Sister Cities

Part 93: Ekko

A troop of armed enforcers will be sent to patrol the fissures tonight, just like old times. Despite the perps being Topsiders, everyone's scared about trenchers. The bridge will be guarded too. Hoverboarding across the river is temporarily prohibited, which is just as well, since I left mine at the Kirammans' house and I doubt I'll be going back there for a while.

The rest of the meeting after the vote was a wreck of cold shoulders and monosyllables. I made an enemy of everyone in one fell swoop. We put fifteen-year term limits on councilors after the coup and scheduled reelections every five years, but I'm playing with the idea of resigning once this mess is over. It would make us look weak, but it could be worth the trade. Scar would do a good job in my place. Lenara's almost eighteen. Even Zelle might want to do it.

I watch the sun move in the sky for what looks like a couple hours. I never put my jacket back on, so I get to feel the warmth directly on my skin. It's real risky, since I didn't wear any pink sunscreen today.

When we were kids, I was always the last one of the group to get burned, so we'd use me as a timer for when to go inside. Someone— most frequently Powder— would say, "Do you think we should head home soon?" and someone else would reply, "Is Ekko burning yet? No? Then we're staying out," and the person who asked would crankily slather on a layer of sticky trencher sunscreen and look to the bright side at the good peeling session they had coming up.

I loved those days. There was no poverty or pollution or Piltover when we raced through the market with our pockets full of snatched wares and played hide-and-seek in the junkyard and drew with chalk on the oil-stained pavement. No kingpin to fight. No gang to lead. No city at my mercy.

I half-sleep with my face in my arm to avoid making my next decision and wake with a start some time later to a sardonic voice calling across the grounds: "Beating yourself up with somebody who can't shut you down. Clever."

Vi. The one they sent to Stillwater to get abused weekly for seven years after she committed no crime.

Approaching me. The one who just voted to bring enforcers back.

Shit.

I get to my feet and move a few paces to the left— not that it'll help me, especially considering that I can't pull my eyes from the grass. She comes around a bend, picks up the lantern, and sits on Snake's stone. It's not the final stone, just the placeholder until the commission comes in. It bears her name and nothing else.

It doesn't matter if we fight.

It doesn't matter if we fight.

It doesn't matter if we fight.

"Caitlyn sent me after you," Vi says. "You weren't answering your comm. She got a little worked up."

I don't want to think about what I said to Caitlyn, and I don't want to put this off. "Did she tell you?"

"Yeah."

It doesn't matter if we fight.

She doesn't sound like she wants a fight any more than I do. I glance up to see her squinting at me through the lowering sun, the lantern swinging between her knees.

I wish she was angry. Then I could be angry.

"You gonna stand there all night?" she asks.

I hold my ground and search for something to say. She reaches out to spin the metal pinwheel with a finger. It squeals.

"I don't bite," she says with half a smile, nodding at the spot where I was sleeping. I pick at my knuckle guards. One of them's loose.

It doesn't matter if we fight.