Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

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"Silco!" Vander’s roared. His animalistic voice boomed over the fire raging beneath the bridge, where Silco had stabbed him only minutes before.

The flames danced rhythmically, writhing in anticipation for a sacrifice to drop down into its hungry, lapping lips.

Vi only heard the sound of Vander's rage faintly. Everything around her was muffled as if she was in the deepest fissures of the Undercity, where the air was so thick sound became muted and stuck.

Vi gasped. Her breath drew fast and shallow, and her ears rang.

She was no longer pinned by the metal door that had crushed her from the explosion. Deckard had lifted it off of her before Vander - unrecognizable. A beast that was still making inhuman sounds out on the bridge - snapped his neck like a stick.

Vi pulled herself along the cold, wet floor, groaning from the strain that simply dragging her own weight caused.

Vi pushed herself to her knees, falling onto her side into a pile of rocks. She used them to support herself and push herself up again, stumbling forward and crashing back down in front of where Milo and Claggor were buried.

Milo's arm stuck out from under the rubble, shards of glass and pieces of metal sticking into his tan flesh. His head was crushed by a massive slab of stone, with too little space between the slab and the hard ground for his head to still be-

Vi sucked in a gasp so hard the air jabbed into her chest, leaving a sharp bubble that stuck inside of her lungs. “No. No no no.” This wasn't happening. This wasn't real.

She grabbed hold of the soft skin of Mylo’s arm.

He was still warm. He was still warm. 

She squeezed it uselessly, sobbing and rocking forward, pressing her forehead against his open palm.

If only she'd been smarter. She should have been more careful. She should have thought things through. She should have known this whole thing had been a trap.

Vi was supposed to protect them.

A piece of her drained from her eyes.

Vander's voice echoed crisply in her ears, getting louder and louder, rumbling in the smoke around her.

"-whatever happens, it's on you."

VI let go of Milo's arm, jerking her face away from his hand like his now cooling flesh had somehow burned her.

It was just... An arm, now. This wasn't her irritating, clever, snarky younger brother, the one who she always had to pull out of trouble. He wasn't here anymore.

VI's gaze shifted to Claggor.

His hand and leg were barely peeking out from under the rubble, and his knee was at an odd angle. His face was mostly visible.

There was a gash extending from his forehead above his left brow, disappearing in his hair at his temple. It was deep and long, the type of head wound that instantly killed people.

blood seeped from it, oozing down the side of his face into his eye, red droplets tracing his jaw and tapping onto the collar of his shirt like a question...

Was he alive?

Vi felt like she was in a dream, her mind detached from her physical body. She couldn't feel any pain from the multiple cuts and bruises and scrapes that covered her body. She couldn't hear her own breathing. She couldn't take in anything around her except the shape of his face; still and pale.

She reached out, cautiously, fingers extending between the crumbling pieces of debris and pressing to his neck. She felt a small shock from touching him, but barely registered it.

Just like Milo, he was still warm. Deceptively warm.

Losing one brother that night was enough, but if she found out both Mylo and Claggor were dead, especially when it was her fault for bringing them into a trap, she'd lose any traces of sanity she was still clinging onto.

Vi didn't care what happened. She didn't care if Vander killed Silco or not. She just needed her brothers to be okay.

They could get through this. They got through everything together. Like when Claggor got so sick for a month they thought he was going to die, or when Mylo fell and cut his palm open and it got badly infected.

Like when Vi was badly grieving her parents on the anniversary of their deaths and Claggor comforted her. He was good at that; Comforting.

"Please. Please." Vi pleaded to her brother. To Janna. To no one.

She pulled every memory she could out of her fracturing mind. Anything to keep Claggor and Milo alive in her head, anything to fuel her delusion.

She thought of Milo. He was smarter than she gave him credit for, and he was fast. So fast. He could outrun anyone. Anything. He could outrun this. He had to. He was Milo. He couldn't be quiet and still, he was supposed to annoy her for the rest of her life. He was supposed to be loud and obnoxious.

Vi was supposed to tell him she was proud of him. Why hadn’t she? Why had she never told him?

She thought of Claggor, who she'd watched grow so big and strong and solid, who reeled her in when she got too hot headed and who always had her back. Claggor who could brake down a wall with nothing but a pole like it was light work, who could always hold his own, who was an unmovable object and unwavering presence. He was her support. Her voice of reason. Her right hand.

He could get out of this. He had to. She'd seen him get out of worse. Yeah. She had. [She hadn't]

Vi didn't move her fingers from Claggor's neck. She didn't breathe.

She felt no pulse.

Vi's hand flinched away, cold air flowing between her fingertips and his throat, stinging her nerves like they'd been cut out and flayed.

She gasped, her breath picking up speed, heartbeat becoming erratic and painful. Wave after wave of sharp, aching stabs shot into her chest, merciless. She teetered backwards.

