Chapter Text
01
Ekko
The first thing Ekko noticed was his heartbeat pounding in his ears.
All he could feel was the thundering rush of his own blood through his body. His head was killing him, and he was so disoriented that it took him a while to even open his eyes.
The last thing he’d seen was blue. Big blue eyes looking wildly at him, the face of the girl he loved holding a body that was both his and wasn't, clutching “him” tighter as Ekko himself slipped away.
Just seconds ago he’d been reaching softly for her—not sure if he was saying goodbye or trying to hold on just a little longer—and the next he’d been thrust back into it, everything around him contorting into weird glitches of colors and shapes until all he could see was white and his body felt like it was ripping in two.
Then there was silence. The world still and eerily quiet until the sounds built back up like a freight train, as if someone had suddenly unpressed mute.
It was so loud.
Ekko blinked wildly, holding his head as his senses caught up and he realized the noise wasn’t just from his brain shaking in his skull.
He stumbled forward, fighting to clear his vision and locate where the loud screeching noises were coming from.
His brain began to register the crunch from whatever terrain he was stepping on, and he placed a hand over his eyes as they finally focused.
Yellow. The air was yellow. Zaun was yellow.
‘What the hell?’ Ekko thought, squeezing his eyes open and shut as he tried to make out anything over the noise both in and out of his head.
The scene around him was deafening— overlapping voices shouting over the noises he was starting to recognize as weapons clashing together.
He stumbled back as someone nearly rammed into him, head only now clear enough to recognize the people rushing past, squinting as he caught a glimpse of one.
They had their weapon raised, face angry, and teeth bared. A red staff in one hand and a sword in the other, complete with a full suit of gold-plated armor.
Battle gear.
And suddenly, the armor was moving closer, bloodied weapon at the ready and aimed at him. His brain fought to catch up, but his body—hardened by years in survival mode— was already dodging like it was second nature.
Ekko’s head was on a swivel. His eyes darted around as he searched for high vantage points or an escape route. Somewhere he could get a clear view of what was happening. Hopefully without getting himself killed in the process.
Dodging another blade, his head tilted back just enough to allow his eyes to land on his way out. The cogs in his head were finally unrusting, and he could feel his senses coming back to him.
He could get out of this.
‘Up. There’s a clearing past the entrance. If I can get on my board—’
“Isha!”
He didn’t get to finish his thought before a blood-curdling scream reached his ears and a bone-chilling fear settled in his chest.
Ekko’s head snapped around, struggling to make sense of anything through the quickly rising dust and smoke.
He knew that voice.
Would recognize it anywhere (even before the last week or so of hearing it every time he lifted his head).
He blinked blearily as the haze cleared just enough to see ahead, and a new fear flew through him like a gust of wind.
‘What the hell is that?!’
He felt his heart pounding in his chest as his vision cleared enough to make out…some kind of fanged monster thing. There was lava—literal lava—spilling from its mouth as it snarled and ripped at any person unlucky enough to fall near.
Ekko held the Z-drive closer instinctively. He felt like time was moving in slow motion as his eyes stayed glued to the creature, mind running a mile a minute as he scrambled for a way out of this.
And then he was falling—
stumbling to the side as something, someone, dove between his legs at lightning speed.
His hand squeezed the device humming against his palm, years of survival instinct kicking into overdrive.
But he hadn’t forgotten the voice. This was dangerous. Too dangerous.
The battle raging around him didn’t matter right now. He’d heard her..
‘I need to—’
“Isha!”
Came another scream, just as tear-jerking as the first. Ekko felt the fear gripping his heart triple in size in response.
Somewhere in the back of his mind, he silently noted that her voice seemed to be screaming a name— a problem his brain shoved to the back to be dealt with later.
Right now? He’d just caught sight of a child under that monstrous thing.
His eyes vaguely registered the hand clutched tightly around a glowing blue gun that looked all too familiar to him, because his feet were already moving before he knew what was happening.
