Archive of Our Own ^beta

'Where are your parents?' Silco asks.

The boy looks at him with misty eyes and remains stubbornly silent.

Silco sighs. Tale as old as time. There are a hundred like him all over the fissures, though few with eyes the colour of polished cogs, and fewer still with crippled legs. Zaun is too rough, too mean. A kid his age, if he can't stand at a factory line, can't crawl between the gears or under looms, can't run away from marks who got wise of sticky fingers... Well, such kids don't live very long.

He'll fall down the levels, pushed and kicked and harassed until he's at the very bottom, in the Black Lanes, alone by the Pilt, taking charity from Demacian monks and beaten harder still if he so much as tries to compete for the pockets of the dead floating down the river.

Silco doesn't even lose time thinking of the mines. They employ kids—there isn't a business in Zaun that doesn't—but the overseers would not even look at him.

Maybe that's how the boy got away with his tricks for so long.

'What's your name?'

The boy keeps looking at him owlishly, and Silco realises that if he's been on the streets a while, he may not believe in kind adults anymore.

'I'm Silco,' he says. He runs a finger under his bad eye. 'Don't let this scare you. It wouldn't look so bad if I hadn't fallen in the Pilt when it was fresh.'

Well, pushed in and kept under, really, but now's not the time for such honesty. This bit of information gets the boy's golden eyes to shine with a new light. A touch of curiosity.

'This,' Silco continues, patting the dagger at his side, 'is to keep idiots who don't know me at a respectable distance. I'm not going to harm you.'

He comes closer, watching for the boy's reaction. He drags his bad leg up and hugs his knees, but he doesn't try to get away. Silco squats down in front of him at a respectable distance.

'What is the square root of sixteen?' he asks.

Finally, the boy speaks, his voice rough and squeaky with disuse. 'Four.' He hesitates, then adds, 'Sixteen is a perfect square.'

'Is it now? And how old are you?'

'Twelve.'

Silco hides his surprise. He doesn't look any older than nine or ten. 'I'm twice your age, give or take. I run the Lanes, ever heard of that?'

The boy shrugs, noncommittal.

Silco opens his hands, encompassing the entire level around them. 'Everything on this floor, and two levels up and down, it's all the Lanes. Every business here is part of it. And when there's trouble, the people report to me.'

Now the boy squirms. Silco lets him. He wants him uncomfortable now, so the relief hits him harder.

'When Soro came to me complaining that a little mite had been stealing from his gambling tables, I promised to look into it. Turned out the kid in question came into his casino with a single cog and played straight, as far as the dealers could tell. And yet he kept winning and winning, more than he should.'

'I didn't cheat!' the boy exclaims, an ugly flush blooming over his pale cheeks.

'No,' Silco says with a smile. 'You counted cards. But that's cheating in Soro's book. And most casino owners will agree. I suspect that's why you got the boot?'

The boy folds in on himself, and Silco can easily imagine a bag tied over his chest, under his clothes. His last winnings, now supposed to keep him going for the foreseeable future. Unless someone else hears as much as a clink and strips him clean.

'What's your name?' Silco asks again. 'You're not in trouble. I'm not after the coin you won.'

The boy's golden eyes seem to almost glow for a moment. They scan Silco like the truth of his words could be read on his face.

'It's... Viktor. What are you after, then?'

'Hello, Viktor. Nice to meet you.'

'What do you want?' Viktor grits.

Silco snorts. It's nice to see some fight is left in the lad. 'I want to offer you a job.'

 

---

 

'H-here? Really?'

Silco opens the Last Drop's doors and steps aside. Vander is at the bar, polishing glasses. He just closed, so he's surrounded by dishes. Viktor takes a hesitant step after Silco, looking around like it could be a trap. When he sees Vander, he stops dead in his tracks. Silco can sympathise with that reaction. The boy needs a new cane, but even with one he couldn't outrun a man like Vander, nor survive if Vander decided to swing one of his oversized fists. Hopefully his daunting size will inspire a feeling of safety before long.

'Vander,' Silco says, putting a reassuring hand on the boy's shoulder, 'this is Viktor.'

Vander looks up from his work and finally notices the boy. He glances at Silco, then back to Viktor, and melts. His shoulders droop and his expression softens with concern and understanding.