The world around her filtered back in; The heat of the fire blazing outside the little room they were in, the sound of Vander roaring and snarling like a rabid wolf, the smell of smoke and stale water, rank with toxins and chemicals.

"I'm sorry..." Vi whimpered. She choked on a sob, clinging onto her own arms, squeezing herself tightly around her churning stomach. She rocked herself back and forth, and she mourned, left crying quietly with her hopelessness.

Then, quieter than the fire just outside the room and the sound of her own weeping, Vi heard something…

Her head snapped up so fast the muscles in her neck cramped.

Her hand whipped back out to Claggor's neck.

She still felt nothing. 

Vi moved her hand up Claggor's neck, fingertips gliding to his cheek, smearing warm blood along his cooling flesh.

Her stomach flipped.

She hadn't imagined it.

She'd felt a twitch under her fingers.

Vi's ballooning eyes passed over every inch of his face, intense and focused. Bloodshot. She looked crazed, mad with disbelief and hope.

His mouth pinched, ever so slightly.

Vi immediately reacted. She lunged forward, cradling his cheeks in both of her hands. "Fuck, Janna, thank you, thank you-" She pressed her forehead to the uninjured side of his face, sobbing in relief.

The moment of hope drained out of her as she realized that, although he was alive, he wouldn't be for long if she didn't get him out of there.

The fire was spreading outside of the room, creeping into the doorway at either edge.

Anxiety spilled into Vi's body, snaking its way from her shaky hands and knees up into her gut, hardening into a thick lump in her throat. She could barely breathe around it.

She squeezed her eyes shut, shaking her head and balling her fists, swallowing.

Vi's eyes opened, her expression morphing into one of determination.

"I'll get you out," She promised, touching the rubble covering Claggor's chest. Her eyes twitched over the large, heavy piece of ceiling that was crushing him. "I'll get you out."

She spotted a smaller rock covering his leg, and scrambled for it, lifting it and tossing it to the side.

Vi dug at the pile over his leg, movements erratic, her nails chipping.

One of the bricks slipped out of her hand and cut her. She didn't slow down. She didn't feel it. She dug fast, movements becoming more desperate, her vision barely keeping up with her hands, lungs barely able to take in a breath from the exertion.

She managed to free his leg.

Vi immediately started to dig for his shoulder next. She was so close to being able to slip him out from under the larger slabs that were pinning him. So close, almost-

The last thing she had to do for her plan to work was to move the larger piece of rubble from over his chest.

Vi grasped tightly to it, pushing it upwards, lifting it with her shoulder, using all the strength she had.

Her feet shifted against the slippery ground. Her sweaty palms threatened to lose their grip. She stiffened.

The blood on her injured hand slicked her fingers, and Vi's heart dropped as she felt herself lose her grip.

It crashed back down against the other rocks, and slid directly onto Claggor's shin.

She heard a sick crunch.

Vi stumbled back. Her hand jerked up to her mouth, muffling a sound of horror.

Claggor's eyes and mouth shot open. He gasped, loud and wet, his throat gurgling as he choked.

Bile clawed up Vi's throat.

Claggor wheezed, his eyes moving spasmodically, bleary and unfocused, pricking with tears and panicked. His mouth and eyes gradually opened wider as he fell deeper into shock.

The slab Vi had dropped had left Claggor's right arm and chest uncovered. His hand reached up, hovering over his chest. His fingers twitched, palm shaking, suspended in the air.

Claggor gasped again. It was strained, and his breath was cut short before he could get any substantial amount of air.

Vi's eyes flashed over his chest in panic, momentarily forgetting about his leg. He couldn't breathe. Why couldn't he breathe?

Bells wrung in Vi's ears, the sharp sound pulsing with her heartbeat into her skull and forcing her to move.

She scrambled forward, placing both hands in his chest, trying to ground him.

"Clag? Clag I need you to breathe for me, okay? Just breathe!"

Vi prayed it was his asthma. She could get him through an asthma attack. But if it was anything worse? If a rib had broken and punctured a lung? She could do nothing for him…

Even with Vi's instructions, Claggor still wouldn't breathe right.

Vi bore her teeth. Anger surged through her. Not at him, but at everything. At their damned luck.

"I SAID BREATHE!" She bellowed, hands gripping the bloody collar of his shirt. She yanked hard, shaking him.

Finally, Claggor took in his first deep breath. He grimaced, face twisting as his chest twinged, and he turned his head, coughing.

Claggor blinked, eyes clearing somewhat, and he squinted at her. He didn’t have his goggles.

"Vi?" He croaked.

Vi couldn't help but smile at him.

"Yeah, Clag, yeah, it's me. I'm gonna get you out of this, just- just breath, okay?"

He was alive. He was breathing.

And Vi was going to make sure he stayed that way.