‘Move. I have to move.’ The words echoed in his head, his conviction strengthening with every millisecond that passed.
He was ready, already taking a step, when his eyes zeroed in on the kid already pulling the trigger.
There was a loud clap.
A crinkling sound.
Someone was yelling something unintelligible over the other voices.
Ekko felt the hair on his arm stand up as a heat rose around him, blinking against a sudden, almost blinding light—
Pull. Rewind.
‘Move.’ The sound of his Z-drive slowing down echoed around the ringing in his ears, but he didn’t think.
Just sprinted forward with everything he had.
He was back. He could see them—her?
The child had just ducked between his legs. He could reach her. He had tunnel vision, eyes frozen to her back as she ran ahead of him with quickly increasing speed.
Just a few more steps against time, and he could catch her before—
Smack!
Ekko flew to the ground, legs flying out from under him with a harsh thud. He looked up, eyes meeting with the edge of a blood stained blade.
It glinted mockingly, as if taunting him. The soldier in red lifted the weapon in preparation to strike. His hand scrambled for the device at his side just as he saw the sword plunge toward his face—
Pull. Rewind.
‘Move. Duck under the blade. Weave around the soldier. Jump over that fallen body. Don’t lose sight of the girl.”
Ekko had run it at least 30 times by now, but each second and retry was still dangerously close.
His legs burned as he lunged forward, fingers stretching to their limit as his hand finally made contact with the child’s arm.
The girl jerked at the sudden contact, body twisting as she accidentally dropped the weapon she was holding.
Ekko barely paid it any mind.
He wasn’t willing to waste a single second, pulling the shaking child to his chest and desperately fumbling for his hoverboard as he tuned out the sounds of war and death around them.
As soon as he had the green and brown hovercraft in hand, he pulled her to his chest and jumped on it, shooting to the safety of the skies in seconds.
Vaguely, he could hear the child in his arms wailing. He was either too tense to recognize any of her words, or she wasn’t saying any.
Her arms were reaching out desperately behind him as she kicked and screamed at his back, but Ekko never looked back, determined to get her safe.
There was a sudden gust of wind that nearly sent them flailing, paired with the sound of a large explosion below them. He grunted in exertion as he fought to keep them upright.
‘What the hell just happened?! What the hell is happening?!’ His mind raced, finally allowing himself to think now that they were out of immediate danger.
Or so he thought.
A sharp pain shot through his arm and he risked a look down to see the tiny teeth of the child he’d just risked his life to save embedded deep in his arm, a matching pair of wide angry amber eyes glaring up at him, body wildly flailing around like she was trying to get him to let go.
He bit back a groan (of both pain and annoyance).
‘I don't have time for this.’ He thought through gritted teeth.
He just needed to get back to the Firelights base—get this kid somewhere safe and secure—and take five minutes to figure out what the hell just happened before his brain started collapsing in on itself.
But he knew the Zaun kids. Most of the refugees they took in were like this in the beginning. He was no stranger to kids glaring at him with fearful eyes hidden behind pools of anger.
So he bit his tongue and mustered a kind smile, holding the still biting and very squirmy child closer to him. Ekko flew forward, off to the base and hopefully, some answers.
–
And suppose his body was shaking slightly, and his mask of stoicism fell once or twice when he remembered the bone-chilling voice he’d heard screaming down there. In that case, he’d have to deal with it later, pushing it to the back of his head like all the other emotional baggage he never had time to address.
–
Later turned out to be a total of six minutes.
Ekko tensed, holding the child protectively as his ears caught a strange sound beneath him.
It was frantic, raw, and almost animalistic in its desperation.
“Isha!”
Her voice echoed, and he only saw a streak of pink before a gunshot rang out and a sudden force sent him barreling wildly toward a nearby building.
‘Protect the kid.’ Came his immediate thought, instinct taking over as he gritted his teeth and strained his muscles to aim for a rooftop and steady the board at the same time.
