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Jinx was… smaller than he’d imagined.
Frailer, too. The same kind of malnourished frame he had come to recognize on Viktor and his Undercity roots. Jayce couldn’t help but notice they also shared that same sallow complexion and gaunt eyes, a result of being drained and battered down by the world around them every day of their entire lives. Being able to draw such a connection between her and Viktor formed goosebumps on his spine. It didn’t sit right with him that she would share so many features as his closet companion.
This was the girl who had caused so much trouble?
Her appearance was a surprise, to say the least. It had only been a couple of hours since his negotiation with Silco and he had come down to the workshop after calling for a council meeting later that evening to gather his thoughts. To take his mind off… things. Instead, he found his and Viktor’s holy space broken into by some strange girl standing by the now-shattered window. Eating his sandwich.
“ Who are you ?” Jayce had asked, but the answer came to him before she spoke. His eyes were drawn to the weapons she had on her person; a pair of guns, some kind of launcher strapped to her back, and devices on her belt clearly of the explosive persuasion. All covered with a familiar neon scrawl that he had found on the bridge just days before. Viktor’s words echoed in his mind.
“The form is crude, but the engineering is… inspired.”
When Vi had first told him of her name, Jayce had found it peculiar. He had known of people of the Undercity and their inclination toward unorthodox names for their children, but this one, in particular, stood out. “Her name is Jinx.” Who names their kid that?
But he could see now that Jinx did, in fact, suit her name quite well. She had done nothing but stand there but something about her presence was… off. As he looked into her oddly pink-hazed eyes, he couldn’t help but feel on edge, like he was standing in the middle of a landmine, just waiting for the bomb to go off.
Without thinking, he readied himself, going into a fighter stance despite knowing he stood very little chance against literal explosives. He eyed the desk that Jinx stood upon where his Mercury Hammer sat, untouched. If only he could race across the room in time…
“ Jeez, you sure took your precious time,” Jinx said, ignoring his prior question and pulling him away from his thoughts. She finished off the rest of his sandwich in two bites and licked off the crumbs from her hands cheerfully. “Mm, a little stale for my tastes, but man, the baloney sure hit the spot!”
To Jayce's discontent, she did not give the air of someone who knew there was a bounty on her head. Had Silco decided not to take the deal after all? Had he sent her here to finish them all off? Damn it, war truly was the only option left…
“You were wrong to come here,” he told her. “There are enforcers at every corner of this building. I don’t know how you managed to get inside, but you sure aren’t getting out.”
“Woah, there, easy cowboy,” Jinx exclaimed, holding her hands up in a mock surrender. She leaped down from the desk and started approaching him. Her long braids swayed by her hips at every step, and the electric blue hue of her hair reminded Jayce of the missing Gemstone, irritating him further. “Don’t you even want to hear me out first?”
“A little long past that, don’t you think?” Jayce retorted, unable to keep the spite out of his voice. “If you wanted to be listened to then maybe you shouldn’t have hurt those people.”
Memories of the sight he saw on that bridge flashed back in Jayce’s mind. He felt the bile creep back up his throat. It didn’t matter how harmless this girl looked, she was still a criminal.
Jinx shrugged. “Maybe,” she admitted. “But aren’t you even a little curious?”
“Curious about what?” he replied without thinking. Her eyes gleamed with their shimmery pink tint. It was unlike anything Jayce had seen.
“About why I’m here, duh .” Without another word, she took one of the guns out of its holster and began twirling it around her finger. “Unless you just want to head straight into tussling. In that case, I’d be down.”
She was asking to be heard out. Using the threat of violence, sure, but an attempt at negotiation, nonetheless. Jayce mulled over his options. Even if he had the physical advantage, he didn’t think he could take Jinx in a fight. Not long enough for the enforcers to get here on time, anyway. He had lied about them being nearby, anyhow. Most of the enforcers had been assigned back at the bridge or the council. However many enforcers were at the building would probably presume any loud noises from the room were just the inventor up to his typical engineering rather than an attack. He was cornered. On the off chance that he could manage to get to the hammer in time, she still had the experience over him. On top of that, so far she has proven she’s more than willing to go to incredible lengths to seize victory. Those grenades on her belt certainly didn’t seem like for show.
