4

Chapter Ten

Swimming through the dark waters, the pollution was so thick that the faint lights of night were almost instantly obscured, dropping me into a midnight void. Flicking on the interior light of my thrown-together sea scooter, the built-in compass was backlit, letting me 'fly by instruments', only underwater. Thankfully, here at the docks it was deep enough I didn't have to worry about hitting the bottom, so all I needed to do was orient myself in the correct direction and go.

Dropping a bit lower, Wild Defense let me not have to worry about things like pressure, or breathing, which was a little disconcerting at first, but I quickly adapted. After a few minutes, I moved to flip on the main lights, only for Wild Defense to practically scream at me not to, and I listened, flipping on the lesser lights instead. doing so, I highlighted something large directly below me, an enormous fish keeping pace, a single basketball sized eye only a dozen feet away, a maw full of sharp teeth partially opened, and I froze, holding completely still as I was carried forward by my device.

Oh right. The sea monsters. The sea monsters Silco waxed poetic about. The sea monsters that Singe likely made Shimmer from at Silco's behest to cement his power base. Silco's sea monsters. Those sea monsters, I thought, my mind stalling. I'd known they existed, but had expected them to be, you know, further down, not thirty or so feet below the surface.

This... this is why I bought Wild Talent, I reminded myself, Wild Defense further taking the 'de-escalates conflict' aura of the first talent and scaling it upwards to creatures larger than me, and holy shit did this qualify. And, if these things were light sensitive, which, given how incredibly murky things were at the surface, though it seemed to clear a little the deeper you got, they probably were, then the creature would almost certainly have taken a sudden bright light as an 'attack', and responded accordingly.

The pollution from Zaun created an odd sort of ecological situation where most of it was, if not oil, then close enough, that while it'd emulsify a little, that same emulsification stuck to the surface like the world's worst beer-foam, leaving things like that to survive just below, though never breaking through, because to do so would mean to get a face-full of polluted waters.

Swimmers, however, were apparently fair game, which had explained Powder's concern, something I'd just attributed to the pollution. Even now I could feel Wild Defense acting, reaching out and nudging the minds of the creature below me, and others, just enough so that we'd go our separate ways.

I'd thought that the toxic waters alone would be enough to make it so that the not-Alcatraz of Stillwater Prison was inescapable, at least without commandeering a boat, but with any escapees serving as delectable treats for things like the giant fish/shark/thing below me, it'd be beyond foolish to try. Though I wondered if the people of Piltover even knew about them, or thought that any swimmers that made it far enough out to get snapped up by the leviathans, like this one, succumbed instead to fatigue or poison, when they stopped to tread water for just long enough for a foot to dangle below the worst of the pollution, and into biting range.

Wild Defense gave me instructions, and I followed them, waving a hand and making a guttural, keening noise that meant something to the leviathan below me, as it blinked, turning its head, and making a similar noise in return.

Am I... am I speaking magic whale? I wondered, trusting my Company-granted instincts, turning off the motor of my sea scooter, gesturing forwards, and following the prompt my Talent provided me to make another sound.

The leviathan replied in turn, slowing slightly as it rose up, until it was in touching range, and moved forward until a long tendril, the end of it glowing a faint blue, nudged me, and I was directed to grasp it. Doing so, I made a throaty trill, getting another one in turn, Wild Defense telling me to hold on, as I quickly pulled the sea scooter close to my chest to keep from losing it and grabbed the protrusion with both hands, the enormous fish starting to undulate, and, in so doing, move far faster than I ever could with my creation.

The leviathan dove deeper, until the murkiness cleared, an omnipresent blue glow coming from the sea floor, outlining dozens of dark shapes, of other leviathans, as well as what were either enormous eels or was an absolutely titanic octopus, and I really wasn't sure which was worse. Regardless, it was all I could to hold on, watching with wide eyes as I observed something that the people of Piltover, and likely most of Zaun, never even knew existed, despite it only being a few miles away, something that I only could see due to my Company-granted Defenses.

When I have time, I'm going to need to come down here again, and take some video with my phone, I couldn't help but think, wanting to share this sight with Powder, though, without Defenses of her own, the girl could never survive the trip. When she was grown, I'd make her the Offer, but until then that was a hard no, and the other way... that honestly seemed more like a pipedream than anything else.

My ride knew exactly where I wanted to go, the bottom of the prison slowly coming into view, an undersea mountain, the base of which was covered with bioluminescent flora, which petered out as it rose, like the tree-line of its surface equivalent. Closing on it, slowing down, the creature made an almost happy-sounding trill as my Talents directed me to let go, the leviathan turning around until it was looking directly at me, and wow was that a lot of teeth.

Following my implanted instincts, I trilled back, patting it on its enormous nose, gently, the leviathan nodding before turning and swimming away, back to the others.

... so... that happened.

Turning my sea-scooter's rotor back on, I let it carry me upwards, toggling off the lights as I neared the murky, black surface, slowing as I broke through, soundlessly, mist obscuring the waters even further. There was a circling spotlight on a tower, but, able to just go under the incredibly murky water, it was child's play to duck the view of any guards. Making it to the shore, I pulled myself up onto the rocks, to the side of the incredibly ominous looking entrance, a stone stairway leading to a partially open pair of double doors, from which a red light poured out, not a living soul in sight.

On one hand, that seemed like pretty lax security, on the other, I'd just discovered why they didn't need it.

Regardless, I shook myself off on the rocks, sending toxic droplets splattering in every direction, then opened a portal and stepped through, nodding to Powder on the other side as I took off my mask. "Okay, I'm there. I'm gonna go shower to make sure I don't walk in, well, damp," I offered, the girl nodding while wrinkling her nose at the smell, and I took off at a brisk pace, jumping in the shower just long enough to wash off the sludge, toweling dry and grabbing a blue and gold suit-coat that looked Enforcer-esque, enough that it'd help supplement my Siren's Song and Psychic Paper to help me get Violet and get out.

Under that I wore my spider-silk shirt, black armored pants, black boots, and a hidden blade was tucked in behind my back, as I was walking into what could very well be enemy territory, and even if I didn't have a problem with the jailors, I might have one with the inmates.

It would be my luck to have a prison riot go off while I was visiting.

Thankfully, while my face was going to be well known in the future, it wasn't now, and a pair of prescription-less glasses, along with a fake mustache, would break up the features of my visage enough that, even if someone made the connection later, it either wouldn't stick or it'd be too late. And given that Silco had thought Violet dead, until Caitlyn got her released seven years from now, I didn't have to worry about him following this connection either.

Making sure to towel my hair completely dry, but leaving it messy on purpose instead the normal combed back look Jayce had favored, and which I was planning on continuing to use, I came down, Powder double-taking at my appearance before breaking down into giggles.

"What is that?" she questioned, trying to hide her laughter and failing.

Smiling back, I wiggled the fake hair, stuck onto my lip with a light adhesive like a giant caterpillar, not having the time for spirit gum to set, provoking more laughter from her. "Are you saying this isn't the most impressive facial hair you've ever seen?" I mockingly inquired, wagging my eyebrows as well, Powder almost falling off her stool, holding her sides while shaking her head no.

"Good, they'll see the glasses, and the 'stache, and think 'That can't be Jayce Talis! Jayce Talis doesn't wear glasses or have a, quite frankly, enormous mustache!' It's the perfect disguise!" I announced, laughing myself before taking a deep breath and centering myself. "Okay, I'm going in. With any luck I'll be back with Violet in half an hour."

That stopped the laughter cold, Powder suddenly looking unsure, before she nodded, a hopeful look in her eye as she turned her gaze my way, though she did giggle a little more at the mustache.

Walking back to Runeterra, I strode up the stone steps of the prison as if I belonged there, and past what was obviously a checkpoint, only... no one was there. A little weirded out, I walked down what was obviously the main throughway, finding myself at the desk, behind which a massive man, likely nonhuman as he seemed to be practically four feet across at the shoulder, was reading something. The man glanced up, then did a double take, tensing slightly, before relaxing a little.

