Jinx blinked, and looked around the room before turning back to Garen. "Eh? No no no, I said no more demands, none, zilch! Ta-lk-ing, we're just T, A, L, K-"
"Sunflower?"
Jinx's jaw closed with a click, and she turned to face Lux, shifting her grip on the chains restraining Prince Jarven.
"Yes, Sunshine?"
Lux waved her arms, the weighted netting and heavy ropes that shrouded her body barely moving, "A little help, please?"
Jinx looked from the chains wrapped around Jarven's neck, to Lux, then back to the chains, muttering, "Uh, well, I would, but this guy doesn't seem like he'll play nice if I let him go so like-"
"I got her, I got her," rumbled Vi, limping over to Lux, wincing as blood trickled down her side.
Jinx nodded, then turned to Garen and the assembled councilors. "So anyway, I'd love to quickly hash out an emancipation of the glorious nation of Zaun, then we can go on our merry way and stop killing each other, yeah?"
Councilmember Bolbok stepped forward, hands clasped behind their back. "You do realize that this is rank coercion? No treaty, no agreement could possibly be valid under these circumstances."
Jinx furrowed her brow, "I'm sorry, but coming from you, that sounds like bullshit. You're just salty that the shoe is on the other foot."
Looking around the room, Jinx shouted, "Does this mechanical jackass speak for you all? Cause I'm happy to leave and try again later. Maybe after a few more graveyards worth of dead, how's that sound?"
"No, they do not speak for us," said Mel, her voice filling the room.
"Councilwoman Medarda..." hissed Bolbok in a warning tone, but the Noxian expatriate sliced one hand through the air like a blade deflecting a strike.
"No, you've had your say, Councilmember. In fact, you and yours have run roughshod over dissenting voices for weeks now, and look where it's gotten us!"
"So you're going to parlay with this, this impetuous upstart of a filthy trencher?" shouted Hoskel, spittle flying from his lips as he gesticulated wildly, and Jinx narrowed her eyes.
Lips pulling back in a snarl, Jinx adjusted her grip on her chains, "You know, I'm not an expert, but is kicking off negotiations with insults the norm?"
Mel smoothed out her dress, "No, but I'm sure you can find it in your heart to forgive Councilman Hoskel's outburst. This has been a... trying day for all of us."
A few heads bobbed around the room in agreement, and here and there, the soldiers of Piltover and Demacia picked through their wounded, lining up the bodies of the fallen while a handful of medically inclined souls did their best to triage.
"So," said Mel after another moment's silence, "do you have a list of terms you'd like to go over?"
Jinx opened her mouth, then turned to Bolbok, "I dunno, did you just shoot the messenger or did you also go through the poor sap's pockets?"
"I have no idea what you're talking about," the mechanical councilmember snarled, their posture rigid.
"I've got a spare copy here," Ekko rasped, limping across the council chambers with a crumpled sheet of paper held in one hand.
"Give me that," snapped Hoskel, all but ripping the paper out of Ekko's hand, only to have it pulled from his own grasp by Councilman Salo.
Furrowing his brow, the slender councilman fended off Hoskel with one arm, as his eyebrows climbed higher and higher.
Heimerdinger, mournfully watching Jinx readjust her chokehold on the prince, sighed, "Well, what does it say?"
Salo shrugged and passed the paper to Mel, "Do you want the broad strokes or the minutiae?"
"This is... almost the same thing you put before this council before," Mel exclaimed.
Jinx loosened her grip on her chains, and rolled her eyes, "I mean, yeah, it's pretty straightforward. Emancipation, money, and a slightly less porous border. I could demand more cash for the whole 'you tried to have me fuckin' killed' thing, but then again, I also blew your boys to kingdom come, so zest la vay or however they say it in Demacia."
Spitting on the floor, Prince Jarven snarled, "It's c'est la vie, you filthy, soulmate-stealing witch!"
Jinx frowned, but before she could start wringing Jarven's neck again, Lux stomped over, and shoved a suspiciously familiar frayed ball of rope into the prince's mouth.
"Ah, thank you, Sunshine. Now, as I was saying, we mmph!"
Vi and Garen both averted their eyes, and Zeri frowned, passing Ekko two gears while Lux kissed Jinx. It was not, as such things go, an especially quiet kiss, though when Prince Jarven began to thrash and let out muffled curses, Jinx was quick to retighten her grip on his neck.