Vi gripped the brick Claggor's trembling fingers were lightly touching. She leaned back, using gravity to her advantage and swinging the heavy object across the room. Both of his arms were now freed.

She tried pushing at the slab extending over his head and his right leg. It didn't budge. It was too heavy, even for her.

She backed away. Her head whirled as she looked around the room for something, anything she could use to help get him out.

"Come on, Come on. Please please plea-"

Vander.

She could hear Vander thrashing and roaring on the bridge, attacking something, or someone. She could hear the person’s screams of agony and terror.

Vi held Claggor's cheek gently, "I'll be back, I promise."

"Okay..." He nodded weakly. He looked strangely peaceful, sleepy, like he had just been woken up from a nap, his eyes drooping heavily. Adrenaline only did so much to keep someone awake. At least it looked like he wasn't fully feeling the pain of his injuries yet.

Vi smacked his jaw, harder than she needed to, but the idea of his eyes closing and never opening back up again...

Claggor's eyes cracked opened a little wider.

"No passing out on me, got it?"

"-ah... mm'kay..." His eyes were already drooping again, his head tilting to the side.

She hated leaving him, but Vi had to move fast. She didn't have much time. The fire was almost reaching them.

She spun around, running as fast as she could out onto the bridge.

Her feet were still unsteady, her steps wobbly, and she had to hold onto the railing for support.

"Vander!" She yelled, squinting out into the smoke. She couldn't see anything, and it stung her eyes.

Vi coughed, the world swaying around her. She clung tighter to the rails to keep from toppling over, leaning heavily against them. "VANDER! Vander, HELP!" Her calls became more frantic.

She stopped yelling when she heard a strange ripping sound. It sounded like clothes, and something else...

A large, dark shape shifted in the thick cindering cloud blocking her vision. Vi approached warily. She couldn't be scared and run off. She needed to help her brother.

When she saw what the figure was, the muscles in her throat closed down around her vocal cords, a bitter taste spilling over her tongue.

It was Vander.

The back of his disfigured, hulking form was crouched over an another figure. A body.

One of the its legs was gone, and an arm, leaving dark red voids where the limbs should have been. 

Its head was turned too far to the side, neck snapped and a piece of vertebrae jutting against the skin; An unnatural lump pushing against unbroken flesh.

It was Silco.

Vi registered that Vander - this creature he had become - was still tearing bits of flesh off of him, twisting his limbs until the bones snapped and splintered, pulling until meat tore like cotton.

Vander didn't do it slowly, or methodically. He yanked and clawed and bit. Like a mindless animal, fueled by rage, fueled by a hunger for blood.

"Vander…?" She spoke so quietly she didn’t even realize she'd said it, the meek utterance sounding more like Powder than herself.

But Vander heard it.

He stopped suddenly, becoming so still that Vi flinched.

His head rotated slowly towards her. The movement reminded Vi of those strange blue owls that would stare at her from the Piltover rooftops, when she was scouting for apartments to rob.

Vi took a step back.

She saw him earlier, for a moment, when Vander saved her from Deckard, but now seeing him again... she almost sobbed. She would have, if she wasn't so frozen in horror.

She took in the sight of him. His glowing veins and ruined flesh, skin turned the dark purple of a bruise, his bulging muscles twisting over him unnaturally.

But his eyes… his eyes were looking at her. Not some mindless monster he was turned into. Him. Vander.

"Please...!" She pleaded, the sound escaping as a whimper. Her voice cracked, "He, he's stuck. Claggor, he's stuck..." She began braking down, her voice devolving into despaired mewls.

She couldn't take it. None of it. Milo being dead, Vander being turned into this thing, Claggor barely clinging to life, the reality that not all of them were making it out of this... That things would never be the same. Everything had changed in the span of one night.

She might never see Powder again.

Vi's tears left clean tracks in the dirt and grime on her face. She couldn't hold herself together anymore. She couldn't pretend to be brave anymore.

"Please! Please, Vander, I know it's still you!" Vi begged, her wails bouncing off the walls of the factory through the smoke, reaching a ceiling she couldn't see.

Vander was still staring at her. His eyes were damp, she realized.

He reached towards her.

Something below them exploded, shaking Vi off her feet.

She hissed, and then screamed, the hot metal of the bridge burning her arms and branding her.

She had been thrown back so hard that she now faced where Claggor was. The fire was in the room now, inched dangerously closer to her only living brother, licking at his foot.

Vi's breath caught in her throat, and she scrambled, trying to get herself up, and failing. Why couldn't she just move?

Something wrapped under her torso, and lifted her off of her hands and knees.

It took her a second to register what it was.

Vander.

By the time she realized, she had already been carried towards where Claggor was.

Vander tore away the slabs of rock with his hand not holding her, clawing them to pieces.

He lifted Claggor into his arms, squishing Vi and Claggor together protectively to his chest, carrying the two of them like they were powder’s dolls weighing nothing.

