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It's been 78 hours and the smoke has not cleared. Piltover has resumed regular operations to the best of their ability, but for the first time in Silco's life, Zaun is completely silent. You can't even hear the howls of mothers who have lost their children on the bridge. Silco isn't sure how that's even possible, though, is that really saying anything? Right now, he's not sure about a lot of things.
For example, he's not sure how he's known Felicia all his life yet has never asked her if she would have preferred to be buried or cremated.
Felicia and Silco, little kids hunting for treasures among piles of trash, in hopes they'd be able to afford something for dinner. Felicia and Silco, teenagers working in the mines as soon as their parents allowed them to. Or in Felicia's case, as soon as they died and she had to find a better way to provide for herself besides scouring through the sump. Felicia and Silco, sister and brother, looking out for each other through thick and thin, for years upon years upon years. Felicia and Silco, one dead and the other alive.
How is it that in all that time he's known her, he never found out what she would have wanted done with her remains?
He was the one that found her on the bridge. He had been looking for Vander, but he found her instead- eyes open but unblinking. Had Connel met the same fate? Had Vander? He didn't get the chance to keep looking for him or call out for him- he didn't even get a chance to think. The enforcers were drawing nearer, most likely to finish off what they had started.
He had taken her to his house at first. He didn't know if the enforcers were after him or not and he didn't know where else to go. Home was safe, but he knew she couldn't stay there. She was dead and he was alive; she didn't belong there.
The hours blurred and his rapidly changing emotions became indecipherable. All he could do was look at her and remember. Remember everything they ever went through. Remember every regret he ever had about her. Remember every dream she had sparked in him throughout the years. Remember all the times in recent memory she had invited him somewhere and he had declined her offers. Remember all the times in distant memory he had wiped her tears. Remember how her now empty eyes had once rolled back at his dry jokes. Remember how her hands had once combed through his hair.
He was afraid to grow it out when he was younger. The others kids had bullied him for its length, and it hadn't even begun to pass his shoulders yet. But she had called it beautiful and said the others kids were morons that couldn't handle his genius. She had washed it when they were kids after long days of roaming through the sump. She had braided it for him a few times too, so they could match. It was one of the few hairstyles he knew how to do.
He had wanted to cut it a few years ago. He hadn't had short hair in so long- but Felicia had told him the idea of cutting it was nonsense. She told him she loved his hair, and accused him of only wanting to cut it out of fear of commitment.
He cut his hair with a nearby knife without any second thought. It was jagged and sloppy and wretched, but what was the point of keeping its length now? Felicia would never call his hair beautiful ever again. Her hands would never make another braid.
It wasn't long ago that they had spent each day together, working their asses off in the mines so they could spend each night drinking at The Last Drop, before finally calling it quits and walking home together, hand in hand. It hadn't been much different when they were kids, either. They used to spend every day picking through mountains of Piltover's filth with all the other kids and Silco ended up spending most nights at Felicia's upon his mother's order. She didn't want him around on the few and far in between nights where his father showed up again, and she certainly didn't want him around when she had those all dangerous men over.
She used to tell him that she wasn't ashamed of the sacrifices she had to make for the two of them, but at some point he reached an age where she couldn't look him in the eyes anymore.
On those nights, he ate with Felicia's family and slept in her bed. He looked at stars through the hole in her ceiling as she told him legends and folklore stories of nature spirits. There was one particular story he never got to hear the ending off, one about a spirit who protected the river. It was always the last one she told, and by the time she got to it he was already asleep and she was too tired to finish it.
He had someone send a message to Vander. He wasn't sure what Felicia would have wanted, or if Vander was even alive, but he knew she would have wanted them all together. One last time.
Silco waited a long time for Vander in the river. He waited until he absolutely couldn't take it anymore, until he could no longer bare holding her dead body, or the nonexistent look in her eyes. He put his forehead against hers (god how many times had they done that before?), a final goodbye. He watched her body drift farther and farther away and he fought every impulse and instinct to go after her and bring her back to him. He stood there for hours, waist deep in the river; Watching, until the clouds started to cry too, until there wasn't anything left to watch because her body was gone.
Felicia was gone, but Vander was back. Silco could hear the water moving behind him. It had to be Vander. It just had to be.
"She's a hero."
It was the only thought that had entered his mind while he was holding her body. Silco knew it to be true.
"Her death will not be in vain. We will make sure of it."
"'We'?"
Silco turned around to face his brother. Vander was drenched and clean shaven and several feet away.
"'We' promised her we wouldn't fail her and we did. We failed them all." Vander's voice dripped with darkness. His eyes did not meet Silco's.
"The bridge was not a failure! Revolutions are not born overnight and wars aren't won in a day. This is only the beginning."
Vander shook his head with disdain. "You never cared about her."
Silco had never heard a more repulsive lie. "Everything I have ever done in my life has been for Felicia. How can you even say that?"