'Ah... I'll go set up an extra bed.'

'I'll show you the place,' Silco says, nudging the boy after Vander. 'This is the back of the bar. There's no room on this floor sadly, so you'll have to take the stairs.'

'I can manage,' Viktor mumbles.

'This cupboard is for storage. We get deliveries through the back, there. Upstairs is my and Vander's room, as well as a small office for my work.'

They go down the steps, to the room Vander and Silco use as a lounge and to host their more secret meetings. There aren't so many of those anymore, with the Lanes properly established. Vander is already pushing furniture around and undoing the work he once did to turn two mattresses into a couch.

'This will do for tonight,' he declares, contemplating his work. 'I'll go get a blanket.'

'The room is for me?' Viktor asks, stopping Vander in his tracks. 'All of it?'

'Sure, lad. Why not?'

Viktor looks to Silco, to Vander, and back to Silco again. He wrings his hands nervously. 'What do I have to do?'

Vander gives Silco the stinkeye. 'What did you tell the boy?'

'That I had a job for him.'

'You can't ever be straightforward, can you?'

'I don't think he was in the mood for simple charity,' Silco replies tartly. He turns to Viktor and says, dead serious, 'Your job is to go to school when you can, eat the food Vander cooks for you, help him with the dishes sometimes. That's it. You'll count the till at the end of the day too, and I'll teach you how to keep an accounting book.'

'He's just a kid, Silco! Look... Viktor, right?' Vander hesitates, pinned for a moment by the boy's unusual eyes. 'We don't need you to work. Silco promised you a job to get you here, but we run the Lanes.'

'Yeah... He said that,' Viktor says, looking back up at Silco.

He gives the boy a thumb's up in encouragement.

'Well, as leaders of the Lanes,' Vander continues, 'it's our job to make sure everyone in the community is fine.'

'More than fine, ideally,' Silco drawls. 'We want Zaun to thrive.'

'My point is, we just want you to be safe, to have a roof and hot meals.'

'For nothing?'

He doesn't seem to believe it, and Silco shoots Vander a pointed look. 'That's why I offered you to work for it a bit. If it makes you feel better, we'll find you things you can do.'

'Your job is to be a child,' Vander says emphatically. 'We fought to create the Lanes so no kids would have to grow up as we did.'

'We can talk politics over breakfast tomorrow,' Silco says. He passes his arm under Vander's, tugs on it to make him follow up the stairs. 'Come on. Viktor, settle down. We'll talk more tomorrow.'

 

---

 

'There's no way the boy will sleep,' Vander says, staring down his mug of ale. 'I know I could never.'

'Because you have no sense of self-preservation and you turn into a stone when you sleep. He'll be fine. This has to be his first time on a comfy bed in days or weeks.'

'I can't believe Soro had him kicked to the curb. Literally kicked.'

Silco smiles with genuine amusement. 'He was getting cleaned out at his own blackjack tables! The kid is lucky Soro didn't come out with a baton to break his one good leg.'

Vander hums pensively. 'So he's smart, you figure?'

'I should think... What's the square root of sixteen?'

'The what?'

Silco hides his expression in his glass of fire bourbon. 'Yeah, he's pretty smart.'

Vander grunts and rubs his chin. 'We'll have to get him an education then.'

'Don't jump the shark. Let's see how he does at the temple's school. No need to start saving to send him to the Academy just yet.'

Out of nowhere, Silco sneezes. It's a violent, full body thing that nearly tips him off his stool and has Vander in stitches.

'Janna disagrees,' Vander exclaims.

It's an old saying, and it sits uneasily with Silco. He's not one for superstition, but he's also not one for sneezing. The saying goes that Zaun's goddess will make people sneeze or hiccup to make them swallow their words back.

'Janna can pay the bloody Academy's tuition fees, if she cares!' he snaps.

Vander smiles, and now it's Silco's turn to melt. His look is so tender. He runs his rough knuckles over Silco's bare arm, the back of his hand. He takes it in his, intertwines their fingers. Then Vander brings them to his lips and kisses them. Softly, reverently. The back of Silco's hand, then turning it over, his palm, his wrist.

'You'll make a great dad,' he murmurs.