"Well, hello there. Who are you?" he inquired leaning forward on his desk to peer at me.

"I'm from the mainland. They sent me to question one of your prisoners," I stated, voice thick with power, as I reached behind my back, the large men seeming to ready himself for an attack, but I merely summoned my Psychic Paper and took it out, handing the black-leather bound booklet out to him. "Here are my orders."

The enormous man took it, looking it over carefully, before he leaned back, relaxing once again, shaking his head as he pushed the magical identification back to me. "Oh, sorry Sergeant. We didn't get word you were coming. Boys in the tower probably slackin' off again." He shrugged, and chuckled, "Not much use mannin' it, most of the time, but what the Council demands..." he trailed off.

"The Council gets," I sighed commiserating, taking the man's demeanor as a setup for both common complaint and as a call-and-response to make sure I was who I looked like, adding a snarky, "Technically," that made the large man, possibly the warden, let loose a bark of laughter.

"You know it," he affirmed, leaning back a bit more to peer at me. "So, who's the lucky prisoner that's caught their attention?"

I grimaced, "That's the thing, I didn't get a name, just a description. Undercity girl, teenage, pink hair, brought in by the Chief Deputy last night."

The Warden seemed to freeze, just for a moment, and my hackles were raised. "Oh, uh, her," he hedged. "Inmate five-one-six. She's... not available to talk right now. Sorry, wish you sent word ahead. We would've told you to come back tomorrow, or in a couple days."

What? "What happened?" I demanded, frowning.

"She's injured, and won't be able to talk for a bit," he revealed. "Nearly killed one of my men."

You couldn't wait one fucking day, Vi? I thought, which wasn't really fair to her, but she'd somehow survived seven years in here, so it couldn't be too bad. That said, if I'd just pushed forward my plans, a bit harder, a bit faster, she would've been spared that. "So your men hospitalized her?" I questioned.

Again, the dodginess, the big man hesitating, as if he didn't want to respond, and I felt my anger flare, wondering what was so hard about a yes or no answer. Frowning, I reaffirmed the Suggestion by commanding, "Tell me the truth."

From the man's drawn brows, he likely realized something was up, but slowly told me, "Well, we wouldn't do anythin' to her. We're here to keep 'em safe, after all. Even from each other. But if she don't want our protection, that's on her."

Even as my annoyance at such complete bullshit grew, my training from Basic kicked in, and instead of doubling down, trying to press through his mental defenses, I switched tracks, visibly relaxing, preparing to slip by them instead, even as, internally, the tension in my gut only tightened. "Oh, good. If we did it, I'd technically have to file a report, but, well, the prisoners in here are here for a reason. We can hardly expect them to act civilized. Don't worry, I won't judge. I know sometimes the rules have to get bent a little, to keep order. So she's in the infirmary?"

That got the other man to relax fully, smirking. "I mean, she will be, when they're done with her."

... what.

"Is there any way to call 'em off?" I asked, hiding my anger, mostly at myself for taking so long, not that I could've known this was coming, under an expression of mild annoyance. "Afterwards, you can do what you want, but I need to get this report done soon."

That got a rueful laugh out of the big man. "Sorry, Sergeant. After we let 'em have their shot? They'd be mighty riled up if we told them no now."

Something about the man's wording just seemed... off. "What do you mean, 'have their shot?'" I questioned, confused.

"You know, have their shot," the warden repeated unhelpfully. Reading my uncomprehending stare, he gave a little 'come on, you know what I mean' headshake, but I just continued to gaze at him. "Ain't that many women that end up in Stillwater, and this one's got some of our guys riled up real good. Don't know why, but it don't hurt 'em to have a shot. Now, maybe, next time she thinks 'bout tryin' to choke one of my men, she'll think twice."

"Rape. You're talking about rape," I stated flatly, doing all I could to keep the rage from my tone at such a blatant evil committed by those who'd taken an oath to protect, Singing without meaning to.

In the face of the accusation, the large man just shrugged, as if it didn't matter. "Hey, we're not doin' it. Those animals down there? We're not responsible for what they do to each other."

The fury in my veins burned white hot, before it crossed a line, and flash-froze. Secure Violet. Get her to safety. Blame yourself later.

And just like that, Plan M became Plan M/W, following contingency X.

"That's understandable. Sorry, just caught me off guard. Didn't expect you guys to be so hardcore. Hey, say if I wanted to go see it go down, how would I get there? If she sees me while it's happening? She might be more inclined to answer my questions," I requested amicably, with a big ol' understandin' smile.

"You got some stones, for a mainlander," the Warden remarked with a large smile of his own. "Just go down the hall and take the elevator, and head down to level thirty-two. Tell the guy today's code is R-8-S-T"

"And if the elevator breaks, how do you move around?" I pressed.

The rapist-by-proxy lifted a large eyebrow. "Well, then you'd take the stairs, but you'd need a key like this to get in," he informed me, tapping a key on his desk, "and get between floors, but that won't be an issue."

I nodded, and started to leave but he called out, "Hey!" and I turned, the big man shooting me a self-satisfied grin. "You ever get sick of doin' the Council's errands, put in for a transfer for here. I think you'll fit right in."

My anger, my rage, my wrath, almost slipped my control at the comment, and I turned back around, smiling broadly, deciding to deal with this now instead of on my way out. "I'll think about it. Hey, look over there," I said, pointing to the man's left. "What's that?"

The big man obliged, looking away, "I don't see anyth-gurk!"

Interrupted by my blade, which I jumped over his desk to drive deep into his throat, I ripped it free, getting sprayed with the crimson fluid, grabbing the key off his desk and opening a portal.

"You're ba-oh!" Powder cried out, panicked at my bloodied appearance.

"Not mine. Get the medical bed and bring it down here. Upstairs workshop, room with the red cross on it," I commanded, and she took off running, as I threw off my jacket, suiting up and stepping through the portal in seconds, running for the elevator. "Level Thirty-Two. Code R-8-S-T!"

The elevator dropped, and I pulled my pistol, levelling it at the door, which opened onto some kind of balcony, with a thick glass window separating it from the area below. In it were several enforcers, watching with dark looks of enjoyment, and I started firing, starting with the closest.

His head practically exploded, the sound getting the attention of the others, and I slowly strode out, shooting the next closest after that, then the others, icy calm running through my veins. The others, shocked, started to charge, as I should've run out of ammo with normal weapons, but that just made them easier to shoot, because they weren't people, merely targets yet unserviced.

Over a dozen were dead, others down from being shot by the overpenetration, those still up having pulled back, fear in their eyes, hurriedly pulling on helmets, when my gun clicked empty, and anger and victory sparked in the eyes of those still unarmored. The first was a pale mirror to my own, the latter I felt not at all, as I toggled the magazine free, slapped in a new one as they charged, and took the lead enforcer through the glass eyepiece of his helmet, right as he met me, stepping aside to let his corpse hit the ground and slide, eliminating the others in several seconds, my rounds having punched through their armor, which only served to trap the bullets inside them as they ricocheted about, before I turned to look through the glass, into the space below. It was a mess-hall of sorts, the table pushed to the side, a bed in the middle, though I could barely see it through the mass of rapists below.

This makes things easier, I thought, shooting the glass, my rounds, meant to go through armor, easily piercing, the prisoners serving as meat-shields.

Emptying my second magazine, the overpenetration meaning I shot two or three with each round discharged, making sure to avoid any possibility of hitting Vi, I swapped it out, slotting the empty magazine back in my jacket before taking the third, as the prisoners panicked, and I continued to kill them.

Switching to magazine four, most of the prisoners were dead, the ones pounding on the doors to try and get out were easy targets, and a couple realized I was avoiding Violet and stayed next to her, and she was... a mess.

