Chapter Text
As an adoptive daughter of Cassandra and Tobias Kiramman, you have always been held to a high standard. You maintained good grades in school and humored your adoptive parents with your presence at their parties and political events without complaint. With a councilor for a mother and an enforcer for a sister, there wasn’t much room for rule breaking.
The Kirammans took you in after your mother was slaughtered in the massacre at the bridge. Your mother was the Zaunite spy who tipped the enforcers off about Zaun’s plan to rally at the bridge. In a last-minute surge of regret, she attempted to warn Zaun’s forces but was too late. She died in the crossfire. She was working under the jurisdiction of Cassandra Kiramman at the time, and after her death, the Kirammans took you in. Since then, you were given every privilege Piltover had to offer. You received a high-class education, from which you derived your love for science and technology.
The culmination of these passions can be seen at present through your participation in Piltover’s annual Innovators Competition, a science fair for young adults and Academy students. The fair is known to bring together the brightest young minds of Piltover and Zaun alike. The Academy scholarships and research grants presented at the fair are highly coveted, making the Innovators Competition one of the most competitive scenes in the nation for aspiring scientists.
Your place in Piltover Academy was already guaranteed. You were set to start your first semester in the coming fall. For you, the fair was just an opportunity to display your talents and make connections for your future pursuits. Still, you worked hard on your project and wanted to win.
Your project is a clean energy storage system of your own design; inexpensive, hyper efficient solar panels that could be housed in Piltover and hooked up to batteries in Zaun. The batteries you developed were a novel way of storing mass amounts of energy with very few losses by containing thermal energy in large silos of sand. You created the technology with the hopes of reducing the reliance on non-renewable fuel sources in the Undercity. With how new the technology is, you were faced with a lot of doubt from your peers and other professionals you’ve spoken with. One judge from the competition seems to share those doubts.
“How exactly will this be an improvement from our current generation system in Piltover? Our operations with chemtech are more fruitful than ever.”
You put on a well-practiced smile and respond to the question for what must’ve been the dozenth time that day. “While the chemtech industry prospers here in Piltover, Zaun is suffering the consequences. Deaths due to work in the mines are at an all-time high and the harmful byproducts of chem mines infect the air in every corner of the Undercity. My work could mean a better future for the people of the Undercity.”
This seems to appease the judge, and the rest of the interview goes smoothly. After another hour, the judging portion of the fair is concluded, and you take the moment of reprieve to look at some of the other projects. There was only an hour and a half till the award show, so you decided to focus on the other projects in your category.
With dozens of projects on display, you’re left in perpetual awe of the creativity of your peers. There was a project that built on current geothermal operations by using chemtech to better access hotspots, a project that made biofuel production more accessible by using food waste as a source of biomass, and a project that increased the efficiency of wind turbines for the Undercity by modifying the rotor blades to accommodate for the denser air. The project that stuck out the most to you, however, was a zero-loss chemical energy cell.
The project’s display board consisted of several complex equations showing how the phenomena was achieved and a working prototype that was covered in seemingly random bits of graffiti in a range of neon colors. The lack of professionalism in such a sophisticated project was a bit off putting, but it didn’t take away from the impressiveness of the device. According to the graphs posted, the model was not zero-loss quite yet, but it was still beyond any system you had seen before. Your own energy storage device was advanced compared to current systems, but this one was even more efficient.
While admiring the project, you feel a poke on your shoulder, startling you out of your thoughts. You turn around to see the grinning face of your sister Caitlyn. She’s wearing her full enforcer uniform with her hat tucked under her arm.
“Scouting the competition, are we?” Caitlyn says with a grin.
You blow out a breath and let out a nervous chuckle, “Yeah, I don’t think I can compete with this, honestly.”
“Your project is fantastic, don’t sell yourself short. I’m sure you’ll win something today.”
“We’ll see how things go. I appreciate your confidence in me, though.” A thought occurs to you, and you voice it with a slight frown. “What’re you doing here? I think Grayson would actually behead you if she saw you talking to me on duty.”
She rolls her eyes, “Sheriff Grayson is hardly the devil you make her out to be. After your incident with the rocket, her apprehension towards you, however, is well founded.”
You scoff and open your mouth to make a comment about how her car wasn’t supposed to be there anyways, but Caitlyn beats you to the draw.