Silco chuckles, but he feels hot at the collar. 'You're already more dotting than I am. And who knows, maybe the kid has family. He wasn't forthcoming.'

'You know what that means.'

'Yeah, yeah... But who knows—'

'Stop worrying. Let's go have a look.'

They go down the steps on tip toes, but they needn't have bothered. Silco was right and the kid is fast asleep on his hastily made bed. They shut the door and share a look, tense with suppressed excitement.

'Tomorrow, make him wipe the dishes,' Silco whispers. 'And I'll teach him to count the till.'

Vander nods. 'All right. Day after, I'll show him how to pour beer.'

'Benzo's sure to have some books on calculus and chemistry. We'll take him around.'

'We'll get him a stool so he can stand behind the counter.'

They whisper plans like this as they climb up, all the way to their room. In their hearts Viktor is already as good as adopted.

There's a demon inside Vander.

Someone told him as much, many years ago, while he was beating them to death. Even with his fists soaked in gore and saliva bubbling down his chin, even after tossing their corpse aside and heading out to find and kill the rest of their accomplices, even that night as Silco disinfected and bandaged his fists, Vander wouldn't hear it, wouldn't see it.

It took years for him to see the truth of it, but he came around. He has a demon in him, yes—one of anger. A brutal rage that has served him faithfully his whole life.

It's how he survived as a child. How he met Silco. How he endured the mine and its overseers. How they carved out the Lanes, and how he gained his reputation and his new name. The Hound of the Underground speaks both of Vander's violence and loyalty. Hounds have master, after all. They can be leashed.

Vander only wishes he had his own anger on such a leash.

He used to see it as a tool. Something to wield against others, to protect his people. Something he could restrain, and maybe it was like that, once, but somewhere along the line it became a part of him—unshakable, undefined, and out of his control. Like any strong emotion, it has cutting edges and no handle. Vander has it by the blade, always, and bleeds as often as others.

It's what he sees when he looks at the boy. What he thinks of. Will I hurt him too? Will I lash out and smack him? What would it take?

Many things drowned in the Pilt alongside Silco, including Vander's delusions of self-control.

That evening a blind rage had swelled in his heart like a tide of oil-dark waters, drowning his reason, extinguishing his love, and propelling him in the shallows of the Pilt after Silco. Silco! The man Vander thought was safest from his anger, who used to anchor him and direct his violence to do good.

His partner of a decade. His only true love.

How do you love someone the way he (still) loves Silco and try to kill them over a disagreement under a drizzle of acid rain and foul tempers? Vander never made sense of it. One moment he'd been upset, the next he was bleeding from a knife wound, soaked through and shaking, Silco gone and their lives in tatters.

He'd lost control. He hadn't wanted for any of this to happen. Yet his hands had struck and clawed and pushed and strangled, becoming the instruments of a betrayal so deep, its effects still ripple through their relationship today.

It's the very same hands that Viktor seeks out, nestling his small ones in, confident in their safety. He hides behind Vander's legs and asks to be carried on his shoulders when he tires of his brace. He's fearless of him, blissfully ignorant.

It makes Vander's heart twist. Every time Viktor reaches out for him, he wants to recoil. He wants to sit him down and explain. The demon's still in there, under his ribs. Repressed and sleepy, perhaps, but a snarky comment, a slight or snide, a bit of cruelty towards his people, and the beast roils, ready to burst out if Vander were to lighten his grip.

There's no safety in his shadow, or under his palms. Only borrowed time.

'You're making things worse with these endless what-if scenarios,' Silco chides him. 'Stop fretting over nothing.'

Viktor's wellbeing doesn't seem like nothing to Vander, especially if he's the cause of any harm, but Silco has talked him out of that thought spiral before and Vander doesn't want to argue.

'You should take the boy out with you more. He needs to see what you do.'

Vander grunts, but he knows Silco is right. He can't keep playing nice dad in the security of their home while leaving the boy's education entirely in the hands of Silco. Viktor will grow up—heck, he's already half a hand taller than when he first arrived now that he gets to eat three meals a day—and Vander doesn't want to be remembered as the one forever in and out of the Drop, or manning the bar and shooing him away to work on the ledgers. He doesn't want to be remembered as the one who wouldn't hold his hand and spend time with him. The distant would-be father.