No. Focus.

Taking a few steps I leapt at the glass, which shattered fully, and dropped the fifteen feet, landing in a clearer area, though slick with blood, my boots keeping me stable as, with my changed vantage, I opened fire, taking them high in the chest and head, sending them sprawling, dead. One of the doors opened, a pair of armored enforcers charging in, clubs raised, but a few shots put them both down easily.

Striding up, I put a bullet in anyone still moving and clinically took in Violet's condition. She was naked, but the ragged bits of cloth hanging off her told me her clothing had been ripped off, and she was absolutely in psychological shock, eyes blank, muscles twitching randomly, and between her legs was a bloody mess of fluids.

Her hands were tied to the bed with cloth, which I cut free with my blade, sheathing it and opening a portal Home. Carefully picking up the girl, I stepped through, Powder on the other side standing by the gurney, eyes wide with fear, and she paled as she saw her sister.

Putting Violet down carefully, I had to strap her down to move her quickly, which got a reaction for the girl, a slurred, "no" as she weakly tried to struggle.

"You're safe. They're dead. It's over," I told her, which helped, as I moved her up to our medical room as fast as I could.

Her sister followed, and Vi, exhaustedly, looked over, seeing the younger girl, a look of panic coming over the teenager's face as she struggled to try and get up. "P-powder? Here? No. No!"

It was only the strap that kept her from falling off as I hurried her to the 'medical workshop' I'd qualified for.

"You're not in Stillwater prison. I took you out of there. I'm sorry I didn't move faster," I told her, and she looked at me, confused, and I realized I was still wearing my mask.

Reaching our destination, I shrugged off the jacket, remotely closing the portal, and took off my mask and gloves, to work better and faster.

"Y-you?" Vi questioned, looking dazed and confused.

Grabbing the tools I needed, and what I'd need to clean the injured girl off, Powder hesitated, with her bunny, looking panicked and scared. "Powder, there." I directed, pointing to the open space on the other side of the medical bed, and the girl scurried over, moving to grab Violet's hand, but saw that it was still bound in what looked like bedding fashioned into wide ropes, and looked to me.

I nodded and the young girl quickly got to work, freeing her sister's hand, before grabbing it and bursting into tears. "I'm sorry, Vi! I'm so, so sorry!"

The other girl ,who was pretty out of it, still tried to rally, shaking her head. "No. N-not your fault. Mine. I... where are we?" she finally asked, eyes trying, and failing, to focus, looking past Powder and to the window behind her, which opened out onto the beach and forests around my house.

"Somewhere safe," I told her, grabbing the pills, among them a pain reliever, a muscle relaxant, and an emergency contraceptive. I knew that, were I to Stamp her, her physical and mental trauma would be, not completely healed, but blunted but... that was only a weapon against my enemies, for allies, it needed to be a choice, because I didn't trust myself not to pull a Dumbledore and do so 'for the greater good'. "Take these, they'll help."

Helping her sit up, I assisted her, glad I'd taken the full medic training course in Basic, helping her drink the water to get them down, and set about treating her as best as I could, undoing the strap now that it wasn't needed, which caused her to relax a little.

"You," Violet said, trying to focus on me, "and you," she continued, looking to her sister, hand shaking as she stroked the younger girl's cheek, "and this," she said, looking out the window. "I'm... I'm dreaming."

"No!" Powder insisted, still crying. "This is real!"

Her older sister just laughed, wincing. "Thanks, dream Powder. I'm, I'm so sorry. I shouldn't've... shouldn't've. . ."

"Shouldn't've what?" the younger sister demanded, but Violet was out cold. "Shouldn't've what, Vi?" Turning to me, the smaller girl demanded, "Jayce! Jayce, you can help her too, right? Like you helped me!"

"She'll survive, but-" I started to respond, wincing as the pain in my throat broke through my focus, and I took a deep breath, having to manually disengage my Song, feeling like I was whispering. "But she's hurt, bad, and that'll take time to heal."

"C-can I help?" the girl asked, and I nodded.

"Hand me what I ask for, but don't rush. An extra second or two won't matter, but dropping something might," I warned. "Now put Flopsy down over there, and hand me those scissors," I directed, the blue-haired child, who, with near-frantic care, did just that. I got to work cutting the rags off my patient, mentally shifting gears as to how to treat her.

When I came back to Runeterra, I would wreak vengeance, but right now that wasn't what Violet needed.

Chapter Eleven

It took almost an hour to do all I could, having to check the manuals and reference databases that were, thankfully, included in my medical 'workshop', before we were done, an IV set up for Violet to keep her out of it for the foreseeable future.

Ironically, the Company's express purpose meant that they had things like safe anesthesia as part of their 'basics' package, or else this would be a lot harder. Back on my own world, the line between 'biological systems suppressed enough that the patient was unconscious' and 'biological systems suppressed to the point they stopped, and the patient died', was far too narrow for my tastes, but the oh so delightfully named 'Slutlife' had developed a cheap, simple substance that'd do just that for most humanoids, and Runeterrans were on the list of approved subjects. It also wouldn't react badly with the other medications I'd given her, something that untrained people normally didn't consider, something I didn't before my Seminars, and which could have disastrous results.

Personally, I wished I had a healing potion, or something equivalent, as the concentrated Life Magic found within them would've covered anything I missed, and generally helped her 'Get Better' in every way, but I'd not learned enough alchemy to get one of those workshops, unfortunately. The sheer amount of rote memorization was something I wasn't the best at, too caught up in the how and why to just accept that throwing together imp stool, magically infused wheat, and the eye of a sabre cat, run through a proper alembic assembly, of course, turned the ensuing liquid a specific shade of red and could heal the drinker from traumatic injury.

So all I had were antibiotics and medical salves that'd help, but not in the 'okay, you're good to go fight now' way that was possible with Magic. There were more competent doctors in Piltover, and likely Zaun as well, but germ theory was a thing that they were only starting to get, Runeterrans naturally more resistant to disease than Terran Humans, and while they'd have me beat in skill, I had them beat in equipment, and supply quality, by a wide margin.

Draping a blanket over the pink-haired girl, setting the room's temperature so that she'd be comfortable, I tweaked the workshop's settings, making it, not quite a cleanroom, but close, the air filtration kicking itself up a notch and the automated use of integrated ultraviolet lights would help keep things that way. I'd narrated everything I'd done as I'd worked on Vi, which helped keep Powder on an even keel, understanding what I was doing and why, talking my way through it also serving to keep it all straight for myself.

Leaving Violet, grabbing my gear, and turning off the normal light in the room, Powder followed me to the kitchen, where I made some coffee, the bloodstains on my shirt having partially dried and were now flaking off, though underneath that the blood was still damp and sticky, my own sweat keeping it so. Staring at the clock, I realized it was only just after nine, despite feeling like it should be past midnight. Getting some juice for my little partner, I sighed, as did she, and I looked over to see her holding onto her bunny pretty tightly.

"She's going to be okay," I told the younger sister. "She'll pull through. Violet, she'll be hurt, not just physically, but we'll be there to help her, just as she and Vander were there for you when you were younger."

Powder nodded, but still looked lost in thought, before looking up at me and asking, "Is, is this my fault?"

I just stared at her, confused, so she explained, "If I hadn't, If... If I hadn't, then the others will still be alive, and Vi wouldn't've been... wouldn't've been..."

Sighing, I got off my chair and crouched down a little next to her, putting us on the same level as I placed a comforting hand on her shoulder. "You aren't responsible for the actions of others, unless you're the one that directly made them do it, and did you make that monster that tried to kill the others? Was it your fault he was trying to break down that door? You made a mistake, Powder, because you didn't know, and you were just trying to help. If that does make it your fault, then it's a very small percentage, and you don't know what would've happened if you hadn't acted."