Thinking harder about it, he realized it didn’t make sense for Silco to send just one person over if he had been planning an attack. Even if that one person was Jinx, Silco was someone who liked assurance; to make sure the job gets done. Then was she here as a way of pleading her case? Did they think once she revealed herself as just a teenage girl they’d set her free? That sure in hell wasn’t happening. If the council was in any way going to make peace with the Undercity, they would need to be offered some kind of tradeoff. Penance for trying to defy them. And that was getting Jinx behind bars.
“So you just wave an arm, have someone dragged off, and don’t bother to find out what it does to someone being stuffed in a stone box for weeks, months, or even years?”
He remembers the pain in Vi’s voice. The anger. He thought back to when he first became a council member, about how Mel had to teach him to turn a blind eye to certain injustices in the system in order to keep an eye on the bigger goal. Was he making the same mistake here?
No, he thought firmly. Unlike Vi, Jinx had actually committed the crimes she was accused of, there was no forgetting that injustice. And if he couldn’t stop Silco, then at least he would have her pay for what she’s done.
“This isn’t what Silco and I agreed on. I told him explicitly that if he wanted his nation of Zaun, the price was your arrest,” Jayce finally said, settling himself. “You can kill me, but that only gives the Council further reason to declare war on your people, and trust me, by then you won’t stand a chance.”
Pause. From where she was standing, a shadow was cast over Jinx’s face, but he could still see a small hint of a scoff in her expression. In a swift pink flash, suddenly the spot was empty. Taken aback, Jayce stumbled over to see where she could’ve disappeared.
“Wow, dramatic much?” A voice echoed from above him. His head jolted up to look at the ceiling. From this angle, she was even harder to see, but Jayce could make out the faint figure hanging off the rafters. How did she get up there so quickly? “Who said anything about killing? I told you I just wanted to chat.”
Seeing an opening, Jayce headed to the desk where he immediately grabbed the hammer and held it close to his chest, feeling much more secure now that he was armed.
“About what?” he demanded, walking back to the center of the room. He could hear her moving across the rafters but couldn’t see where. He kept an eye on the ceiling, nonetheless. “No matter what you say, it all ends the same way.”
“What, so you’re a fortune-teller now?” Jinx’s voice dripped with sarcasm. “Can’t even hear a girl out? Final wishes and whatnot?”
He couldn’t help himself. Who was she to ask for final wishes when she couldn’t even grant that to the others? “Why did you kill those people?” he pressed, gripping the handle of the Mercury Hammer. “What did they do to you? They — those people had families… people to go home to…”
“ Ugh, please. I can’t with the mushiness,” Jinx groaned. Anger flared in Jayce’s chest. How could she be so calloused about her own victims? Does she really not understand the weight of her actions? “Everyone has people to lose. Fact of life. They knew what they signed up for.”
“ Do you really think… ” Jayce grits his teeth. “Anyone will want to hear you out when you say things like that?”
“Probably not. Not those stupid Pilties, anyway. They never listen. They just go around with their huge egos, doing whatever they want without a care to who has to pay for it as long as it isn’t them.” There was something underneath the playfulness of Jinx’s tone as she said these words, a kind of spitefulness Jayce wasn’t used to.
“That isn’t true,” he insisted. “Not —not for everyone, at least. Most people just want to live in peace, that’s all.”
A scoff. “See, you’re just like them.” He could hear Jinx sneering down at him. “You’re all such hypocrites. All this big talk about peace and whatnot and then you turn around and pull shit like at the factory. Were you thinking about peace when you killed Renni’s brat?”
Jayce’s blood froze. The uncontrollable shaking in his hands returned as he recalled the incident, nearly dropping the hammer in the process. He could barely choke the words out.
“I didn’t… it was a mistake .”
“Hm, mistake or not, the kid’s worm food now because of you. You’re just like me.”
Wasn’t that truly a dreadful thought?
“I know now that it was wrong to do what I did,” he confessed, shoulders sagging. “And I’ll never live that down. But —” he glared up at the rafters with a new determination. “—that’s why I have to set things right. If things go on as they are now, people will only continue to suffer. This all started because you stole the gemstone, I’m facing my consequences, face yours.”
There was some creaking from what Jayce assumed was Jinx walking across the rafters. Suddenly, something dropped at his feet. Cautiously, he knelt down to see what it was: a notebook. More specifically —
“The hextech designs,” he whispered, mainly to himself. The notes he and Viktor had compiled together which had disappeared during the raid from what seemed like ages ago. “Why? Why return these now?”