“And for your information, she allowed me to get off early so I could come spend time with you before the award ceremony. I figured you’d be driving yourself insane with nerves and could use a distraction right about now. Speaking of which, do you want to check out that new cake shop by 21st? I’ve heard their cupcakes are terrific.”
You want to wait by the project for its owner to turn up, but the opportunity to spend some time with your older sister is enough to pull you away from the board.
“I’ll do you one better; how about we take a conveyor down and get some fish fry?”
An expression akin to pity crosses her face as she responds. “You know that’s not possible. With your...history, if someone recognizes you it could put you in danger.”
“No one’s going to recognize me! It’s been over a decade; I’m hardly the child I was then.”
“It’s not possible, I’m sorry,” she says with an air of finality.
You huff in frustration but soften when you see the genuine turmoil on Caitlyn’s face. “Yeah, I get it. Let’s just go to the cake shop.”
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Thirty minutes later, you’re sitting next to Caitlyn in a huge crowd of your peers, waiting to hear the results of the fair. The egregious amount of sugar in the eclairs you just ate coupled with your nerves has you on edge.
The keynote speaker was – as it was every year – Professor Heimerdinger: the headmaster of the Academy and your childhood hero. There was a set of stairs leading up to the podium just for him, but still, only his head was visible to the crowd. He begins to speak about his own time as a student, and what drove him to create the Academy. Though in any other circumstance you would be thrilled to hear from him, you tune out most of his speech; unable to focus. You snap back to reality as you hear the crowd erupt into applause.
“Thank you, thank you,” Heimerdinger says, his high-pitched voice cutting through all the noise. “Now, for the part I’m sure all the students are dying for, it’s time to announce the winners of this year’s Innovators Competition!”
The statement is met with another wave of applause, this time with you participating. From the program passed out when you entered the venue, you know your category’s winners will be announced fourth. As you see person after person walk the aisle to the winners’ podium for pictures, your anticipation rises, and you begin to tap your foot and drum your fingers against your knee rhythmically. When it’s time for your category to be announced, you lean forward in your seat.
“Third place in Energy and Sustainability goes to Improvements on Windmill Aerodynamics by Ekko.”
A boy around your age stands up and walks to the podium with a grin as his family and friends whistle behind him. Your leg starts tapping faster.
“Second place goes to Solar Energy and Sand Batteries by-”
The rest of his statement is lost to you as Caitlyn pulls you into a hug and screams. The smile on your face is so wide it hurts as you giggle back to her in a daze. Getting up from your seat, you squeeze your way out of the aisle and walk to the stage. You’re presented with a silver medal and instructed to stand on the second platform on a podium at the front of the stage. From your position, you can see the constant flashing of Caitlyn’s camera as she takes what must be thousands of photos. Just a moment after you become situated on the podium, Heimerdinger goes on to reveal who got first.
“First place in this category comes with a full ride scholarship to Piltover Academy. After seeing her project, I must say there is no one more deserving of that honor than this young lady. First place in Energy in Sustainability goes to Zero-Loss Chemical Cells by Powder.”
The crowd dutifully claps, and you see vibrant blue hair shifting through the rows of chairs before the figure it’s attached to comes into view. Finally presented with the opportunity to see the person behind such a brilliant device, you’re almost grateful you got second instead of first just so you could take her in from the stage.
Her hair is tied in twin buns; a style common in the Undercity. It suits her well, you think offhandedly. She’s wearing a light blue vest with purple flowers on top of a dress shirt. Squinting, you notice the flowers appear to be drawn on. Despite not knowing the girl in the slightest, you find her apparent penchant for doodling endearing.
As the girl walks on the stage to accept her medal, you finally get a clear view of her. Her eyes are a captivating light blue; their intensity highlighted by her bold eyeshadow. You catch yourself staring, but you can’t find it in yourself to care. When she approaches the podium, she eyes the boy who got third and smiles; and though it’s not meant for you, your heart flutters.
The three of you pose for pictures before you’re ushered off the stage and back into the crowd. You sit back down with Caitlyn, but your gaze stays trained on the girl as she’s pulled into a group hug by her family. From their attire, it’s clear they’re Zaunites. Caitlyn is congratulating you, but you don’t hear a word. Your eyes track the group until they disappear in the crowd.
“What’s got your head in the clouds,” says Caitlyn, noticing your obvious distraction.
“Nothing. Just wondering when school starts.”