The girl stared back at me, unsure, asking, "Do, do you know?"

Shaking my head, I told her, "No. I only got a glimpse of one way things could've gone." Now wasn't the time to explain multiverse theory, and I wasn't anywhere close to done. "Maybe they would've escaped unharmed, maybe it would've broken down the door and killed them all, maybe it would've broken down the door, followed them out, and some, or all, of them, would've died. If you want to look to who was most at fault what happened to them, it was Silco's for trying to kill them. And it wasn't your fault for what happened to Vi. It was the prisoners and enforcers of Stillwater Prison for doing it, especially the latter, for violating their oaths."

My eyes dropped, and my next statement was almost a whisper, pouring out of me stronger than I meant to, "It was mine, for not getting to her sooner."

"N-No!" Powder disagreed vehemently, eyes shiny with unshed tiers as I looked up. "Did-Did you know what would happen to her?"

"I, no, I didn't," I replied, wanting to disagree, but I needed to know her argument before I could tell her why she was wrong. "The... the vision, how I knew what was going to happen, it started when my apartment blew up. It only covered the next couple days, cutting off with what happened last night, and then told me what would happen in seven years, for a week or so, before ending once more, before I could see how things resolved. Violet was stuck in Stillwater for years, but seemed fine. Kinda? She was angry about it, which made sense, but I didn't know... and not on her second night, or I would've gone right there, before that could've happened," I said, more to myself than her, trying to excuse my own failings, and failing at that too.

"Then, then it's not your fault!" the girl declared, almost frantically. "You didn't know! Just like I didn't! If, if it's your fault, then it's mine too!"

"It's not your fault," I told her letting go and moving to stand up, but the girl lunged forward, grabbing onto me, as if trying to drag me back down, staining her own clothing with the partially clotted blood of my enemies.

"Then it's not yours either!" she cried, almost screaming it, and I hesitated, before slowly hugging her back. She was wrong, the two things weren't equivalent, as she was eleven, while I was twenty-four, or older, depending on how you looked at it. But it was clear that she didn't understand the distinction, and, as she sobbed, holding onto me, I knew I wasn't going to be able to explain it right now.

Part of me was tempted to Tell her, but... no, I'd been using that too liberally already. Furthermore, using it to help her understand that this was a safe place was one thing, and that she wasn't at fault. I wasn't going to use it when time, and experience, would teach her instead, and not understanding wouldn't lead her to more harm. Stopping her from doing something out of panic was necessary, convincing her of this because I Told her, not because she understood why, was not.

I waited, and she got herself under control, telling me, "You, you didn't know. And you would've done things different if you did. Just, just like I would've. If what happened to, what happened to the others was that, that thing's fault, and that guy's, then what happened to Vi was his too, and, and the enforcer that grabbed her! You-you didn't put her there! You pulled her out, saved her! Just like you saved me."

The last part was almost inaudible, but with her holding onto me, her head pressed up against my shoulder, I still heard her.

She was wrong, but she didn't know who I was, what I'd done. I'd had to leave a world to die to youma, and that wasn't a sin that saving a few washed away. And I hadn't even been able to save them, not as much as I'd wanted to. Maybe I should've spent less time crafting, or, even exhausted as I'd been, tried to swim to Stillwater, or commandeered a boat. It would've been worth faking illness the next morning, maybe sneaking out during the day instead of meeting Viktor, and I could've just claimed I accidentally slept in!

I'd planned, and my plans were good, but they'd been based on the intel I'd had, and I'd been lacking the full picture. I hadn't even considered this, and Jayce's memories hadn't suggested it either, but I knew the boy's memories were skewed, I'd just, just not expected that.

The warden's words, of how I'd 'fit right in' with them, came back to me. He hadn't been talking to me, he'd been talking to the mask I'd been wearing to get the job done, but still, comments some of my instructors in Basic had made, my own apparent value in the eyes of the multidimensional sex slave corporation, and more, it'd... just fit, in all the worst ways.

"J-Jayce?" Powder asked, and I hadn't realized how tightly I was holding onto the younger girl, quickly letting go.

"Sorry," I said, shaking my head and standing up.

"No!" she yelped, grabbing onto me again. "It's okay!"

I took a second to collect myself. "It's okay, Powder. I'm okay."

From the girl's look, she didn't believe me, not letting go.

Sighing, I shook my head. "I will be," I amended. "But I'm not done yet. Not tonight. Not by a long shot. And, well, I have work in the morning, so I need to get this done," I quipped, smiling, which she didn't return. "But I can do that on my own, if you want to stay with Viole-"

"No!" the blue-haired girl interrupted, setting her shoulders. "I said I was gonna help you. So I'm gonna help you! Vi, you said she'll stay asleep?" I nodded, and she let go of me. "Then she'll be fine. This place is safe, but, but where you're going isn't."

Well, she wasn't wrong, I thought, slowly nodding. Gesturing to her juice, I slammed down my coffee, a bit too hot, but temperature wasn't an issue to me anymore, and I let the caffeine through my Body Defense, taking a deep breath and settling myself.

Powder chugged her own drink, following me as I stopped by a workshop and grabbed a handful of nails before heading back to the portal room, suiting back up. Opening a doorway back to Runeterra, and leaning partially through, I could see there were guards, watching prisoners carry away the dead rapists, the time I was gone probably enough for them to 'clear' the area, and see that I was 'gone'.

Their mistake.

Moving back to the cart, taking out the plastique, along with the detonators, I cut off a large piece and explained what I was doing, and what the substance was, to Powder, shoving the nails into it to make shrapnel. It wouldn't be as good as a purpose-built weapon, but with the amount that I was using was, well, I'd say it was excessive, but I had made a lot, and I wasn't feeling very restrained about this.

Molding the explosive like putty, I added more and more until it was nearly the size of a basketball, stuck in the detonator, and set it for twenty seconds, which should be long enough for someone to pick up the pure white sphere and wonder what it was.

Arming it, I gently tossed it through the portal, and closed the doorway.

As I waited, I focused, taking out the freezing cold rage that I'd shoved to the back of my mind, and immersing myself in it once more, in preparation.

Everyone had a primary sin, just like everyone was elementally aligned, something that, whether they liked it or not, defined them, and while some might say mine was Pride, they'd be wrong.

No, my sin was Wrath.

Not a blind one, striking out at everyone near me. I was no tantruming child. No, it, like everything else I did, was turned to serve a purpose. There was a reason that I'd signed up with The Company, and, to be honest, this was it. The world was broken, most worlds were, and I could not accept that. Not because of how it reflected on me, not because I thought my way was best, but because the world was needlessly cruel, unfair, and idiotic, and it didn't have to be.

And before things could be made better, the rot needed to be removed.

With glacial calmness, rage singing in my veins as the world crystallized into razor-edged sharpness, I re-opened the portal and looked back out, noting the floor hadn't collapsed, which was good, but everyone was either dead, parts strewn about, flesh pulped and shredded around the point of detonation, or was screaming and moaning on the ground, either from shrapnel or mere overpressure.

Stepping out fully, I pulled my sword, ending their lives, even as a few more guards ran inside, fully armored, which meant very little to me as I put them down with my pistol.

There was no way that, with how open they'd been about this, even if it took a little prodding, the others didn't know. All enforcers took an oath when they joined up, to serve and protect the people, to enforce the law, and to act with honor. If Caitlyn still became one, a path I'd try and steer her away from, she would mean it, because that was the kind of person she was. To many, however, and the enforcers of Stillwater Prison in particular, their oaths were so much empty words.

And I took exception to that.

Striding out, a few more enforcers came, running around the corner, the first one shot dead before he could even stop, the second when he did, and the last one as he turned to flee. The second guard wasn't actually dead, struggling to his feet, but a kick knocked him backwards, and a thrust to the neck, just under the helmet, punched through the leather armor. Yanking out my blade, I ignored the gurgling as I kept going, reaching the elevator.