"Ah-hem," coughed Jayce, and Jinx broke away from the kiss to whirl on the disheveled councilman.
"Oh, fine, excuse me for being excited to see my fiancée," she snapped.
"Business first, pleasure second, please," chimed Mel, shaking out the list of terms. "For starters, how amenable are you to payments in installments?"
"Gonna install my foot right up your-"
"Installments would be fine," chirped Lux as she clapped one hand over Jinx's mouth, "provided there is an appropriate penalty for late payment. What time frame were you thinking?"
Councilwoman Shoola, now the holder of the terms piped up, "Semi-annual, over a five-year span. That will give us enough time to raise the money without any undue pressure on our own constituents."
Zeri spat on the floor, "Not gonna fly. Every other month, three-year span."
Shoola's gold-tipped fingers clicked together, "Charming. Chem-Empress, does your rescuer speak with authority on this matter?"
Lux and Jinx both nodded, "Chem-Baroness Zeri, the floor is yours."
"Wait, like, really? Cause I know a guy who knows his way around a pickaxe, and this is some fuckin' fancy marble."
There was a bit of snickering, some meanspirited, some not, and Zeri snapped her fingers, sparks flying, "Shoot. Okay, kidding, kidding. Um, anyway, while I get wanting to look out for you and yours, we need the money more frequently than semi-annually. Can you do every other month, over a four-year period?"
Shoola looked around the chamber, "Hmm, every three months, four-year period?"
Zeri looked to Ekko, who nodded and turned to Shoola. "We're agreeable to that."
Tapping her golden fingertips together, Shoola grinned widely, "Marvelous, a little spitting aside, it's nice to finally do a bit of business again. A quick vote, while we're here. Councilors, all in favor of the proposed reparation plan? Aye for me."
"Aye," chanted Mel.
"Nay," snarled Hoskel.
"Aye," said Salo.
"Nay," rasped Bolbok.
"Aye," sighed Cassandra, holding Caitlyn close.
"Never," snapped Heimerdinger, lifting Zapper up, aiming squarely at Jinx.
"Shit!" screamed Ekko, kicking away a petricite blade, heedless of how it cut into his boot.
"Professor!" shouted Jayce, but it was too late.
The hammer fell. The primer was ignited. The powder burned. Caged by brass and steel, the contained explosion forced the lead round forward, spinning down the barrel, racing forward.
For an instant, an eternity, Jinx and Lux were locked, frozen in a duel to throw themselves in front of the shot, and to prevent the other from doing precisely that.
The round struck true.
Jinx's eyes rolled back in her head, and she slumped to the floor with a pained sigh and the rattle of chains.
"Jinx!" cried Lux, and she spun on Heimerdinger, rage, unthinking, blinding rage in her eyes. Petricite arms and armor around her crumbled to dust and vapor, and Lux screamed, her eyes glowing gold, her hair moving in an ethereal wind. Her muscles, run through with veins of purple light, seemed to bunch and swell, and as Lux stepped forward, the marble beneath her feet cracked and fractured.
"Behold, mages in their natural state," Heimerdinger shouted at the top of his lungs, tossing the spent revolver to the side. "All that power, all this strength. Impossible to contain. Impossible to control. And you all, you would sign a treaty with these monsters?"
"You shot my soulmate," Lux cried, tears running down her cheeks, only to evaporate by the time they reached her chin.
Heimerdinger turned to Lux, and nodded, resolute. "Do you think the world will be less cruel? Do you think tragedy is something that will not dog your heels?"
Lux's hand shot out, and seized Heimerdinger by the throat. "Maybe you're right. Maybe this was only a matter of time."
Fingers rolled into a fist, and Lux cocked her arm back, teeth locked in a rictus snarl of unimaginable hate. "But for certain, and for sure, I'll make you regret..."
Lux paused, and cocked her head, her nose scrunching up like she'd just caught a funny odor. "Hang on a tick, why does my butt hurt?"
The remnants of her chains jingled and jiggled, and Jinx slowly propped herself up. "Owie owie owie, right in the keister..."
Lux pitched Heimerdinger to the side, almost bowling over Hoskel with the impromptu yordle missile, before she threw herself at Jinx, sending the slimmer woman crashing to the floor a second time.
"Ow, Blondie, careful there, I really was just shot in the ass!"
"You're an ass! Slumping to the floor all melodramatically and-!"