“Don’t need them anymore,” Jinx replied simply. With a giant ‘THUD’ she dropped down from the rafters and landed back on the desk, scattering papers everywhere. She was holding her head between her knees, like a child hiding in a corner, leaving herself completely defenseless. If Jayce wanted to, he could walk right up and strike her down, easily. But a question weighed on his mind.
“What do you mean?”
Without lifting her head, Jinx reached behind her for the launcher strapped to her back. It was a large thing, now that Jayce had a better look at it, the type of weapon that required two hands to handle. It didn’t look light but Jinx swung it around with ease despite her slender physique; the design looked unrefined and juvenile with its shark-like exterior and neon scrawls all built from second-hand materials, but it seemed the necessary elements were there to make it a formidable firearm.
There was a glimmer in Jinx’s eyes as she showed off her creation, a look that Jayce could recognize from any scientist, including himself: pride. And in spite of everything, he was… impressed. To think she managed to design such an intricate contraption given her conditions and lack of resources from the Undercity; one had to wonder how far she could’ve gotten if she had the opportunities that Piltover offered like it did to Viktor. That’s when it dawned on him. A pit formed in his stomach as the horror overtook him.
“You like?” she giggled and pointed the launcher in his direction, making him flinch. The weapon pulsed with a glowing blue intensity, radiating with power. “I call him Fishbones. You know, Fishbones has put me through a lot of trouble these days, but in the end, I’m pretty happy with how he turned out, aren’t you? I guess I have your notes to thank for that. Though, it was pretty hard to read your handwriting.”
In a matter of days, she managed to weaponize hextech , Jayce realized with apprehension. He thought about Silco and his entire empire built on the operation of Shimmer, how deeply ingrained the substance had become in the trenches of the Undercity so he could seize control. What more could he be capable of now that he had his hands on something like this? What if he decided to attack Piltover after all? They could be preparing an army of armed hextech soldiers at this very moment… and the council would find they have no choice but to respond in turn. This would go further than war — it would mean the complete annihilation of both cities.
“You must destroy it.”
At the time, Jayce hadn’t understood how as a fellow scientist, Heimerdinger could tell him to abolish the Hexcore, Viktor’s magnum opus, with such foreboding, but now he understood. Part of being an inventor was knowing when some creations should never see the light of day. For the sake of humanity itself.
Was it all his fault?
Jinx may have been the one to steal the gemstone, but if it wasn’t for him and his ambitions, Hextech would never have existed. And then maybe this all could’ve been avoided. Jayce watched as the crazed girl in front of him mocked him with the product of his own innovation, and he could do nothing but watch.
“What do you want?” Jayce finally said, dejected, after standing silent for some time. “Why come here if you’ve already broken through Hextech? What more do you need from me?”
Jinx blinked, as if not expecting this reaction from him. Wordlessly, she put Fishbones down, letting it hang at her side.
“I just… wanna talk, that’s all.”
Jayce scoffed, more scornfully than he intended. “ Talk. Is that what you call it?”
She frowned at him. “Talk, chat, I dunno.” Her nose twitched and out of nowhere, she smacked the side of her head. “SHUT UP!”
He jumped at her sudden outburst. But as quickly as it came, it was over, and she was now pacing back and forth on his desk, distracted and muttering to herself.
“It’s not like I wanted any of this, you know. I was just following orders. And then stupid Ekko… stupid sisters … what was I supposed to do ? ”
Jayce was at a loss for what to do. Nothing about the situation made sense but now it really seemed as though Jinx was beginning to unravel, speaking to voices not there and continuously hitting the side of her head. He might as well have not been in the room at all — she was looking straight through him.
“They’re all leaving me. I’ll show them… No one ever listens! Even Silco… that jerk. He’s the reason I’m like this!” She tossed her arms into the air as if to gesture to herself, pink eyes shining. It took Jayce a few moments to realize she was on the brink of crying.
“ Why save me … if he was just gonna toss me aside at the first chance he got?”
In her own words, she fell silent, stopping in place. Jayce watched as she wrapped her arms around herself in some kind of helpless attempt at calming down, and he could see her shoulders shaking just slightly. The room was still, with no other sound other than Jinx’s heavy breathing.