Even if Viktor came to understand the root of Vander's misgivings, it wouldn't help. How much of a coward would he seem like? Afraid of a sickly child, and afraid of himself.

'I'll take him with me to visit Felicia tomorrow,' he tells Silco.

They're in bed together, with Vander wrapped around Silco's waist, head in his lap. Silco is using his broad shoulder to annotate his papers. Bringing work to bed is usually against their rules, but things have not been going well lately, and many of their rules have been suspended or bent to accommodate the rising tensions in the Lanes.

'Good,' Silco says, running a distracted hand through Vander's hair. 'He'll be thrilled, you'll see.'

 

---

 

Viktor isn't thrilled, because he's nowhere to be found the next day.

'He wandered off to see friends, what do I know?' Silco says, irritated to be asked question before his first gulp of coffee. 'He's thirteen, Vander, remember what that was like?'

Thirteen for Vander was nothing like what it's turning out to be for Viktor, and that's for the best, but point taken. Vander had roamed with large packs of children, looking for victims and opportunities, looking for food to eat, scraps to resell and fights to get into. Scraps is definitely something Viktor seeks out, though in his own way. The basement bedroom has slowly morphed into a workshop—or a warehouse with a workbench and bed, depending on how you look at the mountains of parts and mechanical carcasses the boy has been dismantling and reassembling down there—and since Viktor has been vocally complaining about a part he can't seem to source anywhere, Vander decides to pay a visit to Benzo first.

Vander locks the Drop's door behind him. It's still early, and the Grey tints the morning air. Zaun, as city that never sleeps, is buzzing with activity. The energy is different from the evening however. Instead of drunk, most people are hangover. They lean on the walls, the railings, and each other. It's a transition period. Night shift workers heading home, everyone else either up to work in Piltover or down to the factories—at least on this level. Whores live in their brothels and ought to be fast asleep. Most merchants are still setting up their stores, lights low and doors closed. Nobody is looking to spend right now, besides perhaps one scrawny boy looking for... what was it? A transformer with some weird name?

'A flyback transformer,' Benzo informs him, 'and I've been on the lookout for one ever since he asked last week. That boy of yours has been back asking three times since then, but I don't run a miracle shop.'

'And the third time was this morning?'

Benzo jabs a thumb at his mug, rimmed with old coffee stains. 'Before I even took my first sip. I ignored him for a bit, but he kept banging on the window. You ought to be teaching him some manners, you know, not everyone here's as patient as I am.'

'Yes, most patient man in the Lanes,' Vander mutters. The only people Benzo is ever patient with are customers he's embezzling and children he's taken a shine to. Of course that includes Viktor. 'Did he tell you where he went?'

'No, but I can guess.'

Vander goes down the list of parts and pawn shops Benzo gives him until he finds one that's lit and open.

It's Rutier's, so Vander doesn't expect a warm welcome. The woman lost too many of her family—to the Grey, to enforcers and to the mines. She comes to every Lanes meeting, and she'll defend them to anyone who tries and challenge their claims, but she's remains unpleasant to deal with, to the point Vander sometimes doubts she's truly on their side. Loss looks different on everyone, Silco had told him once, and on Rutier it's an ugly thing. Always irate, and forever on searching for more things to be upset about.

Still, Vander is taken aback by her greeting.

She hisses when she sees him entering the shop. 'Out,' she spits. 'Out with you too and don't come back.'

Her hair, prematurely grey, hangs in tired locs down her shoulders. Her eyes are red and puffy, staring daggers over the rim of thick welding glasses. Her lips, pierced and painted purple, twist in a mighty scowl.

'All right.' Vander sighs. 'What happened?'

Rutier fumes in silence for a long minute before taking a drag of her pipe. 'Came to apologise, did you?' she asks, blowing her smoke out with an angry huff.

'What for?'

'That bloody mite you picked up from some Janna forsaken crack!' She coughs and hacks, but recovers enough to point an angry finger at Vander. 'You know how to pick them.'

Vander takes a step forward, standing to his full size, shoulders wide, hand spread out on her counter. He won't hurt her. He can't. She doesn't deserve even his anger. But still... The demon roils.

'Mind how you talk to me,' he says. 'Mind how you talk about Viktor.'