He sprinted towards the hole in the wall.

Vander burst through it, pieces of brick braking away, and they fell.

Air rushed past Vi's ears. She could hear the explosion behind them and the heat reaching out towards them, despaired at the loss of its prey, still trying to envelop them.

Vander turned his back towards the ground rushing up to meet them, shielding his kids. 

He landed with a loud crack.

Vi's vision went blacked out.

Vander's arms loosened from around his kids on impact, Vi and Claggor rolling off of him on either side.

Although Vander had shielded Vi, the impact still jarred her, and she lay beside him, world fading in and out of focus.

The fog in her mind cleared as the cool night air brushed over her fevered skin.

Vi gasped, breaths coming in short bursts of panic.

She rolled into her stomach, looking around frantically. Vander was laying right next to her, Claggor laying just as still further down the alley.

Vi pushed against the ground with her shoulder, grabbing ahold of Vander and lifting herself using his chest.

"Vander..."

Blood pooled under his head, seeping out into the cracks of the cobblestone below him.

She gasped, the sound deep and strange, like she had been punched in the gut. She reached down, tilting his face towards her. "Vander-!" Not Vander. Not Vander. Please.

Vander’s lungs strained to take in oxygen. He only managed to get small puffs of breath that barely took in any air.

His eyes stared at a space above Vi, unseeing, irises colored a bright, unnatural pink.

"Take care of Powder..."

His eyes rolled to the back of his skull, and the the coiled muscles in his neck loosened. His head crashed back into the earth.

Her palm was pressed firmly to his chest.

She felt his heart stop beating underneath it.

Vi stared.

She tried to muster denial, but she had denied too many things that night.

Vander was gone.

Vi’s wails reached out into the star-less night, echoing into the polluted void. 

Her wails were carried away with the wind.

She was left with only the sound of crackling flames as the fire of the factory inched out into the street, always following wherever she went, still trying to catch its prey in a painstakingly slow hunt.

Another piece of her drained from her eyes.

She hung her head, getting to her feet, holding her arm loosely to herself.

She didn't get the luxury to grieve how she wanted to; To curl up in a ball and let the pieces of her still left decay beside him. She didn't have the time.

Vi looked on the other side of Vander, at Claggor.

He'd fallen back into unconsciousness, but she could see his chest subtly rise and fall.

Vi stood over him, her dazed grief fading as she looked him over with manic eyes.

The jagged scar on Claggor's head was still bleeding, and now she had a clear view of where the slab had crushed his leg. His shin was smashed in, torn pieces of his pants fusing into his ribboned flesh. It was bleeding less than she’d expected. The artery in his leg must have still been intact. Thank Janna.

Vi didn't know how she was going to get him to safety. In the past two years he had sprung up to be bigger and taller than her. Vi could support him and drag him away on a good day, but she could feel the adrenaline draining out of her.

She could barely stand, and Claggor would be a dead weight in his condition.

Vi's exhausted body wracked with tremors as more of her strength left her, the sting of the bitter night nipping at her skin.

She crashed to her knees beside him, pushing Claggor's wet curls away from his forehead with a steady gentleness that took all of her strength to manage.

Her fingers flinched away when they accidentally brushed his head injury. Up close, it was even deeper than she thought. It was beyond just braking the skin and muscle of his temple... she realized there was something embedded into his skull. It was so soaked in blood and buried inside of the cracked pieces of bone that she could barely see it.

She didn't know what to do. She could sense him slipping away under her touch. She was useless. 

She crumpled to the ground, pressing her face into her palms, careless of his blood covering her hands.

Rain thrummed against the cobblestone street, and the fire continued to crackle, sizzling as drops of water evaporated into it. 

A voice rung out, braking the hopeless silence.

"Vi, it worked!"

That was… that was Powder's voice.

Vi froze.

"What...?"

What worked? What was she doing here?

Vi turned around slowly, getting to her feet, looking at her little sister.

"Did you see me? My monkey bomb finally worked!" Powder said esthetically. She looked happier than Vi had ever seen her.

Powder’s grin faded as she saw the clear devastation on her older sister's face.

"You did this?" Vi asked. She held her arm tighter.

Powder stared at her sister, bewildered. 

She looked down, behind Vi, at Vander, the man who had been their father for six years.

At first she didn’t know what she was seeing. Then she did.

All expression dropped from her face.

"Why? Why did you do this?" Vi asked. We were almost out. We would have been okay. I told you, you weren't ready.

"I did- I did-" Powder’s words cought in her throat like a hiccup, and she sniffed wetly.

"I was saving you..." Her eyes drifted away.

They landed on Claggor, and for all she knew he was dead, too.

"I only wanted to help," she sobbed, "I only wanted to help- I only wanted to help! I only wanted to-"

"I told you to stay away…” Vi glared at her, fury igniting behind her eyes.

"Please, please-" Powder sniveled.