"You were never there! Her kids don't even know you!"
"You have never judged me for my choices in the past, and you dare to judge them now? So I missed a few birthdays- but you know as well as I do that the best gift I can give those kids is not my time or affectation. No, the best gift I can give her children is their everlasting freedom. Felicia died fighting for their freedom, everyone's freedom! She had everything to lose and she ran the risk because the cause is everything!"
"No. Felicia died because of you!"
It all happened too quick. One moment Vander was yelling cruelty at him from afar and the next, Silco's right side of his face was screaming at him in anguish.
Vander hadn't come to bury Felicia or reunite with Silco. He had come to ambush him.
And suddenly, Silco felt the river all around him. He was completely taken off guard. His teeth clenched, his eyes widened, his feet kicked, his arms flailed, but nothing was stopping Vander's right hand from squeezing against his throat.
Silco felt so much pain. His nose was on fire, his mouth was filling with water from all the screaming he was doing, and his left eye was burning at the feeling of water rushing to his cornea. Though, the sensation was pale in comparison to how his right eye felt. No mater how hard he tried, he couldn't get it to open. It hurt so awfully bad.
No matter how hard he tried to get Vander off of him, Vander persisted. Silco tried pushing him away but Vander was so much stronger than he was. No amount of violence or fury or panic was getting Vander to reconsider. He took the punches. He took the kicks. A few times Silco's hands had made it out the water and reached Vander's face, but not even that had deterred him.
He wasn't even fighting Silco- from Silco's left eye he could see Vander above him. Unmoving. Uncaring. An imposing figure, like a statue.
Or The Grim.
Silco twisted his body and tried to escape, but Vander just grabbed him again, as though it was nothing. As though he was nothing. He tried to claw and scratch at Vander's arm, anything to give him some moment of pause, but Vander simply moved his wrist out of the way and stared down upon him. Silco could barely see, but he knew Vander was watching him trying and failing to fight for his life. A primal kind of worry and desperation then flooded Silco's body. He realized he was screaming too much and his eye was bleeding profusely. It was a feeling he had never felt before, and to say it felt like hell would be too light an implication. He also realized Vander was actively pushing him further into the river, closer to the bottom of the shallow waters they were in.
Silco tried to keep the last of his air in his mouth, but it was too late. A sleepiness like no other overtook him in a moment's notice, before Silco could even process or understand what was occurring. His eye rolled back, his arms fell limp, and the air bubble in his mouth popped. One final scream, one final pleading look, and then...
Light. Not in the vision sense. Light as in weight. Light as in demeanor.
Peace.
When was the last time he felt peace? Surely Silco had never felt like this before. Airy and cradled, comfortable and coaxed. It was like a voice was whispering to him, encouraging him to let it all go. Be one with the water. It will embrace you. Perhaps it was the voice of that river spirit, the one Felicia never got to tell him about.
Let go, Silco. Let go.
Everything felt smooth. Warm, but not in a temperature way. He felt like his thoughts were physically drifting away from his mind.
Get up, Silco.
Hmm. Felicia. His mother. Vander. Silco. Rage. Despair. Loss. The thoughts drifted out, and then came right back. Like how the waves lap the shore.
FIGHT. FIGHT. FIGHT. LIVE. SURVIVE. ENDURE.
LIVE.
LIVE.
LIVE.
No. Not at all like the tide being pulled back in. More like a tsunami destroying everything in its wake.
Struggle. Break free.
Insanity. Or is it pronounced instinct?
You are dying, Silco. You are dying. Do you want to be dead? Do you want to be with her again?
There is a choice. A choice to be made right here and now that won't be offered ever again. It is a choice that he doesn't have a lot of time to make. It is a decision he is already supposed to know his stance on, or rather, it's a question who's answer is supposed to be predetermined.
Have you had enough?
My, what a question- what a choice indeed. Silco wasn't sure what to make of it. He wasn't sure if...
Haven't you had enough?
.
.
.
.
.
Hmm...
Vander has a knife on his side. He's had it for many years now. Silco can barely feel anything, but he can feel Vander's skin underneath his fingers. Silco is still holding on to him.
His hand drifts away, a choice is being made. Fingertips dance across a knife. A choice is being made.
Silco can feel the pressure of Vander's massive hands. Silco plays the part. The choice is being made. The fingers curl around a handle. A knife is briskly stolen from its home.
The choice is made. The question is answered.
And soon, Silco feels the air again. He is gasping and his diversion is quickly wearing off. Vander bellows with fury and with one hand he jerks Silco back towards him, the other hand pushes Silco's head straight down into the river. Silco is terrified and reeling, and he is not going back in the water. He rips the knife across Vander's arm the second his attempt to push Vander's arm away fails. Silco makes his escape right after, not caring at all about the cry Vander just let out. He keeps trudging through the water, trying his hardest to make it back to land.
Vander doesn't bother with following him. Silco doesn't bother with looking back.