Work Text:
"I'm going to kill him."
Jinx stabbed the dirt with the tip of her pink staff, growling and panting like a member of the local wildlife. She probably had forest-crusted hair like one as well…
Blowing her bangs off her face, she clung to the traction and took a step, the ridged sole of her shoe kicking a pebble into the shins of some unlucky soul behind her.
Ekko turned.
"Who?" he asked, eyebrow raised and a lopsided smile.
Unlike her, he looked ridiculously great. He stood there, all bronzed and nimble like a mountain goat, with fluffy-cloudy hair, glowing skin, and a hiking outfit that clung in all the right spots, doing glorious justice to his sun sculpted forearms and his fine ass. He looked like he'd just walked out of their hotel brochures, and Jinx felt a mix of deep envy and admiration.
"The guy," she muttered, taking another step, "the one who wrote the sign."
"Which one?"
"The one that lied to us."
She stopped to catch her breath, forcing Ekko to do the same. Right then, an old man and his Bernese mountain dog strolled past them with a cheerful greeting and a look so proud it bordered on evil.
Frustration started to blur with misery.
"It said: thirty-five minutes," she sighed. "Remember when I read it said thirty-five minutes?"
"We took three breaks," he reminded her, "and this last stretch is steeper. That's why it feels longer."
Jinx leaned on her knees and bit her lip. She didn't want to complain… not when Ekko looked so cheerful, smiling at her encouragingly and glancing around every five minutes like a kid in a candy store.
She wanted to keep up with him, hiking with the same effortless grace, looking like a woodland nymph with flowing hair, outpacing that old dude, conquering the summit and the whole world by his side!
But her feet hurt, socks itched around her ankles, sunscreen was dripping into her eyes and, more than anything, it was almost lunchtime. Their "emergency" supplies had quickly run dry over the weekend, and all that was left was a single bag of chips and a few mint drops that tasted like chlorophyll and Saturday night fever.
Her mind began to wander to the Lodge's menu. There might be those spicy breadsticks Ekko had made her try last time… the ones she'd dipped in plum jam, and that had burst in her mouth with a surprisingly pleasant clash of flavors.
Saliva pooled under her tongue. She greet the fantasy and indulged in it some more. Just a little more. For motivation.
Soft dumplings on a bed of parmesan fondue, golden tirtlen stuffed with ricotta and spinach, tender beef stew with crusted potatoes…
"Fourth break?"
Ekko's voice was sweet, tempting and seductive like his words, a spoonful of dandelion honey.
Butter roses, apple strudel with vanilla sauce, blueberry-glazed omelettes, hot raspberries on ice cream—
"No," she clenched her jaw. "I want to get up there."
But as she spoke, Ekko had already slipped the backpack off her shoulders, gently easing her down on the grass and propping her against it. Before she realized it, she was holding a water bottle and wearing a sun visor.
Jinx gave him a guilty look, but he didn't seem bothered at all. He sat down next to her and pulled out the chips, smiling like just being there, in that moment and place with her, was the most amazing thing in the world.
He leaned in to tuck a blue strand behind her ear. It made her want to scream, bite something, and hug him. She looked away, staring off at some random spot on the horizon.
"Are you thinking about the vastness of the world against the infinite smallness of the human being?" he teased.
"I'm thinking about jumping off this slope and rolling to the bottom like in one of those stupid panda reels."
Ekko chuckled softly — his aura so bright she could sense it even without looking at him (which she deliberately and stubbornly avoided, because it was obvious that if she did, it would fucking blind her).
"Well, we can always try it on the way back."
Creak.
...Was that the sound of plastic opening?
Oh, screw it!
She turned, finding a potato chip before her eyes.
"It's okay," he reassured, "we're almost there."
The outstretched food in his hand only sharpened the picture of herself as some grumpy animal, but on an empty stomach Jinx was weak. And even weaker for those two gleaming chocolate buttons looking at her with such apprehension.
She bit into the snack without arguing.