Reopening the portal, I popped my magazine, loading a new one, and leaned through. "Reload this, please," I requested of Powder, handing the empty one to her. "And I'd appreciate it if you could take off a fist-sized block of explosive."

She accepted the empty, asking, "Mine or yours?"

I glanced at the hundred or so pounds I had left, and what tactics I could employ with it. "Yours. I have a feeling we'll need to ration it. But make two." She nodded, and I leaned back out. I entered the lift, toggling the comms, stating, "R-8-S-T."

"What floor?" came the reply, even as alarms started to sound.

"What floor are we mustering on?" I questioned.

There was a pause. "You, you don't know?"

Which meant it was probably standardized. And I needed a lie to cover for it. "I'm still waking up, and can't remember the exact number. What floor?"

"But you should sti-" the elevator operator started to argue.

"Take me to the correct floor," I commanded, throat burning a little.

Another pause. "S-sure," he replied, sounding anything but. "And it's twelve. Everybody's getting together on floor twelve."

Readying myself, I set the portal to open, but waited until we stopped, the app not working well with small moving spaces. The second I reached my destination, the doors opening, I spotted a dozen enforcers in various states of preparedness, the eyes of several widening, even as one went for his rifle.

I shot him dead, hitting the one behind him as I opened and stepped through the off-angle portal, taking the first ball, pushing a detonator into it, setting it for three seconds, arming it, and tossing it through so it'd land among the others, closing the portal for four seconds. Taking the second explosive, I armed that one too, tossed it through the reopened portal, then reclosed it.

After that detonation, I leaned out of the once again open portal, gun in hand, but the Enforcers were dead or down, and I stepped back into the elevator, then out into the room, finishing the job.

Walking through, making sure they were dead, I spotted a duty roster, scanning it for names, or, more specifically, numbers. I'd read somewhere that officer to inmate ratios were anywhere between 1:4 and 1:10, which, from what I could guesstimate the number of prisoners as, especially since Stillwater wasn't known for its rehabilitation program, meant there were quite a few still left.

Reading it, I saw I'd already taken out a good chunk, but there was still work to do.

Opening the portal, I leaned in, handed Powder my empty magazine, accepted the full one, requested another grenade be made, and continued.

​

Cragit sat in his cell, wondering what the hell was going on. The alarms had gone off twice now, guards running by, looking more worried every time they passed. He, and the others in the cells, had asked what was happening, but the enforcers had gone from yelling at them to shut up, to not responding at all, which... wasn't good.

Sitting on his cot, he had nothing to do but listen, perking up when he heard the elevator opening, a couple halls away, followed by gunfire, then the sounds of running boots. He was surprised to see it was an enforcer, who, another gunshot going off, dropped with a muffled scream right in front of his cell.

Then there was only the sound of another set of footsteps, too soft to be boots, or even shoes, slow, and unhurried. There were gasps from the other prisoners, and a muttered prayer, but Cragit didn't know what was going on until the shooter stepped into view, and then he understood.

The dim, yet harsh lighting of the prison often seemed to distort things, but the man's eyes literally glowed, as the enforcer tried to struggle to his feet. The attacker lifted a pistol, unlike any Cragit had ever seen, splattered with glowing blood, and pointed it at the back of the enforcer's head. The enforcer's helmeted head. And then the gunman pulled the trigger, only instead of deflecting off the metal, like what should've happened, the front of the enforcer's faceplate shattered, gore pouring out as the guard slumped, dead.

Then the man reached inside his coat for a second, before pulling off a part of his gun and tossing it into the air, where it vanished, as if it never existed, only for it to reappear, flying back at him a moment later, the brass of alchemical charges now glinting in the dark light, which the man slammed back into the bottom of the gun.

"Hey!" Raslin, in the cell opposite of Cragit, called, the Mage, because what else could he be, turning to look at him. "What're ya doin'?"

The Mage paused, before pronouncing, in a tone that cut through Cragit like a shiv through flesh, "Justice."

Raslin laughed at that, a bit nervously. "Well, killin' enforcers kinda seems like goin' the wrong way 'bout it, not that you're gonna see me complainin'! How 'bout you let me out, and I'll lend ya a hand?"

Cragit blinked, having to shake his head at the man's balls, but, if it worked?

The Mage regarded Raslin for a long moment, then demanded, "What was your crime?"

"I ki-" the other man started to say, before stopping himself. "They said I killed somebody, but they were just pinnin' it on me! I'm innocent! Let me out an' I'll show you I'm a good guy! Great even!"

Which was complete load of shit, but, as the Mage just stared, Cragit wondered if he'd buy it.

He didn't.

"Do not lie. Tell me. What was your crime?"

"I killed some dumb kid," Raslin admitted, eyes wide, panicked, as if he hadn't wanted to say that, but couldn't stop. "How was I supposed to know he was sumpin' it! No one cared about the others, I axed, so how's it my fau-"

Bang

Raslin fell to the ground, dead.

The Mage turned around, and regarded Cragit. "And you?"

"I," he didn't mean to talk, but couldn't stop himself. "I roughed up a couple assholes, stole a bit, normal undercity shit. Broke the nose of someone that wouldn't take no as an answer from one of Babette's girls. Didn't know he was from Topside."

"Babette?" the figure asked, and only now did Cragit realize the thing he was talking to didn't have a face. Only the impression of cheekbones, a nose, and a jaw, but no mouth at all. And then he noticed that its coat had ribs.

"Y-yeah, Babette," he nodded, the Mage, if it was a Mage, standing perfectly still. Unnaturally still. "She, uh, runs the, you know, cathouse?"

"And for that, you ended up here?" it pressed.

"Well, that, and, when they tried to arrest me, I knocked one of the enforcers on his ass," Cragit admitted. "Or three. I'm kinda an angry drunk," he shrugged, wondering if he was about to die.

However, the Mage holstered his pistol, pulled out a key, and tried it on the lock, but it didn't work. Putting it away, the faceless man turned and stepped into thin air, disappearing completely.

"... Uh, are you there?" the prisoner asked after a moment. "Just, uh, invisible?"

There was no response.

A moment later it walked out of the air, holding a small, bone-white blob, with an obsidian-black piece sticking out.

"Cover your head," it commanded, which Cragit did, confused.

A moment later there was an ear-ringing Crack, and, peering through his fingers, he saw the lock on his cell had been torn open, the bit of white gone. Some sorta explosive?

"You're free. Free others that are here unjustly. Kill false enforcers. Live well," it commanded. "Hopefully we will never meet again."

The dark figure walked away, with slow, measured, unhurried steps, as Cragit hesitantly moved to the doorway, peering out, and watching it stride off. "Are, are you a Mage?" he called after it. He'd heard they were nothing but trouble, that they only cared about themselves, and that there weren't any in Piltover. But this one seemed alright.

It paused, turning to look at him with one glowing green eye.

"No. I'm not. I'm a... visitor, to this world. A servant of Death. One who does not like what he sees. And seeks to rectify it. Now, you have your task."

The prisoner stood, watching, as the spirit reached the stairs, then pulled out the same key as before, and used it to unlock the door, leaving it open as he moved on. Ducking down, the prisoner grabbed the cell-key from the dead enforcer, along with the guard's weapon, and moved down a few cells, over to Hurst's, quickly unlocking it. The skinny man inside was staring at his friend with a little fear, and a crapton of confusion.

Cragit smiled back, feeling... purposeful. "You heard the shade! Time to get to work!"

​

I approached the last one, who begged for his life. "You, you said if I helped you, I'd be safe!" the elevator operator begged.

"And you promised to uphold the law. Have you?" I inquired.

The man was able to resist my Song, but not able to lie directly, which was answer enough. "Honor is only for the honorable," I informed him, but unlike what he and his did to others, the coward's death was quick.

Mad dogs weren't to be tortured, only put down.