It was far from a graceful fall.
They landed with a sickening crack, and Ekko’s shoulder hit the rooftop first. The impact sent pain shooting down his spine, and he choked in pain—with a good feeling something just cracked in his ribs.
He struggled to get his bearings, registering the weight in his arms go limp as he barely managed to shield the kid around him.
“Damnit...” Ekko groaned out, hand hovering over the Z-drive while his eyes scanned their surroundings for the threat.
“Kid?” He rasped out, breath labored. “You okay?”
He forced his aching body to his feet, and his stomach dropped when his double vision finally merged into one.
Powder—
No, Jinx.
Jinx. Standing there. On the rooftop.
Coming face to face with the realization made his breath hitch.
He wasn’t in that alternate universe anymore.
He was back in his world with his Jinx, and she was standing right there in front of him.
Looking so similar yet so different from how he remembered.
Ekko studied everything new about her; her once bright baby blue eyes, the ones he swore held a glimpse of Powder on the bridge, were now laced with a color eerily close to shimmer pink and glowering with fury.
His eyes squinted as he went to examine more, focus drifting from her eyes to her glistening cheeks.
… Was she crying?
He swallowed, trying not to go into a coughing fit as every ounce of air left his lungs.
His head was loud again. Vision blurry as memories from both universes crashed over him and muddled together in a confusing heap.
Jinx. She had once been his best friend. Now essentially a stranger.
And yet, he still recognized her.
Ekko’s vision cleared. His mind raced.
He had to speak to her. He had to do something.
So many hours he had spent in Powder’s universe, wondering what he’d say—what he’d do when he finally got back to her.
But now that it was here, any words his mouth tried to form died on his tongue.
“What is this?!” Jinx’s voice cracked, pulling Ekko from his thoughts with the realization that he’s staring down the barrel of a gun.
It trembled in her hands, jerking wildly as her eyes darted between Ekko and the kid in his arms.
“Another ghost from my past, coming to taunt me?” She choked out, voice caught between a laugh and a sob.
“Jinx, please—“ Ekko started, trying to keep his voice steady even as his heart beat like a jackhammer.
“Don’t!” She snapped, causing Ekko’s grip on the girl to tighten reflexively.
Jinx twitched.
“Don’t say my name like that.” Her words were slurred, almost frantic as she spoke. Eyes flicking to something over Ekko’s shoulder.
“What are you even doing here, huh?” She laughed, voice shaking as her gaze lowered to the unconscious child in his arms. “Here to drag Isha to hell with you?”
Ekko hesitantly took a look at the girl, who looked as if she were merely sleeping, then made eye contact again with Jinx.
Pieces began to click into place.
His thoughts ran wild, struggling to maintain a calm demeanor with a gun literally to his face.
‘So she cares about this girl. A lot.’
The thought settled in his throat like mold, another brick of guilt sliding into place. He used to think she’d changed into a person incapable of loving anything.
“You…you always find a way to come back, huh?” Jinx’s voice cracked through his thoughts again as she held the barrel closer to his face. “Even in death? You just love to haunt me!”
Ekko tensed. He didn’t know what she was talking about. But he could see her desperation, could see her unsteady grip and the way she held the gun like it could protect her.
“And taking the kid? Isha?! You’re really overdoing it this time, boy wonder!”
The resulting laugh sounded suspiciously like another choked-back sob, even if she placed her finger on the trigger of the gun afterward.
Ekko took a deep breath.
He lifted his eyes, making eye contact.
His time with Powder…it’d changed everything for him. He was determined to get her—Not Powder, not Jinx, just her—back.
He took a small step forward, forcing himself to stay calm even as he felt his hands start to shake.
“Jinx….I don’t know what’s going on here.” He started, tone even. “But I think we can talk about this without the need for violence.“
Jinx’s grip on the gun tightened.