"I told you to stay AWAY!" Vi lashed out, smacking Powder across the face.

Powder yelped, the blow sending her to the ground.

"No-" Powder held her cheek.

"Why did you leave me!?" She screeched, tears streaming down her face.

Vi grabbed her jaw, squeezing so hard her fingers sunk into the soft space of her cheeks between Powder's teeth, forcing her lips to pucker.

She yanked Powder forward, surging closer until their foreheads almost touched, "BECAUSE YOU'RE A JINX! Do you hear me!? Milo was right!"

Powder shook her head, whimpering, blabbering nonsense. "No, no, no, mom, please-" blood trailed down her nose, seeping into the wrappings on Vi's hand.

Vi's anger drained from her body in an instant.

She gasped, realizing what she had done.

She looked down at her shaking hand, her wrappings stained with her sister's blood.

Vi gasped again, turning her hand and staring at it.

Powder continued to cry on the ground, looking up at her, desperate, eyes blurry with tears.

"Violet, please!" Vi's little sister begged.

Vi stood up, Powder shrinking back and shielding her face, preparing for another hit.

Vi needed to breathe, oh gods she couldn't breathe.

Vi stumbled past her sister’s crumpled form, out of the alley.

When no blow came, Powder's eyes cracked open, her shield lowering.

She saw Vi walk past her, and panicked.

"VI!! Vi come back, please come back, please Violet, I need you please!" Powder's shoulders heaved as she bawled there on the ground, her face a wet dripping mess, eyes puffy and red.

Vi stumbled in the rain, holding her injured arm and leaning against a wall, panting.

Her body finally collapsed from exhaustion, and she slid down the wall, onto the ground.

Violet cried.

It was all her own fault. Why did she take Powder on that job in Piltover? Why was she so reckless without thinking? Then maybe Vander and Milo wouldn't be dead. Then maybe Claggor wouldn't be dying with no way of them saving him. He was going to die. They couldn't get him help in time. Powder would be burdened with this for the rest of her life.

Vi heard Powder, still sobbing in the alley.

"Violet... No VIOLET! Please-" Her pleas were broken apart by sobs that racked her entire body. She curled forward onto the cold wet street, covering her head with her hands.

The last thing Powder remembered from her sister, was that Vi didn't come back.

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Powder was left alone with the bodies of her father and brother.

She rocked back and forth. Her muscles spasmed as the cold rain pelted against her skinny frame, soaking through her thin clothes and sticking the fabric to her skin.

She only felt the rain a few times in her short life, being born and raised in the suffocating air of the Lanes where there was nowhere for the smoke to go or the sky to reach.

The few times she was caught in the rain, she was with her older siblings doing a job by the docks. Her siblings would grumble resentfully at getting wet, but Powder loved the way it made her feel fresh and alive, like every part of her could fully feel the wonder of the world.

After they all would get sopping wet; Vi would rub Powder’s arms up and down to get her blood flowing, or Claggor would squeeze her tightly to his side all the way home, sharing his body heat and lifting her away from any puddles they tromped through. Even Mylo threw her his jacket one time (threw it at her, was a better way of phrasing it).

At the end of their long walk home, they’d all shuffle into the Last Drop with chittering teeth and runny noses. Vander would look at them with a fond, yet stern expression, shaking his head at the trouble his kids would endlessly find for themselves. He’d tell them to be smarter or they could get sick, while starting a fire for his shivering kids without a single complaint. He’d always let Powder curl underneath his big soft arms -the girl finally made cozy and warm after a cold walk home by the massive furnace of a man- and there she’d drift to sleep, her mind finally quiet.

Powder had no body mass or lean muscle like her siblings to protect her from the rain. She ate like a bird, no matter how much her father figure and two oldest siblings tried to get her to take care of herself. She was too busy. She always forgot. She had drawing to draw. She had bombs that never worked to tinker on. Bombs she wished had never worked…

In the middle of the empty alley, the only heat Powder was spared was from the fire spreading into the street. It had attached itself to the oily surface of water that pooled out of the warehouse, and the pieces of rubble that had fallen with Vander and Claggor’s motionless bodies.

The flames reflected off of the rainwater drizzling over Vander’s greying corpse, giving the appearance that he had been set ablaze; A loving symbol of strength and safety becoming nothing more than burned meat caught in the glowing yellow teeth of death.

Powder didn’t look at him fully. She couldn't. 

Vander deserved that much from her; For her to look. For her to be haunted for the rest of her life by the mutilated husk of her father that her own mistake had made. 

He was her father. She didn’t remember her mom or her dad. She only heard stories from Vi that she couldn’t even attach faces to. Powder only remembered Vander. He was her father. Was.

Powder’s fingers latched onto her head, digging mercilessly into her scalp, pulling her face down into a puddle and trying to drown her.