Turning around, I saw a crowd had gathered behind me, though they quickly backed away. The first one I'd freed stepped forward, and asked, "What now?"

"Do as I said, so we do not meet again," I told him. Would leading a prison break cause problems? Probably. Were all the ones around me here for as banal a reason as their leader? Almost assuredly not. Would this have knock-on effects? Definitely.

Did I care?

Not.

One.

Bit.

Walking through the crowd, they followed me out, and I reached the top of the steps leading down to the waterline. Breaking into a sprint, I leapt off the top, summoning my hoverboard underneath me and taking off, riding a trail of glowing green over the waters, and back to Zaun.

Landing on the top level, I dropped off the board, dismissing it, stumbling a little, dead tired, but my task was almost finished.

Stepping Home, I sighed, Powder at the ready to catch another magazine, and I shook my head. "It's done," I said, closing my eyes, releasing the last of my anger, tiredness wrapping me in leaden chains, but I could handle it. It was an effort to open them again, but I needed to get closer to home.

I'd warned my mother that I might be late, and it wasn't too bad, yet, but I needed to get back to her house. I really need to get my own place, I thought, as it'd allow me to excuse calling it an early night without making it to my registered address.

"I'm just gonna move the entrance a bit more, then go to sleep," I told my small partner. "You were a great help, Powder. I'm not sure I could've done this without you."

The girl nodded, staring as I took off my jacket, eyes widening as I hissed in pain. "You're hurt!"

"Just a bit battered," I replied, identifying a bruised rib, maybe cracked, but recovery time on Runeterra was maybe half of that which I was used to, possibly less, and I'd be fine without medical attention, though I'd look a mess for a bit. At least I'd avoided any face-shots, and my gloves had protected my hands, not all of the enforcers as easy to kill as the first few dozen.

As I'd suspected, though, I really needed to get better blunt-force armoring before I tried something like this again.

"Can, can I help?" the girl asked plaintively.

"... sure. Just let me shower first," I told her, and she nodded energetically. Glancing down, at her own blood-encrusted clothing, thankfully just secondary transfer from hugging me, I added, "And shower and change yourself. We're both more than a little dirty."

She followed me upstairs, heading into her own room while I went into mine, stripping and cleaning the bits of blood that'd soaked through my disguise off my skin, my chest and arms a mottled mess.

I really need to learn how to fight, I thought, my own meager skills not enough, as I'd been running off surprise, intimidation, anger, and portal tactics, but even then it hadn't been clean, easy, or as one-sided a victory as I would've liked. Getting out and dressing, I left my shirt off, swinging by the medical bay to grab some bandages and bruise-cream.

Checking on Violet, she was out cold, but otherwise unchanged from when I'd left her.

Walking back, I ran into Powder, who was looking for me, and let her help me apply the salve, before I wrapped myself up and shrugged on a shirt and jacket. Leaving her behind, I stepped onto the streets of upper Zaun, into an empty alley.

From there, it was a steady path back across the bridge, and up into Piltover, not bothering with a secondary change of outfit before I made it back to my mother's estate, my room, then back Home.

Stepping through the portal one last time, I found Powder was still there, waiting for me.

Smiling, mussing up her hair a little, I stumbled my way upstairs to my room, and practically fell into bed, still fully clothed, grunting as I tried to kick my shoes off, but the workboots were laced up, and I couldn't.

I froze as I felt something grab them, a moment later noting small hands as they quickly unlacing them, and removing them.

"Thanks," I murmured sleepily, already halfway out of it.

"Jayce?" Powder asked, moving up to my side. "Can, can I sleep with you tonight?"

Right. Today's been kinda rough, I thought, though the ideas were slow, like I was dredging them through sludge. "Sure," I slurred and she quickly scampered onto the large bed. "Shoes off. Other side. This one's hurt."

I blinked, and by the time I was done, she was already on my other side. I weakly lifted a hand, summoning my phone, and set an alarm, dropping it beside me, as my eyelids were dragged back down.

Okay.

Still Plan M.

M-ish.

Close enough.

Chapter Twelve

Consciousness returned, and with it a symphony of aches and pains commenced. Unfortunately, the shot of healing that'd taken my internals from 'hit hard enough to die' to 'can run about getting into gunfights' had long since been spent, dropping me back to Runeterran standard, which, while better than the long recovery times I could expect back on Earth, still took longer than the seven hours I'd been out.

Trying to get up, I found the task unexpectedly difficult, as Powder, still asleep next to me, was hanging on to my shirt pretty tightly. It was hard to get a good look at her, with her head buried into my side, my arm having wrapped around her while I'd been out, but, while I wanted to just go back to sleep, I had too much to do.

Though the list was, thankfully, getting ever shorter.

Grateful for the Piltovan proclivity for button-down tops, I was able to unfasten mine and slide out of it, even as the girl clutched onto the fabric with a worried groan, stuffing a pillow into it as Powder held on tight to it, hugging the shirt-covered cushion to herself.

Slowly making my way to my bathroom, grabbing a new set of clothes so I could change inside, I hissed a little at the pain as I unwrapped my bandages, the red and purple blotches shifted to mostly blue with some green edging. Healing, but nowhere close to healed.

More than my injuries, I still felt tired, not having recovered from the other effects of my cleansing of Stillwater. People liked to say that anger is a double-edged sword, but it was obvious that anyone who said that had never used a double-edged sword, as, honestly, they were just more useful than a single-edged blade. Katanas, cutlasses, and so on were only practical if one had ample room to swing them in full arcs.

Yes, I knew it was a metaphor, but it was a shit one.

No, Anger was a blade without a hilt, that may or may not also be on fire. If you were careful, you could use it, donning a metaphorical glove, but it was a protection made of will and self-control, and one that took its toll even if it didn't fail, my tightly held anger not able to 'cut' me. Or maybe what I was now experiencing was it cutting, or... okay, that metaphor still needed work, but it was better than something that said Anger was unreservedly good, and thus easily misunderstood.

In that state of crystalline focus, I could move faster and respond with a surety I normally couldn't, priorities in mind with no room left for any thought other than achieving my goal, but, while it wasn't the hysteric strength that'd let a housewife lift a car off her children, it utilized the same mechanics, and left me sore for days afterwards.

But, given some of the times in the past I'd had to use it, it'd let me still be alive to be sore, so worth it. However, that fact didn't make it hurt any less now, my body having to heal both the injuries I'd taken, as well as my strained muscles and ligaments, and it was registering its complaints with management, at length.

Sooo glad today's Friday, I thought, Runeterra keeping the same weekly, and monthly, schedule as Earth, down to the names, which made no sense. The days of the week on Earth were named after the planets, which in turn were named after the Norse/Greek gods, which is why we had Sun's day, Moon's day, Tiu's day, Woden's day, Thor's day, Frigg's day, and Saturn's Day. Months made even less sense, as they were all Latin/Roman in origin, like January being named after Janus, god of beginnings, transitions, and endings; April named after the word aperire, which meant 'to open', because that's what the flowers did; and July just outright named after Julius Caesar, who didn't exist here.

But apparently we had the not-Norse in the area known as Freljord, land of eternal ice and snow; Mount Targon, which was like Greece, only if the entire country was situated on the slopes of Mount Olympus; and Noxus was Rome by way of Germany, and so it had doubled up on those group's tendency to conquer everything around them. It was Noxus who'd set up the Runeterran Calendar, which fit the Latin naming scheme, so I guessed it wasn't too far-fetched, but Cross-Dimensional Psychic Harmonization was likely a factor here, the increased Mana levels, combined with how... loose some of the dimensional barriers were, having been the true culprit.

Either way, it just made things easier on me, as the imposition of the five-day work week wasn't really a thing until the early 1900's, but it existed here in the pseudo-Victorian not-England of Piltover, and thus granted me two days of free-time to help Violet, and to heal.