“I kno',” she chewed, with bits of dehydrated potato still stuck to her molars. Then she lowered her eyes and added, " 'mshorry…"
Ekko stretched out his legs, relaxed.
"Don't be," he tilted his head to the side. "Views like this calls for a bit of stillness."
She followed his gaze and actually, if you looked at it with a clear mind and a few chips in your stomach, the landscape wasn't all that bad.
Before them, green hills sloped down into a valley scattered with pitched-roof houses, the kind children put in their drawings; jagged rocks popped up from the grass, along with sprays of yellow and lilac that broke the monotony. The sky behind the mountains was a bold blue, almost fake, as if the same child who'd drawn the houses had cut it out, colored it in, and stuck it there with some tape and rounded scissors.
Jinx breathed in, filling her chest with a cool and light bubble. Maybe it was just the texture of the air outside Zaun's industrial area, and maybe that was just an unspoiled sky.
Ekko promised that what they'd see from the top would be even better.
She remembered a twelve-year-old boy, who wove dandelion rings around her fingers and rescued bees from the public pool with a plastic flip-flop.
At times, a bitter thought prodded her. That she and Ekko were born different, that he had something… inside him, that she lacked. A clear piece that escaped natural selection and wasn't made for the streets life had thrown them into. Or maybe she wasn't either. Maybe no one really was, and it was all just a harsh matter of forced adaptation.
They had both learned, both adapted, like a liquid in its container, reshaping their lungs to breathe chemical fumes and sharpening their retinas to look straight into artificial neon lights. In the end, for two children of the Lanes like them, it was easy to enjoy places like this. Or to feel utterly out of place in them…
"Pow." Ekko's hand tapped frantically on her thigh to get her attention. At that point, she was about to bite him for real.
"Hey! I was actually having a deep thought this ti—"
"Shh!"
He pressed a finger to his lips, then lifted his chin, pointing at something on their right.
All Jinx could see were grassy highland, green like all the rest. She might had underestimated the fact that it was lunchtime for Ekko too, and that he'd let her have the whole bag of chips. But just when she was about to roll her eyes and turn away, about ten meters out, a patch of grass rustled. Jinx craned her neck, squinted, and there it was.
A squatty little creature, brown fur, poked out of the ground like a rye loaf risen from the earth. It stayed still for a moment, then sprang out fully, revealing its snout and tiny front paws tucked up against its chest. Nose twitching in quick spasms.
Jinx's eyes widened.
"Wait!" she exclaimed, trying to keep her voice down. "It's one of those! One of those things... the ones that scream!"
"A marmot," he corrected her, a laugh stifled between his teeth. "And look..."
A moment later, another one came out, smaller, standing guard like the first. Seeing them like that, heads moving in sync in the same direction, was almost comical, like a scene from a cartoon. She stayed silent, watching them until a smile slowly crept onto her lips.
One of them let out a sound, something thin and whistling. The dog from before barked in the distance, and both little animals vanished behind the curve of the hill. Jinx sank down onto the backpack.
"Oh," she knitted her brow, somewhere between surprise and disappoint. "That's not the sound I was expecting."
"You don't say."
"That was… cool."
Ekko's smile grew bigger.
"Yeah. It was."
There was a moment of silence, where they both kept staring at the little patch of grass.
"Your ass looks amazing in those hiking pants, by the way."
"What?"
"Nothing. Let's go."
Jinx stood up, tightening the backpack across her chest and pretending not to notice the confusion resolving on Ekko's face (or his stupid, and absolutely not charming, pleased look).
He blinked a couple of times, then shook his head.
"W-wait, are you sure? If you're not feeling this, we can—"
Huh. Snapped out of it fast. Jinx couldn't help but soften. Always the boy saviour…
"I'm sure. Feel way better already," she cut in, hands on her hips. She took off the visor and put it back on the white locks it belongs to.
"Let's show that evil grandpa who actually rules this mountain!"
Ekko's face was an odd mix now: doubt between his brows, fading bubbles of a fizzing ego in his eyes, and an amused smirk on his lips.