"It's been a rough day! I passed out for a moment, that's all!"
"I'll show you a rough day!"
"Promise?"
"Ah-hem."
Jinx and Lux turned to glare at Jayce, who shrugged, "Bicker, kiss, fu-, ah, ahem, whatever later. Aside from reparation payments, are there any other points of business that need to be covered before someone else tries to spin the cycle of violence like a carnival prize wheel?"
Jinx snickered, Lux sighed, and Jarven snapped his spear up from the ground, spitting out the gag of rope as he leapt to his feet and spun on the two Chem-Empresses.
"Garen, with me! We will strike this witch down and free your sister!"
Garen drew his sword, stomping toward the brewing melee, before shouting, "Prince, on your right!"
Jarven whipped his head to the side, and twisted to the side, spear twirling in a defensive cage of glittering steel to protect himself.
A maneuver which did nothing to protect Jarven from Garen's sucker punch to the side of his head. The prince let out a woof of displaced air, and sank to the ground in a clatter of plate mail.
"If anyone asks, she did that," Garen said, pointing to Vi. Members of the Demacian expeditionary force saluted the Sword-Captain, or simply put their heads down and got back to the task of patching up their comrades.
Vi tapped one finger of her gauntlets to her lips, "... Can I actually hit him? Ya know, to help sell the story?"
Garen shrugged, "Take those slabs of metal off your hands and you've got a deal."
Caitlyn and Cassandra spun from where they were having a tearful reunion to shout, "Vi!"
Shrugging, Vi took off her gauntlets, "What? It's not every day you get permission to punch royalty! Plus, like, I'll never get to go to Demacia anyway, might as well double down on that."
Cassandra sighed and put her head in her hands, while Caitlyn turned to face Garen, "No hunters, no assassins?"
"They'll have to go through us if they want Vi," Abigail and Cameron chimed in, and Lailha nodded along, tapping ash onto the council's fancy floors.
"Okay, okay, okay, that's all well and good," Jinx chattered as her sister put a dent shaped like her own fist into the side of Jarven's helmet, "but yes, there is one more serious bit of business that absolutely cannot be done later."
The various councilors, soldiers, Zaunites and assorted hangers-on all drew their breath, a collective inhalation as Jinx's eyes grew flinty, and scribbled apparitions darted around the room.
"All in favor of making the tin can and Heimerdorkle pay for our wedding? Oh, and who wants an invite?"
The room echoed with silence for a moment, before Jayce broke it, sighing, "You're kidding, right?"
Jinx shook her head, even as Lux had to hide her snickering grin behind one hand, "Nuh-uh, totally serious! Heck, I'll even invite you, a gesture of good faith and all that jazz!"
Jayce sighed again, and swept his hair back with one hand, frowning, "... Mel can come too. And Viktor."
"Done, done, and done. For real though, can we get Ballbag and Hinneydonkle to pay for our wedding? I'm thinkin' open bar."
Hoskel pushed aside a dazed Heimerdinger, and ponderously rose to his full unimpressive height, roaring, "You would extort some of our most venerable and treasured councilmembers for your trencher festivities! Outrage on top of outrage, one that I will not stand for!"
"Then please, Councilman, sit down, and shut up," snapped Mel. Turning away from the flabbergasted Hoskel, she put on her best smile and bowed shallowly to Jinx and Lux, "In light of certain actions and behaviors of the Council and its members, and in the name of fostering good relations with our sister city, I believe paying for your wedding is the least we could do."
Jinx grinned, and a shiver of apprehension went around the room as her grin grew wider and wider until it seemed to fill her face. "I think this is the start of a bea-uti-ful relationship, Councilwoman Mel." Twisting her head to the side, Jinx looked up to Lux, "Sunshine, do we need anything else?"
Lux smiled wanly, and patted the top of Jinx's head, "We'll need these agreements to be put to paper, and the first reparation payment needs to be sooner rather than later, but ultimately, yes, that's everything."
Mel clapped her hands, and offered the Chem-Empresses a winning smile. "Splendid. I do hope we can maybe hash out a joint workforce to repair the bridge and maybe, ah, our docks. The Council would be happy to lend you the most recent census and the data from the last round of taxes we collected from the und- from Zaun, if you'd like."
Jinx cocked her head to the side, confusion write large across her features. Lux blinked, but nodded, "Yes, that would be most helpful. Numbers make the world go round, I suppose."