“Talk?!” She hissed as her shaking voice began to rise. “About what, Ekko? Talk about how I knew—”
Her voice cracked again, as if the words were fighting to get out. She was trembling so much that the gun nearly fell out of her hand, slowly pointing away from Ekko and instead towards some random debris on the rooftop.
“I knew..I knew I’d get her killed! Everyone I touch, everyone I—”
Jinx chokes as the words die in her throat. shaking her head as if she could forcibly push the thoughts out. Tears slowly start to spill from her eyes like a leaky faucet, and all Ekko can do is watch it happen.
“How are you even here, Ekko?” She looks at him again, blinking through glassy eyes. “They couldn’t find your body. I thought I’d blown you up to nothing!”
Jinx’s voice cracks again on the last part, before she shakes her head, breaking eye contact. Her hands shake, slowly coming down to rest against her elbows instead, holding herself.
“Just another ghost from my past gone forever because of me, while I can’t seem to—!” She cut herself off again, another humorless laugh erupting from her.
Ekko swallows carefully. He’d never seen her like this—not this bad. Not this close. It was tearing him apart.
Jinx blinks, taking some deep, desperate breaths and wiping her eyes. She tensed, looking at random corners wildly for a second before shaking her head again.
Her eyes land on Ekko as she straightens up, eyes zeroing in on the eerily silent child he’s carrying, trying not to look as heartbroken as she feels.
“And now you’re here.” Jinx walks closer slowly, looking down with a shadow cast over her face.
“You’re here. Carrying—carrying the dead body of someone I thought….” Jinx swallows, abruptly stopping and hugging her elbows again.
Her eyes tilt up until pink meets brown again.
‘Dead body?’ Ekko struggles, the fleeting thought overshadowed by the sight of Jinx looking at him the way she was.
This Jinx. She’s a far cry from the one he’d left on the bridge. The one who—he thought—never felt emotions other than joy at people’s suffering.
She stumbles over her next words, her voice barely audible.
“Are you even real?”
And for the 10th time that day, Ekko’s mind reeled.
He was struggling. He felt as if a massive wave of guilt, grief, and confusion had been teetering on the edge of overtaking him since he got back to this universe, but he didn’t have time to think or process anything right now.
Not when Jinx is in this state.
Not when she needs him.
‘I’ve gotta calm her down.’
With one hand still wrapped protectively around Isha’s limp form, Ekko cautiously but steadily reached his free hand out to Jinx.
It was a lifeline held out to her. A bridge, an invitation to not do it alone.
“Jinx.” He said softly, voice unwavering despite the storm raging in his chest. “I’m real. I’m here. Alive and well.”
Jinx’s face flashed with something, but she didn’t reply, eyes still locked on the girl’s limp form.
“Isha?” He paused, making sure he held her gaze. “She’s okay. She’s here too.” He takes a deep breath, bracing himself as he takes another step toward Jinx, steadily trying to land his hand on her arm.
“She’s fine. I think she may have had a little shock after everything today, but she’s not hurt. She’ll wake up soon.”
Jinx looks like she took a sudden breath, her hand twitching at Isha as Ekko took another step forward, closing the gap between them inch by inch.
“You didn’t destroy us. Isn’t that proof enough?”
His hand finally lands on her arm, a light touch that slowly merges into a stronger grounding grip when she doesn’t move. Jinx is frozen under him, eyes looking almost vacant.
Ekko tried not to think too hard about who he’s holding onto.
This was the same girl who’d blown up his comrades—his family— right in front of him, the same girl who caused him to paint the mural with new faces every-time they came in contact, the same girl he’d fought viciously and barely escaped with his life with time and time again for eight years.
But this was also the same girl who once promised to teach him shooting if he helped her with hand-to-hand combat so she could “show off to Vi”. The same girl who’d show up at Benzo’s specifically for him, teary-eyed and furious when the older kids made fun of her broken gadgets, and she knew “Ekko would understand.”
This was Powder. And it was Jinx.