"You kidding, right?" he finally said. "He's not even in sight anymore."
"We heard his dog, he can't be too far," she brushed off. "I bet he stopped as well."
She brandished her staff and pointed it up the trail. A wild spark in her eyes.
"We'll strike when he least expects it!"
Ekko raised an eyebrow. Jinx cleared her throat.
"Metaphorically. Obviously."
She put the staff down to prove her will. A quiet laugh escaped him as he straighten up again, flexible like a reed.
"Alright, then," he said, backpack on his shoulder and a playfully surrendering tone. "General Jinx, you lead the charge."
Jinx nodded, all in, charging up the ascent with a pair of big, confident strides. One pair, two pairs, three… and that was it. She clung to the staff with both her arms, regretting her life choices and cursing Vi and Cait for shaking the snow off themselves on a travel agency's doormat that Christmas. The gift: a stay in this damn slice of paradise made of fresh air, uphill walks, sensational food, and terrible data connection. If Princess Kiramman was subtly trying to kill her, she'd sure picked an original way to do it, she could give her that.
(And for the record, she had asked for an air fryer, thanks a bunch.)
She glanced back at Ekko, trying not to look too desperate.
"Hoplite phalanx?" she suggested.
Ekko was beside her in a second, planted a kiss on her temple, and switched his staff to the other hand to take her arm.
"Of course."
And so they set off again, side by side now. Around them, the sunlit green offered a different perspective every time they paused, stealing the time of a sigh and a picture.
Ekko tried to distract her by sharing curious bugs facts ("Did you know that bumblebees can get drunk on pollen and pass out with butts sticking out of flowers?" "Guess Vi was a bumblebee in a past life"), or by listing the properties of some wild plants. His soothing voice was a balm for her nerves, while what kept her going was the delightful feel of his forearm beneath her fingertips and the promise of their lunch waiting at the lodge.
Raspberries on ice cream, raspberries on ice cream, raspberries on ice cream, raspberries on ice cream!
Eventually, they took a fifth break and found the old man resting on the shady side of the trail. The dog trotted over to them, wagging his bushy tail and sniffing their shoes. Ekko scratched his ear as the owner offered them a seat beside him.
And so they found another Zaunite: a former math professor at Piltover University, now enjoying his retirement up the mountains to keep osteoporosis at bay. Apparently he also knew Heimerdinger — who had supervised Ekko's thesis in biomedical engineering two years earlier — and he held a kind of reflected affection for that "brilliant boy so dedicated to the ultimate purpose of his studies, whom good old 'Ding always talked about."
"And the young lady...?"
Jinx lazily peeked out from Ekko's frame.
"Jinx."
The old man stared at her, studying her face and name long enough to make her start fidgeting. Then he lit up, as if he'd just pieced something together.
"Of course!" he exclaimed. "Mechanical engineering, odd-numbered student ID."
Jinx's eyes widened, caught off guard. She hadn't expected a teacher to remember her by that name… after all, it wasn't the one listed in the university records. But if he did, then she had a pretty good idea why.
"The student who—"
"Blew up the east wing lab in her first year, yes."
He smiled, the residual breath of the sentence still hanging in his mouth.
"I was going to say: who made the podium at the National Innovators' Competition, in her first year."
He adjusted his shoulders and settled an arm on the dog's panting belly.
"Anyway, as 'Ding likes to say: you can't make a prototype without breaking a few wrenches."
Jinx scanned him with curious suspicion. He went on, unbothered.
"Second place, if I'm not mistaken."
"Third," she corrected.
The professor widened his small black eyes. Now he was the one looking genuinely surprised.
"Is that so? A shame. Your little shark for river water filtration made quite an impression on me."
"Yeah," she smiled nostalgically, "Old Fishbones still got all his fangs up in my father's attic."
"It was a very solid project. I hope you kept the documentation," he stated. "I've always been curious: do you happen to recall what kind of battery you used?"