Jinx tugged on Lux's sleeve, and Lux nodded again, "With all that said and done, I believe we'll be excusing ourselves. As the good Councilwoman said earlier, it's been a rather trying day."
"Luxanna, wait," Garen blurted, and it was only by a supreme effort of will that Jinx stopped herself from rolling her eyes. Lux froze, and offered Garen a smile that stretched the definition of 'friendly' nearly to the breaking point.
"Just Lux, brother. What do you need?"
Garen marched over to the Chem-Empresses, and reached, slowly, under one pauldron.
"Here," he mumbled, thrusting a bundle of letters at Lux, "I... I wasn't sure how this would all go. I was duty-bound to help, but I... I wanted to bring these, just in case."
"What are they?" Lux murmured, hefting the twine-wrapped bundle in one hand.
"Letters, by the looks of it," Jinx offered, her tone full of mischief and wonder. Lux and Garen both let out a small snort of laughter, before looking at each other. Lux passed Jinx the bundle, and stepped up to her brother, one eyebrow cocked inquisitively.
Garen shrugged, "I gathered letters from your friends, from our family, everyone who missed you. Some declined, citing your, um, talents. But most expressed a desire to see you again. So, here are their wishes. Maybe you could write back? To... all of us, I suppose."
Lux's lips twisted in a frown, and she spread her arms wide, beckoning with her hands.
Garen, slowly, like it was all a dream, crouched down, and hugged Lux, just as he was hugged in return.
"Thank you Garen," Lux sighed, "I know this can't be easy, but I'm happy here. I'm finally with my soulmate, and I'm free to be myself."
They stepped apart, and the smile Lux gave Garen was much less strained. "Give mother my best."
"And father?"
"Knee him in the dick."
Garen winced and reflexively moved one hand protectively in front of his own groin. "Any chance I could just, I don't know, duel him? Challenge him to a jousting contest? Convince mother to divorce him, loudly and publically?"
Lux's grin was truly heartfelt now, and she hissed, "Knee him in the dick, or neither you nor mother get invited to the wedding."
Sighing, Garen pinched the bridge of his nose, "Well, that would put an end to my objections, since now I either assault my father, or die by my mother's hand. I suppose I'll take my chances with father's wrath."
Jinx snickered and Lux giggled, "Oh, chin up Garen. If things go sour in Demacia, you'll always be welcome in Zaun."
"Well," Jinx cut in, wrapping herself around one of Lux's arms, "at least until we're violently deposed by someone else who wants the title of Chem-Empress. At that point, all bets are off!"
Lux laughed nervously, "We really do need to work on a better means of electing leadership in Zaun, hopefully before any coup attempts. Regardless, thank you Garen, for the letters. And I hope to see you and mother at the wedding. We'll send you a few invites once things, ah, calm down around here."
Nodding, the Sword-Captain of the Dauntless gave a sort of half-wave, and started rounding up what Demacian souls were left, the uninjured supporting the wounded, or carrying the dead. Garen himself lifted the limp body of Jarven Lightshield, and carried the insensate prince from the Council chambers.
Silence reigned, briefly, before Jinx, plucking Pow-Pow from Lailha's hands, loudly exclaimed, "So, we can leave, right? Like, we're not gonna get shot leaving the building?"
Ekko shook his head and pointed down. "We got a way out. Follow me."
Zeri bumped her hip into Ekko's, and ducked one shoulder low to help support him, "Better yet, follow us."
Ekko, Zeri, Jinx, and Lux started from the room. Caitlyn looked to Vi, and Vi looked to Jayce.
"So...," Vi started, "we're off the hook for all the property damage, and the self-defense stuff, right?"
Jayce looked to Mel, but it was Hoskel who piped out, roaring, "Absolutely not! Why, for all your foul magicking and your, your dastardly aid to that two-bit criminal, you'll be lucky to-"
Vi shrugged, and turned her back on the screaming councilor, "Jinx, sis, wait up!"
Cackling, Jinx, and Lux waved the rest of the rescue party over while waiting for the elevator, while Cassandra began to shriek like a banshee, matching and overwhelming Hoskel's snarls and shouts.
"Hey, Sunshine, I got a question," Jinx whispered as the doors to the elevator dinged open.
"Ask me anything, Sunflower," Lux said, cupping Jinx's face in one hand, leading her into the elevator.
"What's a taxes?"