Rutier chortles and takes another drag. 'I get to talk to you however I want, Hound. This is my shop and you not even a paying customer.'

'I'll give you a cog if it calms you down. I just want to know if you've seen Viktor this morning, and what he's done to upset you.'

'Why would I have seen him this morning?' she asks, and she seems genuinely curious. 'I told you, he's not welcome here, and neither are you unless you make things right.'

'I can't make things right,' Vander says through clenched jaws, 'if you won't tell me what's wrong in the first place.'

Rutier slams her pipe on her counter and leans forward, the beads in her locs clicking as they tumble forward.

'He threw a fit!' she exclaims. 'Kept me open an hour past close time to go over all my stock, then he threw something in the sorting bins. Told him to be careful or else he'd have to pay. He looks me dead in the eyes and says, and I quote, "You don't have a single scrap here worth a cog if I could make one out of farts". That's the sort of rascal you're raising!'

It's all Vander can do not to dissolve into a fit of laughter. He runs a hand over his face, in appearance to push his hair back, in reality to hide his smile.

'He's thirteen, Rutier,' he says, sensitive to the irony of the situation. Silco had needed to remind him not an hour ago, and here he is now, chastising another. 'If your son were alive—'

'Don't,' she growls.

'If your son were alive today,' Vander continues, undeterred, 'he could have kids Viktor's age.' He comes right up to the counter, looking down on this old, broken woman he swore to protect as a member of the Lane. He speaks softly, crossing his hands behind his back, out of sight. 'Wouldn't you want them to be like him? To run freely? To feel safe enough to talk a little smack?'

She stares down at the grimy countertop, frowning and scowling, but remains silent.

'You joined us to make a better Zaun,' Vander continues. 'How can we make it any better if we're not soft on the new generation? We work hard so they have it easier, don't we?'

Vander almost thinks the conversation is over and Rutier will not look at him or reply, when she finally shifts, pushing herself back on her stool and taking her glasses off.

Her eyes are as red as usual, so it's hard to tell if she's misted by emotion or irritation. Either way, she jerks her chin and says, 'That sounded like an old Silco speech. He's rubbed off on you in the end.'

Vander smiles weakly. Silco doesn't do that sort of uplifting speeches anymore. That evening in the Pilt changed him. Vander changed him. So it's only fair if a bit of that old Silco lives on in Vander.

'I'd say so. Took long enough.'

Rutier grunts and flicks a bejewelled hand towards the door, shooing Vander out of her shop. 'If the boy has the guts for it, he'll have gone down to the Black Lanes. I told him ages ago that's the only place he'll find some of those parts.'

'Thank you,' Vander says, making sure he sounds as earnest as he feels. 'Next time I'm around I'll bring him for a proper apology, all right?'

The old woman spits and turns her back on him, but Vander is already flying out the door.

 

---

 

The Black Lanes are off limits, and Vander very much hope he won't find the boy there. He hopes with every fiber of his being that he dismissed Rutier's recommendations and recalled their warnings.

He runs through the rest of Benzo's list first, just to be sure. His throat is already closed off by the time he hits the last, but the locked door and "PISS OFF" sign over the window steal his breath away. Vander's got a knot at his side—he never was a runner—and an icy feeling spreading through his chest. The only thing that keeps him on his feet is a fear the likes of which he's never experienced before.

He jams a fist under his ribs and staggers towards East Ladder, the closest way down to the Sump, and the Black Lanes.

His mind is swimming. Torn between visions of the worst scenarios—Viktor's lithe body torn and battered, the ship bearing him to slavery in Noxus disappearing over the horizon, brilliant gold eyes dimmed and unseeing sinking into the Pilt—and Silco's reaction to the news.

More often than not, Vander has been the one dealing death in the Black Lanes. He knows exactly what it's like down there, he knows how easy a prey Viktor would be. How enticing he would look, with no real way to defend himself.

Whether Viktor gets mugged or killed or just broken all over again, it'll be Vander's fault. Because he let his guard down, because he never taught the boy well enough. He should beat him, Vander thinks, feverish, flying down the steps two or three at a time. If he finds him down there but alive and well, he should beat Viktor himself with his own hands—open, loving palms slapping into him a pitiful simulacra of what the Black Lanes could deal, so he never dreams of going again.