Jayce finally decided he needed to say something. “So then… you’re telling me Silco was going to turn you in? He wasn’t backing out? That’s what he told you?”
Then why was Jinx here? She certainly didn’t come here on Silco’s orders, she didn’t seem like the type to go down without a fight. She scowled at the ground.
“He didn’t need to. I overheard him talking to Vander. What a nutcase… talking to dead people like that. First Vi, now him. We’re supposed to be family, aren’t we? How could they— he said he needed me… Fishbones was for him. So now what? He’s just done with me?
Is his precious nation of Zaun that much more important than his daughter? Jokes on me for trying, I suppose…”
Jayce’s heart clenched. She was Silco’s daughter? His eyes traced across her face once more; they didn’t seem to bear that much of a physical resemblance, but maybe she took after her mother. Still, now he understood exactly the weight of his request to Silco, and why he had looked so reluctant to comply. It couldn’t have been easy, choosing ambition over family…
Was I being the same way?
“What happened to you? ” Caitlyn’s accusatory tone stuck him in the chest.
Jinx’s hands were fisted up in her hair now as her frustration was clearly hitting a boiling point. “ I didn’t mean for any of this to happen! It wasn’t supposed to be this way! ”
Jayce cast his face down to the floor, unable to stand looking at Jinx anymore. His hammer fell to his sides. Before he knew it, he was speaking.
“I really am sorry… it had to come to this. I don’t know you or what you’ve been through, but it must not have been easy.” He sighed and rubbed a hand on the back of his neck, suddenly feeling incredibly tired of everything. “All this time, I’ve been telling myself that everything I’ve been doing was to help the Undercity, making a difference to the world, but now, I’m not so sure anymore… I haven’t been sure of anything for a while now.
A huff came from Jinx when in another pink flash, she was suddenly on the other side of the room, next to the chalkboard, covered in his and Viktor’s formulas and calculations, with her back turned to him. “Whatever… it’s not like Topsiders are exactly known for being helpful. And we don’t go around expecting handouts. That’s just how it’s always been.”
Her finger traced across one of the equations on the board, smudging the writing and leaving behind a trail of chalk dust. “... and I’m so sick of it. All of it.”
The sentiment was mutual but Jayce wasn’t going to admit that. He couldn’t. Not when he was responsible for so much that was going wrong. Jinx continued to speak.
“The truth is… even I’m not sure why I came here. I guess, I just wanted to get a look at you.” She turned her head to give him a quick glance. He couldn’t read the expression on her face. “I wanted to see who was the fella that Silco was going to hand me over to. Not gonna lie, you’re not what I was expecting. To think Silly is bending over to comply with the likes of some guy like you…” Her eyes hardened into a glare, and the hand that was on the board was suddenly clawing against the surface, making a painful screeching noise. Jayce winced from the sound. “Pisses me off like you wouldn’t believe.”
She went on. “I thought long and hard about what I should do now that Silco has no more use for me. I thought about killing him… but man, I guess I’m pretty mushy myself, I couldn’t bring myself to even do that. Then I thought I should go over to that bitch’s place and show her a piece of my mind… but that didn’t sit right with me either. ‘Cus what if Vi chose her over me? I might really lose my shit then. And then I thought about you… man of progress … my ass. The only difference you make is now the Topsiders have another goon to go and push us all around. And then you have the balls to demand that I turn myself in? Just for having a little fun?”
“ You killed people! ” Jayce protested, interrupting her monologue. He wasn’t going to just stand there and listen to her spout off about all those who wronged her without acknowledging her own charges. “Look, Piltover may be guilty of the things you accuse it of, but it doesn’t change the fact that the Undercity has been harmed under Silco’s rule! He had children working in the Shimmer operations! People are scared for their lives and out sick in the streets! I made that deal with Silco so no one else had to be hurt. So that you wouldn’t be able to hurt anybody else.”
Jinx scrunched up her nose in displeasure. The two glared at each other from across the room, the animosity thick in the air. For a moment, Jayce thinks she may attack and he grips tightly onto the hammer expectedly until —
“Whatever. It’s not like it's my problem now anyway.”
Not missing a beat, she lifted Fishbones up and held it out to Jayce. Almost as though she was… offering.
“This was one of the conditions with Silco, right? That he returned the gemstone? Well, here it is, right here for you to take back. You can have Fishbones, too. I’ll be sad to lose him but…” she didn’t finish her sentence. Jayce was dumbfounded, to say the least. He hadn’t seen this coming.