Don’t look don’t look don’t look. All your fault. It’s all your fault. Look. Look. Look. Look.

The dirty water blurred her sight and darkened her world into a freezing point. It was so cold a sharp ache began to form behind her eyes.

Her lips parted, water filling the cavern of her mouth. For a moment she contemplated taking the liquid into her lungs and letting it choke her. She was so tempted. She deserved it.

Her head jerked back up, and she gulped in a breath, coughing and sputtering around the water that spilled out of her mouth. She clenched her eyes shut, swinging her face away so hard her neck popped. 

Her nails dug further into her scalp.

A wetness spread under her nails, not cold like the rain, but warm and thick. It seeped into her hair, turning the blue strands dark purple.

Red droplets flew past her vision into the puddle below.

Her panic came to a sudden pause. The sight of her blood mixing with the water… it was mesmerizing. 

The way it swirled and created patterns she’d never seen before… the way the red and the clear liquid, traced with flecks of dirt, somehow conveyed everything she felt…

The moment was broken by a small sound. It was airy, like the wind… but it couldn’t be the wind, it was too low.

Powder launched herself up from where she had been curled in a ball, scrambling around Vander, tripping in her rushed hysteria. She fell - hard - on the other side of him. She barely missed falling into the fire, her chin bouncing off of the stone, scraping it.

Her head whipped back up to her brother from where she landed below him.

Her eyes were bloodshot, her irises jittering pinpoints as she fully looked at Claggor for the first time.

She was closest to his legs, and her jaw clicked open at the sight of his mutilated shin.

Her eyes dazedly drifted up his limp body, hoping to see his face. She couldn’t see from the angle she was at, his body successfully shielding her from seeing his face.

He was dead. Just like Vander. You killed him. You killed everyone. Of course Vi doesn’t love you. Of course she left.

Powder crawled closer, past his legs and middle, gripping his vest and using it to pull herself up until she was laying over the side of his chest.

Claggor’s hair on one side of his head was turned black and shiny with blood, and the soft rain pattering against his head created a river of red and clear down to where his skull connected with the ground.

The blood swirled with the pinkish water pooling there, enacting a slow, beautiful dance, like Powder’s own blood had done.

Powder spun around, away from her brother. Her hand slid against the slippery stone as she bent over and emptied the contents of her stomach onto the alley floor.

She gasped between bouts of vomit, until there was nothing left but retching.

The acid stung her nose and eyes, and Powder looked back at him, her clothed wrist pressed to her mouth.

Powder scanned the jagged gash that split the left side of his head, her wide blue orbs drawn across to his ear.

A piece of the shell of his ear was missing, some of the top part. It looked like something had bitten a chunk out of it.

Powder reached out towards it, thoughtless in her stunned state, and touched it.

Her fingertips barely brushed the ruined cartilage, and suddenly her mind was no longer empty.

Her brain flooded with neon images, bright color bleeding from behind her eyelids into the world around her.

Her breaths came in short, loud gasps.

No, it wasn’t her fault. It couldn’t be. 

"Clag-" Powder coughed wetly, tears streaming down her throat and out of her nose.

She pounded her fist against her head as she shook it back and forth. She didn’t feel it.

He was dead. She was alone.

"No, no. No no No-" 

Powder pressed her ear to his chest. Her hands grasping his clothes, her fingers fisting the fabric. She held them so tightly her nails poked through the cream material of his undershirt.

She sucked in her bottom lip, biting down.

Her canines broke the skin inside of her mouth, flesh slipping between her teeth and a warm metallic liquid spilling over her tongue and down her throat.

The tangy taste of blood combated her salty tears. Her racing mind quieted enough for her to think. She breathed in, and back out.

She closed her eyes and listened.

Somehow, Powder almost felt peaceful, laying there against her brother’s chest. She drew her arms underneath herself, so they were squished between herself and her brother's side, curling up against him.

If she ignored the bitter rain, it was like those rare nights when she would have a nightmare and didn't want to wake Vi. Claggor would sometimes be awake; he liked to read in the quiet hours of the night when he could think. Powder felt a kinship with him in that, although the only way she could think clearly was with music blasting in her ears. Powder would stand on the other side of the dark blue sheet he used as a curtain to shield his bed from the rest of the room, creating a little peaceful den for himself where the light of his candle wouldn’t wake his siblings as he read. Powder would peek into it, and Claggor would sometimes startle, or sometimes smile at her, expecting her. “Couldn’t sleep?” Claggor would ask, lifting his blanket to let Powder crawl into bed with him without her even having to ask. She’d always fall fast asleep, knowing he understood, and knowing he’d protect her like Vi would. It was their own little ritual.

Powder heard it.

Ba-dum.

Her eyes flung open, her breath catching in her throat.

Ba-dum. Ba-dum.

Powder gasped, sniveling as tears of relief poured from her red, irritated eyes.