He pictures Silco crying, Silco pointing accusing fingers, stabbing into Vander's chest, deep between his ribs. As he lands with a crash on the top level of Factorywood, Vander can already feel it. A cold dagger under his heart, and well deserved.

'—der.'

He jogs towards the funicular stop, hoping to catch his breath while descending the rest of the way. If it doesn't arrive soon, he'll have to go to—

'VANDER!'

He stops and nearly trips on his own feet.

'What are you doing here? Are you all right?'

Vander whirls around, not believing his ears. But yes, yes, it is Viktor. Gangly little sprout of a man, constantly outgrowing his brace, clacking his way towards Vander in an awkward cane-powered trot, a large box of metal scrap clamped under his free arm. He looks dishevelled and sooty, but whole. Unarmed. And crucially, at the top level of Factorywood.

Vander feels the icy cold grip of panic exit him much in the same way a load bearing pillar exits the base of a building when you blow it up. He falls to his knees, too out of breath to say anything, just relishing the heady relief. It's potent stuff, dispelling the terrible images and thoughts that had gripped him just moments ago.

Viktor comes to a stop before him and drops his box unceremoniously. In the mad swirl of Vander's still confused mind, he finds himself hoping there wasn't any fragile flyback transformer in there, because Viktor won't be leaving the house to look for more for a while.

'What are you doing here?' he barks. He notices the girl when she flinches, dancing away from Viktor's shadow. 'Sorry, sorry. Let me... Let me catch my breath. I didn't mean to scare you, little lady.'

'Do you have to go somewhere?' Viktor asks, looking around like Vander might be pursued—or the pursuer. He's unphased by Vander's yelling, and comes to place a small hand on his shoulder, like he could support him. 'Do you need help?'

'No,' Vander huffs. 'I was looking for you.'

Viktor has the grace of blanching at the realisation. He fidgets awkwardly, then waves at his friend and nudges her closer. She takes a half-step, nervous, light on her feet.

'This is Sky, I met her up to at the pools. She, er... She said her mom's factory keeps a heap of trash to build up for days before porters come and sift it and, well, ah...'

Sky is tanned and freckled, a bony little thing of an age and size with Viktor. She has dark, curly hair, tied in a messy bun by a strip of wire.

'I said he should come take a look beforehand so he can get first pick,' she says.

She gives Vander a shy nod in greeting, but her tone is sure and firm. He likes her already.

'You're a good friend, I see. I'm Vander.'

'I got that,' she says with a smile. Then she blushes and takes a half-step back to hide behind Viktor. 'Uh, from the... From the yelling.'

Viktor, who has grown bold over the months, bold enough to cuss Rutier and go wander off to Factorywood without permission, gathers himself up and asks, 'Are you mad at me?'

Vander's skin is on fire. It tingles with sweat and the last residue of fear. He's caught his breath, but not all of his temper. He has to make sure. He can't hit Viktor, not ever—he regrets the thought already—but he has to make sure he understands.

'Did you find what you were looking for?' he asks.

Viktor looks down at the crate of parts at his feet. 'Uh... No? But we found lots, and I think I can bypass that transformer I'm looking for.'

'Just make your own already,' Sky whispers from behind her hand.

'Where would you have gone next to look for it, if you couldn't find it here?'

Viktor's eyes shine like cogs under chemlight. He's scanning Vander's face and thinking, gauging. He's so much like Silco, always so quick to read the situation. He knows Vander's question is meant as a test. Even if he lies, Vander couldn't be mad. At least he's thinking things through.

'I would ask if I could buy a new one at Bridgewaltz,' Viktor answers slowly, waiting to see if he's got it correct. 'The stall that sells chemtronics—'

'Ben's.'

'Yes, Ben. He says he can do special orders, even from Piltover. But it would cost a lot, so I decided to try with Sky first.'

Sky rolls her eyes, like she can't imagine anyone spending money on a transfomer. Vander can't either, but he's just relieved Viktor had the good sense not to mention the Black Lanes.

He tells Viktor as much, just to make sure.

'I talked to Rutier, who said you might have gone down there—'

'But you said never to go!' Viktor exclaims.