Happen to recall? That jumble of metal had cost her an unreasonable number of sleepless nights, back cramps, tears of joy, and her sister's muffled curses while clutching a pillow over her ears. About nine months gestation for thirteen kilos of love and nervous breakdowns. It was like a child to her!
What followed was an unexpectedly engaging conversation.
("Can you believe they docked me points because sharks aren't river fish? Like, wow — brilliant insight, Cassandra! That was the whole point: we've got a river in Zaun. What did they want instead? People freaking out on the beach? I put a shark in a river for a reason!")
Suddenly, the old man didn't seem so evil anymore. Jinx almost felt sorry when he left them at the trail split to rejoin his group.
They picked up their pace a little. Meanwhile, the sounds around them grew sparse: no more barking, no more voices. Just the wind, stirring their hair and rustling the grass.
And then, without fanfare or announcement, it showed.
The summit.
A stone area that opened up before them like the throne room of a humble king, marked only by a wrought-iron bird sculpture. Ekko must have felt the same, because he crouched to set down their equipment with a kind of reverent bow, slowly lifting his gaze from the ground.
Jinx followed his movement, and what she saw left an hallow space between her lungs.
The valley looked so much smaller from where they stood now, the little houses like toy bricks, the green slopes like soft, woolly blankets where a fairytale giant could've comfortably sprawled for a nap. But if she turned her gaze slightly, to the other side of the sculpture, the chain of rocky peaks was close. So close and solid that Jinx had the feeling she could touch them, if only she stretched her arm far enough.
For the first time since she had set foot there, the mountain seemed to look at her from eye level: solemn, but not intimidating, welcoming in a way she hadn't expected and couldn't quite describe.
The sky was no longer above them: it surrounded them, they were in it. Janna breathing around them. They were in her mouth and at the top of the world.
She turned, meeting the gaze of her partner in that palace. Ekko was looking at her as if she were the most beautiful detail in the whole view, the only one truly worth lingering on. As if she herself were the rightful queen of that place, fully deserving of his undivided attention.
But it wasn't a secret that she didn't rule alone.
The Zaun's royalty.
"We are the mountain's royalty," she whispered, a breathy smile on her lips.
"We are…"
Drops of sunlight sparkled in the chocolate. Ekko ran a hand through his hair, then started to laugh.
"We are!" he repeated. He dropped the staff and snatched her into his arms, lifting her feet off the ground.
Jinx screamed, digging her nails into his shoulders, then joined his laugh, silly euphoria making her heart float higher than where it was supposed to be.
Back on the ground, she grabbed his face and pulled forward without thinking.
The kiss was a crooked, messy clash of lips, teeth, and tongue, without pattern or direction, more like two mouths trying to eat each other at random. Maybe it was the rush of the moment, or maybe just the fact that they were both hungry, but after his lips she bit his cheek, so he went for her nose, and she for the other cheek.
Ekko was halfway between her shoulder and her neck when Jinx thumped him on the back.
"Picture, picture!" she demanded. "Miss Blueberries Cupcake won't believe I'm still on my feet!"
He let out a reluctant sound before pulling away from her skin and grabbing the phone.
"You know there's no signal up here, right?"
"I don't care, she'll see it eventually. C'mon, get over here—"
Ekko switched to the front camera and stretched out his arm as she ducked in under it. But the very moment she did, something winged and small enough to get caught in her eyelashes was slammed against her by the wind like a tiny bullet.
Jinx tried to swipe it off, but she moved too much: the sudden snap of her head earned Ekko a whip of hair and five knuckles in the face, while her heel stumbled on a sneaky bump in the ground. She felt her weight slipping inexorably backward, her legs giving way forward, and Ekko's free arm catching her to stop the fall— turning it into a joint landing on a jagged mix of grass and gravel.
His other hand clenched around the phone to keep it from taking a celestial plunge down the Alps and his thumb slid across the screen. Their very royal asses stained with green.
Ah… Nature. Wicked stepmother.
Picture taken.