His relationship with Viktor had greatly deteriorated when the war started, as Viktor very explicitly expressed against it and Jayce didn’t do much to stop the violence. Eventually, Viktor defected back to Zaun, and the next time Jayce saw him, he had completely changed and was now considered one of the many new threats of Zaun.
The Machine Herald, the Loose Canon, the Mad Chemist, the Wrath of Zaun, the Dreadnought… The cycle of violence never stopped.
The only good thing that came out during all these years was his partnership with this Zaunite inventor, whom Heimerdinger introduced. He, too, was desperate to put an end to this carnage. Unfortunately, despite all their good intention, time proved them that no amount of help would ease the tensions. The losses had been too great in both sides, and the bitterness too strong. The Twin Cities were now both ready to go down, so long as it meant bringing the other with them. The damage had already been done and the only thing that could ever make a change at this point was to undo it all.
The project was ambitious, foolishly so Heimerdinger had commented. But it was also their only hope. Ekko’s Z-drive had already proven that time travel was possible. If only they could extend those few seconds to a few minutes, to a few days, to a few years… Things could change. Now, after years of intense research, trial and error, their project could finally come to life.
They would only have one chance. The Z-drive had been heavily modified to allow the trip, but only a limited quantity of non-organic matter would withstand such a big travel in time. Moreover, the amount of energy needed to activate it would surely destroy it upon activation. There was no room for failure this time.
The two partners sighed in anxiety as their long awaited project was finally coming to an end. Ultimately, it was Ekko who broke the silence.
“You ready?”
“Always.”
Their eyes fell upon the time capsule with only two words written on it: “Save Powder.” And after long seconds, together, they activated the Z-drive. This was their one and only second chance.