He couldn’t give up on her again.
He wouldn’t let her slip away again.
So Ekko held his ground, his voice barely above a whisper now.
“It’s not your fault.”
He stood closer, arm around her shoulders now, so he felt it when her dam broke. Felt her shoulders start to shake, small at first, then harder until tears were streaming down her face and into his shirt.
”Vander…Vi…”
Jinx’s voice trembled as she spoke, leaning into his chest and sobbing into her hands.
“I thought…I thought it’d all be okay again. Like it used to be.”
Ekko almost froze seeing her break apart in front of him.
He hadn’t seen her so upset since they were both children in the lanes, being introduced to how dark the world gets just by surviving.
Jinx kept talking—she wasn’t even talking to him anymore; lost somewhere in her head. Ekko had no idea what she was talking about. Mentions of Vander threw him off.
But he couldn’t stop the way he wrapped his free arm around her, guiding her to rest fully against him.
And, surprisingly to him, she let him, trembling as she slid in next to Isha.
“It’s okay.” Ekko felt the words whispering out before he could stop them. “You’re okay.”
It was a while later when her cries finally slowed to a stop, when her guttural sobs turned into quiet whimpering. Somehow, the silence that followed was harsher than the storm that came before it.
“Come with me,” Ekko suggested gently, breaking the silence. His words surprised them both, but he quickly continued. “The girl, Isha? She needs to get checked over. You care about her, right? I just want to make sure she’s okay.”
And he felt it, the pull to say it, to tell her how badly he wanted to make sure she was okay too—but he swallowed the words down his throat, never to be seen again.
Jinx just nods, slowly untangling herself from him. She looks so tired. Not a single trace of her usual chaotic energy was there, as if she were a candle that’d been snuffed out.
‘How am I gonna explain this to the Firelights?’ The thought suddenly rang out in his head, realizing Jinx had, in fact, just agreed to go. ‘How long have I been gone?’
Ekko’s mind spun as his brain finally started to catch up on everything that had happened today.
Then his eyes locked on her again, Jinx staring at Isha in his arms with a faraway look in her eyes. And he realized it was enough. She was coming, she was with him. He could work with that. Everything else he could figure out later.
Right now, he had a chance.
Jinx
Jinx felt like she was floating.
Drifting. Untethered.
All she could see was Isha. Everything else was almost static-like background noise, blurring out of focus in her view.
She felt like she’d been free-falling into a pit of jagged nails for the past hour, and Ekko had somehow cheated the game and given her a safety net.
‘She’s breathing. Chest rising and falling. In and out.’
She muttered it like a mantra, clinging to the thought like a lifeline as she ever so often approached Ekko just to put her finger under Isha’s nose again.
Just to feel that faint puff of air.
A physical reminder that Isha was still here.
She thought she’d lost her.
The world dulled.
Ekko was speaking to her again, quiet and low, probably saying things that mattered, but she couldn’t hear him.
She couldn’t hear anything.
It was so quiet.
No absent-minded hums of acknowledgement while Jinx talks animatedly about things no one else cares to pay attention to.
No pitter-patter of tiny, determined footsteps chasing after hers as they explored those old streets in the lanes together.
No breathless childish giggles when she lost another bug battle and the “tickle monster” scooped her up.
Jinx felt another sob bubble up in her throat, tightening until it hurt.
‘She’s okay. She’s right there. She’s not dead…’ She tried to remind herself again. She barely registered Ekko’s hand gently pressing on the small of her back, guiding her forward to walk.
Everyone thought Isha was quiet because she didn’t speak. But Jinx heard her. In the tap of her feet, the rustle of her clothes, the grumbles when Jinx said no to something, and the happy squeals when she said yes.
But she couldn’t hear her right now.
Isha was cradled in his arms, her small body limp and unmoving as he walked. eyes closed and peaceful like she was just napping—like this was all a nice dream.