But there must’ve been a catch. There always was.
He narrowed his eyes at her. “Where is this coming from?”
Jinx looked out the shattered window, a faraway expression on her face.
“You know… Silco’s probably right for wanting to get rid of me. I mess everything up. That’s the real reason everyone always leaves me. It would have happened sooner or later. But I guess it’s sooner.” Calmest she’s been ever since appearing, Jinx set down Fishbones on the ground. But Jayce could see how her face was screwed-up — she was trying not to cry. She looked more just like a child than ever.
She faced him, now with a hint of desperation on her face. “I promise — I won’t do any harm from now on, okay? I’ll leave. I’ll disappear like I never existed so I’m nobody’s problem. Somewhere far away from here and you’ll never have to hear from me again. So just… keep your end of the deal, huh? Say I died or something, I don’t care. There isn’t anything for me here — not anymore… Vi has that stupid enforcer chick and Silco will have Zaun to take care of. I can’t take back what I did but… this way everybody gets what they want, right?”
Heaven forgive him, but Jayce felt his resolve falter. In the end, who was he to play god? Decide who gets to go free and who gets imprisoned? Especially when in moments like this he felt utterly powerless?
“How do I know you won’t go against your word the moment I agree?”
Right then, Jinx let out an empty, soulless laugh that would haunt Jayce in his dreams. “You don’t,” she admitted, shrugging. “You’d be a fool to trust someone like me, right? And lemme guess, as a scientist, you don’t like leaving a lot of things to fate. You like to be sure. Fine, then. But I’ll tell you one thing, I’m not going to spend the rest of my days rotting in a cell in Stillwater.” She opened her arms out as if egging him on. “So you’re either going to have to kill me or let me go. How does that sound, Wonder Boy?”
She had come there tonight prepared to die, Jayce realized. It all made sense now. She didn’t really think he’d let her leave. In a sadistic maneuver of circumstances, by leaving her life in his hands, Jinx had manipulated everything so that no matter what choice he ended up making, she’d obtain her freedom, no matter what, while punishing him in the meantime. It was genius — she couldn’t lose. And the only person he could blame was himself for making her the dealbreaker in the first place.
As he looked over at Jinx, looking completely at ease, Jayce caught that anticipative gleam in her eyes. She wanted him to kill her. She might’ve not realized it, but she did. And that’s what set him off. How dare she make him responsible for her consequences? Make him carry the weight of her actions? None of it was fair.
He snarled, baring his teeth at her and a gleeful smile took over her face as she reached for the guns in her holsters. But then —
“Leave.”
She blinked. “What?”
Jayce dropped the hammer to the ground and turned his back to her. “You were never here. I never want to see you again. Don’t worry, Silco will get his nation of Zaun just like he wished. Now, out .”
He wouldn’t play her games. He was done being a pawn for other people’s whims and fancies. There were more important things in life that he let himself be distracted from while trying to make everyone happy. Maybe if he hadn’t been so preoccupied with such superficial concerns he could’ve maintained his goal of helping the Undercity. Maybe he could’ve caught on sooner to the fact that Viktor was sick and helped him seek help earlier. A lot of things could’ve been different.
Jinx was searching his face for any signs of deceit but there wasn’t any. Jayce was a man of his word. She was frowning. For once, he had been able to turn the tables on her.
“Huh. Well, aren’t you boring? ”
In a final bright pink flash, she had vanished. All that was left that signaled she had even entered the workshop was some scattered papers, a shattered window, an empty plate that had previously had his sandwich, and Fishbones.
Slowly, Jayce walked over to where the launcher sat and picked it up delicately. After a few moments of observing the mechanics, he managed to figure out how to eject the blue gemstone from its holdings and it landed gracefully on the palm of his hand. He grasped it tightly in his fist before pocketing it and setting Fishbones down on the desk to deal with for another day.
Too distracted now to get any work done, Jayce headed to the doors. The meeting with the council wouldn’t be for another couple of hours, so for now, he decided, he would go and be with Viktor. He didn't know how things would turn out now. Probably not well, but he'd be there to face it, nonetheless.
Among all of his accomplishments and successes, it was time for Jayce to focus on what mattered most: The more important achievements in his life.