He was alive.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, turning her face down into his collar and jerking her head back and forth as she sobbed, hiccuping wetly and darkening the cream material with tears and snot.

Powder was so overcome with emotion -relief, grief, joy, guilt; everything muddled and mixed in ways that were too much for her, overwhelming her senses- she didn’t hear the footsteps approaching behind her.

Even when she did, the shuffling steps scuffing to a stop behind her, she didn’t acknowledge them. She didn’t care. She didn’t care if whoever was behind her was there to stab her in the back and kill her.

She couldn’t bring herself to look away from Claggor, not even for a second. She feared that if she did, in that one moment he would abandon her too, like everyone else had.

Ran stared down at the bawling girl; she was curled over one of Vander’s other kids, her sobs racking through her and shaking his slack body aggressively enough that his wrists rolled against the the ground limply.

Ran craned their neck, looking up at the hole in the side of the warehouse. Flames roared angrily out of the gaping brick, the drifting smoke turning the sky brown and orange.

It made the open sky of Promenade look like the thick air of the Lanes, how the gas and smoke rose and was trapped by the cavern’s curved ceiling, with nowhere to disperse. The toxic air was always brown, or a green that seeped into people’s skin and turned it sickly and yellow.

When Ran was up to fight Vander’s oldest daughter Vi on the bridge, they’d glimpsed the boy -now lying in the cold street- working on a way out.

Even if the bricks of the warehouse were old and brittle, it was impressive to see what he had accomplished. He had more strength to him than his appearance first gave away, but now that Ran got a better look at him, they could see his broad shoulders and the strong muscle hidden under his soft exterior. Strategically masked.

Many of the strongest Zaunites in the undercity looked like that. The bigger you were, the stronger. That was just common sense.

Still, even if the boy was strong, the only person Ran knew who might be strong enough to be able to accomplish demolishing a whole wall on his own with nothing but a pole and brute strength was Locke, and he was twice the boy’s size.

Ran’s eyes followed the length of the wall down to the dead body of Vander. That was a long fall, at least for a person. Ran wouldn’t be surprised if the boy was dead, too. Shame.

Claggor. His name was Claggor.

Ran had worked for Sevika long enough to know that. They went with her to the Last Drop on business so many times that they’d overheard Vander talking to that old Benzo about his kids once or twice. It hadn’t been hard for Ran to figure out which names belonged to who.

Ran looked back at the sobbing girl. They didn’t know that one’s name, though they figured it didn’t really matter. A lot of Sevika and Silco’s men were slaughtered in that warehouse from an explosion (or from the fall off the bridge thanks to A single scrappy brat) that Ran still had no clue what had caused it; that didn’t really matter either. What happened, happened. Who was dead, was dead. Couldn’t really change anything, Ran could only figure out what to do with what was left.

The sobbing girl had seemed almost happy for a moment -perking up at something that Ran could only assume was the discovery of her brother being alive- but now she was starting to fall into panicked hysterics. Ran watched her stand, watched her grab her brother’s arm and try to drag him away from the spreading fire, to no avail.

Ran grimaced, something sour spreading over their tongue. They shifted the thick muscle in their mouth, rolling away the taste. They couldn't waste their time being fucking empathetic. Feeling fucking bad. It was weak.

But saving his life out of selfish gain was a different story. If the boy had the strength he did at his age, he could be useful in the future, the perfect muscle for Sevika… if he cooperated and fell in line.

Dus came up behind them and stood next to Ran, looking at the sobbing girl. He gestured towards Powder with his knife, a stupid expression on his face despite the act he was wordlessly asking them if he should do.

Ran's eyes looked between him and his knife, and they kicked him hard in the stomach, sending him collapsing into the wall. "Fuck you." They snarled.

Dus raised his hands, coughing air back into his lungs as Ran’s kick had winded him. "…jus wondrin."

"Check him." Ran ordered. With Sevika out of commission, and everyone higher up in Sevika's gang dead, for the time being Ran was left in change. 

The two goons from Silco's gang were following Ran around like lost puppies, hoping Sevika would wake up so they could be ordered around by somebody again. They seemed fine being bossed around by Ran, for the time being. Ran scoffed, rolling their eyes. The two goons were past the state of sad and verging on the realm of sickeningly pitiful.

Ran watched Dus as he kicked the side of Claggor's face with his boot.

Claggor’s head rolled from the rough nudge, his bare face pinching. Ran remembered him having goggles.

Dus grinned, far to excited at the revelation that the teen was still alive (as he was about everything) "Fella’s still kickin!" He laughed.

The blue haired girl suddenly snapped out of whatever daze she was in, the fog in her eyes visibly clearing and being replaced with rage. She launched to her feet, tackling Dus and clawing at his face.

Ran wasn’t expecting that from the girl, watching in surprised interest.