‘Ekko says she‘ll wake up. She’s sleeping. Don’t panic. Don’t panic. Don’t panic.
Jinx gripped the thought in her head as she forced every step forward through sheer willpower alone, feeling as if her whole being was a brittle piece of paper trying desperately not to tear.
Her grief was so heavy that it felt like she was carrying a physical weight.
She could feel it, pulling her down to the cracked rooftop with every sinking foot forward. As if the ground wanted to swallow her whole.
‘Isha is alive. Isha is alive. Isha is alive. Isha is alive. Isha is aliv—’
“Down here.” Came Ekko’s voice, quiet but sure, cutting through the silence that’d been drowning her. “Watch your step.”
Jinx startled a little when he spoke, blinking like she was waking up from a dream. Her throat felt a little less tight as she felt the pressure of his hand guiding her to the rooftop edge.
She knew logically that Zaun had to be buzzing with life around them. Pipes hissed to life, and old neon signs flickered in the distance.
But to Jinx, the world felt muffled, silent, and cold.
‘Deep breaths.’ She thought, latching onto the feeling of his hand steady on her back.
“Just follow me.” Came Ekko’s voice, his hand maneuvering to her elbow as he helped her climb down a metal ladder onto the alleyways they grew up in.
Jinx took a shuddering breath. The familiar streets stretched out in front of them, it was the streets she had always known in only three words: Crooked and broken and home. The air smelled like wet metal, all hot and humid, but it was better than the choking air of despair and hopelessness she’d been breathing in.
She took another breath, the air filling her lungs a little easier this time.
“We’re almost there,” Ekko murmured, hand on her back never wavering even as she swayed unsteadily on her feet. He was always right behind her, keeping face as she stumbled over the uneven pavement.
The sight felt like it opened yet another fresh wound, and something between grief and relief crashed over her.
‘Ekko…..’ The thought was soft and aching, and her hand moved on its own. It reached for him, fingers curling into his jacket.
Seeking him. He was steady, he had gravity, maybe he could make sure she wouldn’t float away.
She was drowning. She was sure of it. And he was here. He was the only one giving her air. And for the first time since Isha was injured, she could breathe freely.
Ekko didn’t make any noise of complaint, even when her nails dug in hard enough to leave little crescent moons through his jacket.
He just kept walking, steady as ever, while muttering things every so often. It’s like he knew she needed to hear it.
Jinx barely registered anything happening around her. Her hand clung desperately to Ekko’s sleeve, then to Isha’s limp arm, back and forth as her mind all but shut down. Like she was afraid that if she let go for a second, they’d both disappear.
She felt like her mind was coming apart.
One moment, she’d been soaring, the happiest she had been in years. Finally getting her family back, finally letting herself believe it was possible to stitch her family back together with all their broken parts.
And then it completely shattered.
Vander’s face— twisted, transformed, crying tears full of scalding lava and anguish—flashed behind her eyes. His hands reaching out for her, tearing apart whatever he could find.
Her side ached from where he’d thrown her, a white hot bruise blooming against her ribs. She subconsciously pressed her free hand into it, vision going blurry as she flinched.
A cold drop of water landing on her wrist snapped her out of it.
Blinking up, she realized they’d made their way into the narrow sewer corridors— dim tunnels with rusted pipes and metal grates as far as the eye could see.
“Watch your step, okay?” Ekko’s voice sounded closer now, grounding her as his hand reached up to make sure she didn’t fall.
Jinx was grateful, even if she couldn’t quite say it.
The silence stretched for a while, only broken by the sound of their footsteps landing in wet puddles that echoed off the metal walls.
Jinx’s mind wandered. She didn’t want to think. Didn’t dare.
The second she did, the same fear and grief she’d felt earlier started once again gripping her soul.
“I have a place we can rest in here.” Ekko broke the silence, voice careful not to startle her. She even caught him adjusting his pace to match her slow, uneven steps.
“And maybe..talk.”
Jinx tensed.