'The Black Lanes are dangerous,' Sky chimes in, 'and my da says if I get in trouble down there he's not coming to get me.'

'Vander would come get you,' Viktor says, all naïve and kind and childish.

Vander wants to cry. Instead he growls and points a threatening finger at both children.

'Her father's right to scare her. I could go down there and look for whoever I want, yeah, but you have no idea what could happen before then. There are worse things than being beaten and robbed. And there are worse things than dying. You don't want to be taken off to Demacia or Noxus. You don't want any of the gangs down there to realise you don't even have a knife to defend yourself with.'

Sky shrugs. 'I live up top, I'm never going down there, don't worry.'

Vander pins Viktor with a stare, and the boy stares right back. 'You said I can never go alone, so I'm not going. I wasn't going! Come on, dad, you should trust me too.'

Dad. Vander will never be used to that. And trust?

'Am I supposed to trust a thirteen year old who picks fight with Rutier?'

Viktor blushes.

'Who's Rutier?' Sky asks, looking between the two of them.

'Erm, a partmonger... I should say... sorry to?'

'Is that a question?' Vander asks. 'I promised her I'd come around with you for an apology.'

Viktor grimaces. 'She's rude,' he mutters, 'and her shop's a mess and everything's overpriced.'

Where has he gone, the boy who used to be too scared to even talk around him? Snatched away and replaced by this bundle of attitude.

Vander sighs and gets back to his feet. 'We'll go tomorrow. I've gotten enough Rutier myself for one day. I'll carry this.'

He picks up Viktor's haul and points the kids towards the funnicular. 'We're going up. We'll drop Sky home, then this at the Drop, and then you, mister, will be spending the rest of your day with me.'

Viktor gawks at him. 'Why?'

'Why?' Vander scoffs. He runs a hand over his chin, rough with overnight stubble. He'd left the house in a hurry and didn't shave. 'Because you've been left to run around so much, you took off for Factorywood without warning or permission. Also, I was told you'd be thrilled.'

The kids exchange a look.

'Really?' Viktor asks. 'What are you doing today?'

'Can I come along, then?' Sky asks, and Vander can't help but wonder if she isn't the one who's embolden Viktor. He doesn't know how long these two have been friends, but she's got plenty of spunk to share.

'Aren't your parents—'

'They're at the factory until night bell,' Sky cuts him off. 'Please?'

The funicular arrives and they board, Vander paying for the kids and shooing them to the back of the car. He balances the box of scraps on the handrail and looks down at the two kids.

'Fine. We'll go put this down and then we'll do some shopping. A friend recently gave birth and her husband is working double shifts. I'll cook something for her while you help look after her new baby.'

'Ohh, babies!' Sky exclaims, delighted.

Viktor seems less convinced. Certainly not thrilled. 'Aren't babies kind of useless?'

'Hey now, that hurts,' Vander says with a smile. 'I was a baby once.'

Viktor gawps at him. 'I know that's a fact... But I really struggle to see it?'

Sky laughs and pokes him in the ribs. 'Babies are fun, stupid.'

The funicular grinds to a stop at their level and they make their way to the Drop. The children chatter happily next to Vander, peppering him with questions, then bickering with each other, the talk circling back to transformers and how much can be tinkered at home.

The argument keeps on going even as they disappear downstairs with the parts, shouting promises of being right back up and ready to go.

'A new friend?' Silco asks, amused.

Vander hums, putting his head down on Silco's shoulder. 'Taking her with us.'

'Where did you find them?'

Vander explains, in a few words, the madness of the last hour. He can't believe it hasn't been a whole day of dread. He feels exhausted.

'There's still coffee in the pot,' Silco murmurs. 'You're doing great.'

'Am I?' The question is muffled, half lost in Silco's collar.

'You're doing your best. Isn't that what you said? Mmh?' He runs a hand over Vander's back, his nape, giving him silent reassurances and dispelling the last dregs of his fear. Putting that old demon to rest, a little longer. 'There's no point if we can't raise an ankle-bitter or two?'

'Quoting me? That's not fair.'

'Never fought a fair fight in my life,' Silco laughs.

And then the ankle-bitters emerge from the stairs still huffing and puffing about circuit boards and breakers and Vander only has time to steal a kiss before heading out after them.