Violet.

Damn, there was a whole mess of guilt, and blame, and anger that I couldn't afford to indulge in right now. She'd need time to heal, time she now had. I'd gotten her out. I'd done what was smart with the information that I had. My actions in regards to her had been unilaterally good, and a flat improvement over the trajectory of canon, which I was not to blame for.

If only I could believe that.

Sighing, I turned off the shower, one of the many, many perks of this place being an infinite supply of hot water, but that also meant I couldn't use it running out as a timer for my rumination. Drying off and getting dressed, I quietly left the bathroom, Powder still out of it, and headed for the medical bay. First order of business was applying a new layer of healing salve to my wounds. Slathering it onto my back, where I'd been shot almost point-blank by a hiding enforcer, was a little more difficult on my own.

Thankfully, no one had gone for my head, which had lacked any kind of blunt-force protections, but the shots to my back, even if they didn't pierce my armor, had still hurt like a bitch. Thankfully, I'd thrown a segmented metal ridge down my spine, so the hits to there had bounced right off, but I'd need far better armor before I tried anything like this again.

Using the remote application tool, which was pretty much just a double-length metal ruler, I got everything covered in medical ointment and bandaged up, before turning my attention to Violet, who, from the faint smell, needed it.

While the Company's knockout drug was safe, putting someone into the equivalent of a medical coma was still putting them into the equivalent of a medical coma, which meant that biological processes still functioned, with zero conscious control over them, and that led to predictable, messy results.

With great care, I shifted her, giving her a quick sponge-bath, changing out her bandages, and replacing the sheets for an... unspoiled set. Tossing the fouled linens in the disposal bin, I had to shake my head at the process, the House getting rid of them by dumping them into the multiversal space which it sat in.

The marketing material called these Sweet Homes 'Islands In The Sea Of Time', which wasn't exactly inaccurate, but wasn't true either. All dimensions were bubbles in the eternal sea of the Blind, Screaming Eternities, where the answer to every question was simultaneously yes and no, and, without proper protections, you'd die instantly, as the questions of who you were, what you were, and did you even exist were simultaneously yes and no as well, and thus effectively null, destroying you utterly.

It was from this primordial chaos that new matter, in a state of such flux that even looking at it would set it off, was collected for the Home, to replenish its stocks of food and materials, though not in industrial amounts. It was into that environment that waste was dumped, to prevent any kind of 'go through your trash to get your documents/biologicals/etc. in order to control you' shenanigans. And anything that could latch onto the outside of your pocket dimension and grab it before it was gone was strong enough that it didn't need to do that in order to get to you.

So, essentially, doing what I was to these soiled linens was the equivalent of buying a new car when my current one ran out of gas, but I had the resources to waste, and the reserves could only hold so much proto-matter at any given time.

But hey, no laundry!

That left the problem of what to do about the girl. My first instinct was to wake her now, but that was stupid, for several reasons. First of all, she was still healing, and resting right now was the best thing she could do, any running, fighting, etc. more likely to tear open still-healing wounds. Second was that, from what little I knew from my Seminars, keeping her out like this would help create psychological distance from the event. It was more phrased in a 'knock them out after capture to let the Stamp-set, and to make them more amenable to their new situation' way, but the base concept was the same.

The third was simple.

I had to leave.

I'd somewhat lucked out with Powder, who'd taken things, not exactly well, but without any major freakouts, and I hadn't realized the possible emotional issues until I'd already gotten home from work, though they, too, hadn't been too bad. I would not get similar results from Violet, who might not even remember what'd happen, trauma-based memory loss a thing, let alone the possibility of full-blown Dissociative Amnesia, though, again, from how she'd ended up after the time-skip, I probably wouldn't be dealing with that.

Or maybe I would be, and she'd broken that first week, then stabilized, in the next seven years, unbeknownst to the audience.

Regardless, the earliest it would be smart to wake her up would be tomorrow, which meant she needed another IV, this one just to replenish fluids lost through basic things like respiration and so on, though, thankfully, it wasn't that hard to get the drip set up, something more complex like a feeding tube only required if she was going to be out for a week or more.

Pausing on my way out, I moved back to the girl, taking a moment to comb her messy hair, telling her, "Rest, and recuperate, Vi. You and Powder are safe now, and the people that did this to you dead."

It was stupid, and shouldn't've done anything, but I felt just a little bit better.

Leaving her, I turned off the lights, heading downstairs to start cooking breakfast. When I was almost done, about to go get Powder, she came ambling in, holding Flopsy Hoppingsworth (the Third). The look she gave me flitted between several emotions, from relief, to worry, to something that almost looked accusatory, before finally settling on slightly guarded neutrality. "I, I left your shirt on the bed."

"That's fine," I nodded, gesturing for the table, and she took a seat. "I have to go to work, but I'll have the next two days after that off," I informed her, the girl perking up.

"Then, then could we spend them together?" she inquired, and I nodded again, the girl grinning widely as I plated breakfast.

There was silence as we ate, and I downed my, hopefully not customary, mug of espresso, sighing as I finished. "Okay, what else. Violet's okay, still healing, and everything looks okay there. I'll be keeping her out today, but we can wake her up tomorrow morning."

Powder paused, mid-bite, slowly finishing before asking, staring down at her plate, "Do, do we have to?"

I considered the question. "We don't have to, but it should be sooner rather than later," I slowly articulated. "Why shouldn't we do it tomorrow?"

She didn't answer at first, and I checked the time. While I should leave in the next few minutes, I had a window of a good half-an-hour before I'd truly be late, so instead I leaned back, waiting.

"Can we have a day, that's just, just us?" she enquired, looking up at me with wide, pleading eyes. "You keep having to leave. And..."

However, she didn't continue, just looked back down, so I asked gently, "Powder, what are you worried about? I promise I won't judge."

The girl still hesitated, but I didn't Sing, just gave her time.

"It's stupid!" she finally announced.

Reaching over, I put a hand on her shoulder, and she looked back up at me. "Emotions usually are. Doesn't make them not real. Not valid. Just as long as they don't rule you. So, what is it?"

"... I'm worried you won't come back," Powder murmured, looking away.

"Okay," I nodded, without reservation.

"O...Okay?" she questioned, looking back at me in disbelief.

"Okay," I repeated. "It's not rational, but it's completely understandable. The only way I'd leave you is if I was dead, Powder, and I've now done everything dangerous that I'd planned, and hopefully everything dangerous for the foreseeable future. However, that also isn't something that would be solved by letting your sister sleep for another day. So, Powder, why do you want me to put waking her up off an extra day or two?"

This pause was longer, and when she replied, she wouldn't meet my eye. "Vi hates me."

"And you want an extra day before you have to face her," I nodded, getting it, receiving a wince and a dispirited nod of her own in response. "Powder, trust me on this. It's better to find out earlier, then to torture yourself with 'what if's. Trust me, I've done it enough times, and not knowing is always worse than finding out."

I sighed, running through the mental models. "Worst case scenario, she hates you just as much as you're afraid of, and wants nothing to do with you. I'll make sure she's healed, and give her enough money to go somewhere else, just like I said I would."

"What, what if she wants to leave. Wants to take me with her?" the blue-haired girl proposed worriedly.

"Do you want to leave?" I questioned in turn, getting a frantic head-shake no from Powder. "Then, to put it bluntly, she'd be shit out of luck, given that the only way back to Runeterra is through a gate that I control. And, while she's probably a better fighter than I am, she's not that much better.

"You'd do that? You'd fight for me?" Powder asked, eyes shiny, visage vulnerably hopeful.

I smiled confidently, "I did the day you came here. I was ready to face down Silco's gang, what was left of it, to get you to safety. What makes you think I'd stop now?"