‘Talk? With Ekko?’
The thought whirled in her brain. When was the last time they even talked? Really talked?
Her brain reached back automatically, grasping at half-forgotten memories.
The Last Drop. Hidden under the stairs. She remembered it clearly now. Her knees were scraped raw, one too many attempts at imitating Vi’s parkour abilities, and she’d been whispering furiously that Ekko should be the one to ask Vi to sneak them some extra snacks from the bar since she was too nervous to do it herself. His laugh had stayed with her then, light and breathless. He said her cheeks were so red she looked like a strawberry poro, laughing so loud that Vander heard, and they’d gotten caught.
Even further back, when was the last time she talked to anyone who wasn’t Isha or Sevika?
Before Silco died?
It had been months.
The ache in her chest twisted painfully as Ekko’s voice reached her again.
“It’s got food, med kits, whatever you might need in a pinch.” He said carefully, footsteps echoing off the dripping walls. “I don’t know what happened out there, but…if you need a place to lay low…”
He let the rest of his offer hang in the air, the unsaid part loud enough.
Jinx just nodded vacantly, her mind moving too slow and too fast all at once.
Ekko was being kind. To her. ‘How?’
She didn’t know what was happening. Everything was so overwhelming. She couldn't move. Her head was throbbing under the flickering sewer lights, and the cold was starting to seep into her bones.
She realized she was shivering as her gaze darted between the corridor ahead and the small, still shape in Ekko’s arms.
Isha looked peaceful. Like she hadn’t almost—
Another wave of nausea rushed forward in Jinx’s gut.
“You almost killed her.”
The thought twisted into a voice, stabbing right through her chest.
“No one you love will survive with you around. She’s just going to die anyway. It’s what you do!”
Mylo’s voice. Clear as if he were standing right beside her.
It shook her to her core, and she stumbled to a stop. Hands shaking and voice hitching, nails digging into her own arm. Her head snapped to the side, a learned behavior from years of trying to shake the voices loose from her brain.
Her wild eyes flicked to the side, and there he was. Standing there, post-mortem as usual, holding a plush bunny with its head ripped clean off and glitching in and out of reality like a broken projection.
Jinx squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head violently.
‘Not real. Not real. Not real.’
But her mind refused to settle as they took another turn in the corridors. It was sharp and jagged and angry, and she didn’t even notice when Ekko moved a little closer.
The rusting tunnels suddenly seemed endless, the walls closing in on her tighter and tighter. She clung to him, gripping his arm like it was her only anchor in the world.
Ekko didn’t pull away. Didn’t mention it. Without a word, he slowly shifted his grip and slid his hand into hers, providing a lifeline of physical grounding that Jinx so desperately needed.
Her eye twitched.
He was touching her. Not to hurt, not to push, not to drag, not to do any of the things they’d spent the last 10 years dancing around.
Just to hold.
To help.
Her eye twitched again.
“Here it is,” Ekko said gently, voice rising above the endless drips of water in the distance.
They came to a break in the sewer walls, hidden away behind a collapsed pipe and some loose stone.
It was a small room, with walls cracked with age and a faint smell of moss clinging to the air.
She hesitated at the entrance, body still wracked with small, broken sounds of grief and lingering, silenced sobs made their way out of her throat no matter how tightly she bit down on them.
It wasn’t much.
Just enough supplies to survive; small crates stacked neatly in one corner, dented metal shelves half stocked with med-kits and canned foods in the other, a worn, patched bed tucked into the farthest corner—but it was big enough for all of them.
Jinx took a sharp, shuddering breath as she stumbled without thinking, rushing forward as Ekko lay Isha carefully on the bed. His hands were steady, cradling the small girl as if she might break if he jostled her.
Jinx leaned down beside them, arms twitching with the urge to grab Isha’s face and make sure she was breathing. Make sure she was still real.
Her hands hovered awkwardly in the air. She was so scared to touch—terrified to hurt her more—but the thought of leaving her alone was even worse.