Dus hollered in pain, cradling his cheek where the girl left three red marks. He stumbled back, looking at the girl’s fingers, the tips of her nails stained red, and the blood smearing his own palm as he pulled his hand from his cheek.

A wide grin split his mouth, and his eyes became wide and manic. His knife smoothly slid from his leather holster, and he adjusted his grip on the handle.

The girl’s furious expression fell into one of pure fear, her breath fluttering. 

When Dus was about to strike, Ran smashed their fist into his face, sending him sliding across the wet stone ground.

Ran was fine with killing teenagers, they weren’t far past the awkward phase themselves, but the young child was too far, for them.

Locke watched without much reaction. He’d probably punched the crazy bastard once or twice, himself, Ran would guess.

Lock looked at Ran, jerking his head to motion behind them. For them to get out of there.

He was right. Anyone around would be able to see the blazing factory. Hell, the Pilties could see it all the way over from across the bridge. They were probably already sending Enforcers.

Ran looked back at the kids.

The boy's neck twitched, rocking his head in a small movement. He looked bad, his pale skin turned sickly from a loss of blood, and the rain soaking every inch of him.

Then Ran looked at the girl.

Powder stared at them, in shock that one of the people who had been trying to kill her siblings had just saved her.

Ran saw when the girl decided that Ran was someone to plead to, the tears in the girl’s eyes welling and her eyes squinting. She fell hard on her knees at Ran’s feet, clinging to their wrists. "Please, please help him! I can't, I can't lose him, please!" She begged.

Ran yanked their arm away, the girl falling back to the ground.

The girl started to sob again, rubbing her wrists into her eye sockets, drool dribbling from her lip as she wailed.

Dustin stuck his tongue out in disgust, grimacing. He looked at Ran, and like Locke jerked his head for them to leave, his expression a bored question.

"What's in it for us?" Ran asked the girl.

Powder stopped crying.

A few more lagging sobs hiccuped out of her, and she sat up slowly, teardrops clinging to her lashes as she blinked away her tears. "W-what?" She asked, her hands curling against her chest as she became confused and anxious.

Ran looked at the ground to the side, at the boy’s abandoned goggles. They’d spotted them earlier, though it hadn’t really clicked who’s they were. They walked over, picking them up, and stepped closer to the small girl, crouching down in front of her.

Powder shrunk back, but continued to stare at them, her eyes twitching between Ran and the goggles.

Ran held them out to her, "You do something for me, I do something for you." Ran said, simply.

Powder looked uneasy. She slowly reached out, her hand shakey, blood still caked under her nails and staining her hair, and she took them. She sat for a moment, rolling the offer unsurely in her head. She didn’t know what that meant. 

But she didn’t have time to be figure that out, or be cautious. She needed to save her brother.

Powder nodded jerkily. Despite her enthusiasm, her lips pressed together in an unsure line.

"I need you to get something for me." 

Powder nodded again, more vigorously, her curled hands drawing the goggles tighter to her chest in anticipation.

Ran held out a small tube shaped object.

It was a shimmer vial, empty besides purple traces of what had once been it's contents still staining the bottom of the glass.

Ran shifted the vial between her fingers, using it to point towards the warehouse, the way Ran had escaped from.

Powder’s eyes followed the direction of the vial, like an antlermouse drawn to cheese set inside a trap.

"I need you to go inside there and find more vials like these, as many as you can hold, and bring them to me." Ran said.

Fear entered the girl's eyes, but she nodded again silently.

She stood up, very slowly strengthening to her full height. She only reached Ran’s chest, and looked all the part of a small rodent about to go into a wolf’s den.

Powder looked behind her, at Claggor.

Determination filled her, and she clenched her jaw, her nostrils flaring and lips pursing.

She shuffled back to her brother, kneeling down and taking one of his hands, putting it over his chest and sliding Claggor’s goggles into his slack fingers.

Powder kept her hand there with his, over his heart, "Don't stop beating while I'm gone, okay?" Her lashes fluttered, eyes shiny and wet, and she closed her eyes like a prayer. "Please..."

Suddenly, she spun around and indicated started running, turning a corner and going straight into the factory.

Ran watched her go, surprised for a second time of the girl’s bravery. She had a lot of guts, for such a skinny little toothpick of a thing.

Lock stepped closer behind them. "We actually taking them with us?"

Dustin hummed, "Yeah... I'm not so sure Sevika will-"

Ran grabbed Dustin by the shirt, yanking him forward, hovering their brass-knuckled hand in front of his face.

"Say another thing about what Sevika wants, and I spill your guts in the streets." They shoved him, and he fell on his ass. "I get to make any decisions I think are an extension of what Sevika wants, until she can make them herself." Ran looked at Lock, evaluating him. Looking for any sign of a challenge in his stance.

He nodded quickly, his head bobbing, his fear turning him into something other than strictly crazy for the first time she’d seen.

Ran let him go, shoving him away with a snarl.

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