Luxurious Anarchy (Lux/Jinx)

Chapter 2: CLOUDS

At almost the same instant Vi groaned, her words overlapping with Cait's, "Without Silco, who'll be there to protect my sister?"

Caitlyn's head whipped up to look at Vi, and then quickly at Jayce. His expression was still one of confusion, and Caitlyn rallied what remained of her wits.

"Well it's been a real pleasure Jayce, please stop by sometime tomorrow, I'm sure we can help brainstorm some sort of action plan," Cait blurted in a rush, all but pushing Jayce out of her room.

Jayce's look of utter befuddlement never lessened, and as he unthinkingly stepped across the threshold that separated Caitlyn's domain from the rest of the manor, she had the briefest sensation of hope that Vi's unguarded remark would go unremarked upon.

"Wait, did she just say Jinx is her sister?"

In response to Jayce's question, Vi, who had crossed the room with gutter-born stealth, smiled politely, gently but firmly finished disentangling Caitlyn's hand from Jayce's jacket, and slammed the rich hardwood double doors in his face.

"Fuck," she groaned.

"Fuck," sighed Caitlyn in agreement.

---

"Fuck!" screamed Jinx, her feet skittering out from underneath her. Sliding to a stop on her butt, she felt more than heard several Hextech revolver rounds snap and pop around her as she scrambled for cover.

It hadn't taken long for Jinx to realize she'd made a number of grave mistakes by running off toward her soulmate after the tea party ended.

"Mistake the first, shouldn't have left him there, gotta say goodbye properly," Jinx mumbled as she finished getting into cover behind the shattered remains of a tombstone. Who had looked at the warehouse, this relic of Zaun's dark beginnings and thought, yeah, let's put a graveyard right next door?

"Not me, I think this is a terrible place for a graveyard, the bloody ground is boggy and muddy and oh gods damn it, would you pricks stop shooting?!"

Not bothering to look, she stuck Pow-Pow around the corner and let her express their collective displeasure at the chem-punks who had somehow moved into the decaying warehouse in the twelve hours she'd been away.

Jinx blind fired for several thunderous heartbeats, playing Pow-Pow's wrath over the warehouse front, forcing the punks to duck down and dig in. Or have their organs scrambled with lead, a couple of them made that choice, weirdly enough?

"Mistake number two, never made a safe house, kept putting it off," Jinx sighed, letting Pow-Pow hang from the sling on her back, blue braids streaming out behind her as she raced closer to the warehouse.

Some of the braver punks got back to trying to plug her full of lead. Jinx splashed through the muck, her blood thundering with Shimmer. Every shot they took was too slow, far too slow, more than enough time to guesstimate where the shots would go and correct her trajectory on the fly.

"Can't go back to the Last Drop, Sevika is gonna take over in the power vacuum..."

Jinx's right hand played over Zapper, but the handle of her favorite revolver felt unfamiliar. Jinx giggled, but frowned too. She'd made Zapper, custom-built the gun, for her to feel off in Jinx's hand was freaky.

Jinx shrugged, and plucked a double handful of Chompers from her belt. "Third mistake," Jinx shouted around a mouthful of pins, "I only have a few house-warming gifts, so you all need to share!"

Laughing uproariously, Jinx put one combat boot on another grave marker, and pushed, eyes burning bright.

Jinx wondered what she must look like to the chem-punks as she flew through the air. Did she look like some malnourished sump-rat, just another abandoned child of Zaun? Did they look at her and see Jinx, the Loose Cannon, Silco's hatchet woman? Did they see an angel, a vision of beauty and grace, soaring through the air on Shimmering wings?

Or maybe they just saw the grenades clicking and chattering as they latched onto friends and comrades with blood-slicked metal jaws.

Briefly, of course, since once the Chompers went off, they didn't see anything anymore.

Jinx landed with a flourish, standing tall with grace and poise, ever so slightly undercut by the fact that anyone who could have seen her acrobatics were either bleeding out or blown up.

"Mistake the fourth, do cool shit with no one watching." Jinx kicked a rock and started into the warehouse. "I always, always fuck that one up, no one sticks around to watch, fucking sucks..."

we saw

"You guys don't count, you're dead."

and whose fault is that, jinx?

Jinx punched the side of her head a few times, hitting the snooze button on that particular conversation, before pushing open the door to the warehouse. The interior looked nearly the same as when she'd left. The long table, the mannequins, the cupcake,

"You go through all the trouble to make someone a snack, and for what? Sheesh."

And, of course... pops.

Jinx blinked, and blinked again. He'd told her not to cry, he'd...

It didn't help. Before she'd been filled with rage, a feeling of betrayal, a hollow void in her heart where she'd last felt her bond, and just wanting to end everything. Flip the table over, start a new, better game. Then the excitement of her bond, her private little sun, the desire to hold it in her arms, running all the way to the western edge of the city on that feeling of elation.

She hadn't processed it, not really. Sinking to her knees, Jinx bawled like a baby. She sobbed apologies, and begged a voice she knew would never leave her for forgiveness. Time slipped from her mind entirely, lost in the hell of her own self-loathing, and Jinx cried harder, knowing some part of her pain would be felt by the unlucky stranger tied to her, by her sunlight.

don't cry, you're perfect.

Jinx knew she wasn't, but maybe, just maybe, when she could stand side by side with her other half, she could be a little closer to the woman pops had seen in her.

Cutting the ropes free, Jinx lay him down on the ground. Was he always this light? Always so thin?

Gently, Jinx tugged his coat off. A bit bloody, and it had a couple more holes than it should have, but...

"It's a symbol. Can't wear it yet, gotta clean in, gotta fix it, but gotta be worthy of it too..."

Jinx sniffled, and looked around. "Shovel, shovel, digga hole... say goodbye."

Humming to herself, even as tears continued to drip down her cheeks, Jinx started looking, thinking, planning. The first step on her road to lift Zaun up, to dust it off, and to set it free.

In her soul, her personal sun radiated warmth and love, and Jinx knew she could do it. For now at least, while the sun still shone, she wasn't alone.