Finally, trembling, she rested them lightly on Isha’s shoulders as Jinx leaned over the bed.
“Isha…I’m here, okay? Wake up soon…” She muttered, the words spilling out in a frantic whisper. Her hands moved on their own, fingertips brushing against Isha’s cheeks, sweeping her hair back in trembling strokes.
“I won’t leave. I’ll be right here.”
She didn’t know how much time had passed like that. Minutes? Hours? Her surroundings fell away as her world became nothing but the rhythmic sound of Isha’s chest rising and falling.
‘Alive. Alive.’
Jinx clung to the steady beat, timing each thought with every one of Isha’s breaths, almost counting them.
She could feel Ekko’s eyes on her— his gaze heavy with questions he had yet to ask.
Something was buzzing in the air, an energy thicker than concern alone.
But she didn’t look at him. Couldn’t. Too overwhelmed to focus on anything but the fragile little heartbeat of her girl in front of her.
Her fingers gently pushed her hair aside as Jinx leant down to kiss her forehead, muttering nonsense, promises, anything to keep her with her.
The scuff of Ekko’s boots broke the silence.
“So this is it.”
Jinx tensed instinctively, but she still didn’t look up at him.
“Stay here for a while, alright? I’m gonna get someone who can check on Isha. Just…stay here.”
‘Stay?’
‘Stay here?
‘With him?’
The thought ricocheted through her broken mind like a bullet.
‘No…he must be giving us safety for the night.’ She told herself, not moving from where she knelt. ‘It makes sense. He always had a soft spot for kids.’
Jinx blinked slowly, her throat dry and raw, before she managed to scrape her voice together loud enough for him to hear.
"You really like to live up to your name, huh?" Her voice was sharp, but not as sharp as it could’ve been. There was something almost grateful under the bite.
She caught him smirking out of the corner of her eye.
"That's your way of saying thank you?” He said casually, stepping just slightly closer. “Never thought you’d be the type."
And god—Jinx found herself chuckling under her breath.
The sound was bitter, yet softer than expected, but it was real.
She felt lightheaded, almost like she was on air. Her walls, her towering walls she built brick by angry brick, were wobbling dangerously. Uneven from the cracks in her chest as her words slipped out unchecked.
“Yeah? What can I say?” She muttered. “I guess people act differently when they’ve got something to live for.”
Her words hung in the air, heavier than either of them dared to admit.
She wasn’t sure what she meant; so much had happened—had changed in just a few hours.
Ekko hovered by the doorway, staring at her for so long that Jinx thought he might even approach her.
But she blinked, and when she opened her eyes again, he’d slipped out of the room, the door closing softly behind him.
The room plunged back into silence.
Only then, when she was sure she was alone, did her body finally truly break under the weight it’d been carrying.
A shudder ripped through her chest.
Then another.
And then she was crying.
Open, helpless, silent tears ran down her face as she climbed into bed.
She curled into Isha’s silent, unconscious form, pressing the girl so tightly into her neck she could feel her breathing on her skin. Like she could fuse them together. Like if she held close enough, nothing would ever take her away again.
“I’m here, Isha.” She sobbed hoarsely into her hair. “Right here. Just wake up for me.”
She didn’t know if she was saying it for Isha or herself.
She didn’t know a lot of things anymore.
Didn’t know how she ended up here— in a Firelight safehouse— led by Ekko, her enemy, who somehow had enough kindness left in his heart to save Isha’s life and ensure she’s going to be okay afterwards.
Didn’t know how the world had shattered and stitched itself back together just to shatter again in one night.
Vander was alive and dead again.
Vi returned and went again.
Hope dangled in front of her and was snatched away over and over and over—
Her hands still shook violently as she clung tighter to Isha and breathed in her warmth, burying her face in her hair.
But that’s right. Isha was here. Alive. Breathing.
And for now, that was enough.