Her matching smile was hesitant, but gained in strength, and her lunging hug was, by now, expected, and I caught her easily, deflecting her away from the cracked rib, and biting down to smother the gasp of pain as she still managed to hit some of my bruises. "Then, let's wake her up tomorrow," Powder told me, holding on tightly. "Are, are you doing anything tonight?"

Seeing where she was going, I shook my head. "No, I'm free this evening. I'll make dinner, and you can tell about your day, and about how Chemtech works. Sound like a plan?"

She nodded, and this time, when I left for Runeterra, Powder waved goodbye with a broad smile on her face, holding her bunny so Flopsy could wave as well.

​

Entering the workshop, I wasn't early, but I wasn't exactly late either, and I waved to the scientist already hard at work on the upgraded proto-matrix I'd explained to him. "Viktor! You're looking better!"

The crippled man looked up at me, stopping his soldering. "Jayce. You're... not."

I hesitated, before I realized that, while covered by my pants, the injuries on my legs probably threw off my gait. "You know when you go too hard, but it takes a few days before you really feel sore?" He nodded. "Turns out it applies to injuries too!"

Viktor sighed, shaking his head. "You could have taken the day off, you know."

"I'll take tomorrow off," I disagreed. "Besides, you were going to fire this bad boy up, right?" He hesitated, which was answer enough, so I smiled, teasing him a little. "I thought I was supposed to be the reckless one here."

"It should be perfectly safe," the scientist argued.

"Should be," I echoed meaningfully. "And between the two of us, I'm the one best suited to stopping it if things start to go wrong."

Viktor frowned, his eyes dipping to my legs for a moment. "I assure you; I am capable."

"What?" I questioned, not getting it for a second, having not considered the fact the man was a cripple before speaking. "Oh. No. I meant that my experience means I'm more likely to recognize the signs of hexite crystal destabilization, and stop an explosion, or at least toss it into the safety corner."

There was a moment of awkward silence, the other man looking away, pale cheeks reddening slightly in embarrassment. "Ah. Uh. Yes. That. Is such a destabilization likely?"

"No," I shrugged, walking over, checking his construction. "But this is something literally no one on this planet has ever done before. It should go off without a hitch, but, if hitches happen, better that there's two of us here. Actually," I looked up at the man. "Proposed, I don't know, lab rule? Let's not use the hexite crystals here unless both of us are present. Carving and construction is fine, but using the experimental, poorly understood, highly temperamental bits of crystallized Mana should merit a... spotter, so to speak."

Viktor looked at me skeptically, "And you will not use it without me either?"

Lifting an eyebrow, I pointed out, "Kind of a shitty rule if it only applies one way."

"That's not a no," the scientist observed.

"That's a no, combined with an obviously," I countered, finishing my inspection. "Now, since I'm here, let's finish this up and see if this will work, or will blow us both to kingdom come!"

Soon enough, it was ready, and Viktor clicked the dial while I opened the windows, just in case, not remembering which part created the overpressure, then suction effect that nearly killed them both as glass shards became flying knives. The outside casing of the proto-matrix spun, the mana from the hexite crystal running through it, creating a rising harmonic that built up more and more activated energy, crackles of blue-white lightning forking out from the crystal and grounding themselves on the spinning frame.

Part of me worried, as this kind of cascading effect had been exactly the kind of thing Jayce would abort his experiments over, and I was acutely aware of just how much energy was contained within the Hexite, energy that was priming itself to leave, at speed.

Faster and faster the proto-matrix spun, the air inside our laboratory twisting like a miniature cyclone, blowing notes about, the wind thick with Mana, until, finally, like entering the eye of a hurricane, the buildup dropped off, the rapidly rotating frame slowing to lazy revolutions, glowing, jittering formations of energy surrounding the crystal, but with no discernable pattern. Vague two-dimensional polygons seemed to dance, forming and coming apart, though that might've just be me trying to make sense of what I was seeing.

The hexite crystal itself was slowly spinning in the air over the housing that originally held it secure, and Viktor, with a grin, asked me, "Alright! What's next?"

"That's simple," I told him, hitting the switch, causing the crystal to power down, and drop back into its holder, the energy dispersing. "We do this about a dozen more times to make sure it's safe."

From the scientist's expression, you'd think I kicked his puppy. "But, but, don't you want to see if your creation works?"

"Viktor," I smiled, "we have six months to make this work. We can spend an hour or two perfecting this step before we do it in front of the ruling Council of Piltover. There's all sorts of things that could go wrong, that we wouldn't know about, having never done this before, and could cause this to explode in front of the people who might decide, 'Yeah, I know we said six months, but now we agree with Heimerdinger and this is too dangerous'."

The chances of them actually doing so were slim to none, especially with my Song, but, honestly, this was just common-sense stress testing, and it was best to start as I meant to go on.

"Yes, no, you are correct," Viktor allowed, still disappointed, but nodding in understanding, looking at me with small smile, "But I get to hit the button."

"I'll need to do so once, to make sure that doesn't somehow change things, but sure, you can hit the button," I agreed, rolling my eyes, and getting a chuckle from the man.

As I suspected might happen, the fifth time we activated the hexite crystal, Heimerdinger just 'happened to drop by', opening the door unannounced, freezing, eyes wide as the energy buildup hit a fever pitch, only to, once again, stabilize itself. I looked over the light patterns forming around the charged crystal, which weren't visibly different than the previous four times, and nodded to Viktor, who hit the switch, depowering the proto-matrix once more.

"Good morning, Councilman Heimerdinger," I noted, my partner's head snapping over to see the intruding Yordle. "As I promised, no explosions, yet, and when we try something that might get that way, we'll send someone to warn you."

"What, what is this?" the Dean asked, frowning.

I shrugged, "Step one: the stabilization of the hexite crystal in its activated state, before it can be used for more sustained uses than what you saw yesterday. We've gotten it up and running, and now we're stress testing the activation process to make sure there are no unforeseen variable that may cause problems."

Heimerdinger stared at the hexite for a moment, before he tore his eyes away, nodding. "Yes, yes, good. Such safety measures are something that you should have considered sooner, young man! I am glad that my assistant is already a positive influence on you."

Said man frowned, and started to disagree, "Actually, it-"

But I cut him off, "I wasn't lying about appreciating a different outlook. If nothing emerges in the next half a dozen tests, we'll move onto step two, which might cause an overpressure issue, though not a true explosion, in the 'blast wave that causes damage' way."

"Only half a dozen?" the Yordle questioned, aghast, "No, no that is far too few! Better a dozen. Two dozen would be even better!"

I sighed, visibly annoyed, watching the Councilman, and seeing the disapproval in his eyes that I was aiming for. "Two dozen tests it is," I shrugged resignedly.

The small, hairy being grinned, almost preening. "I know you think it unnecessary, my boy, but such things cannot be rushed!"

I nodded, frowning, "Sure. In that case we'll, again, if nothing happens, be doing stage two after lunch, now, I guess, so this is the warning of future explosions you requested. Is there any other way we can assist you, Councilman?"

"No," the little being smiled self-indulgently, spinning on his heel and heading out the door, tossing over his shoulder, "Keep up the good work, the both of you!"

I noted that the little shit didn't even bother to close the door behind him after he left, and held a finger up to my lips as Viktor started to speak, motioning for him to start the next activation sequence. He narrowed his eyes in a confused look, but nodded, hitting the switch while I shut the door. After the crystal stabilized itself, again, I checked it, labelling it test 6/24, under 5/12.

Using the humming of the activated hexite as a white-noise generator, I looked to my partner. "Yeah, expected that."

"But, he was incorrect," the scientist observed. "Why did you not tell him the truth? I would've corroborated your statement."

"And that would've gotten us what, exactly?" I questioned in turn, lifting an eyebrow. "Heimerdinger believes me the loose cannon, and you the moderating influence. Disabusing him of that notion would likely not result in him understanding he'd been wrong about you, despite working with you for years, Viktor, and about me, despite his initial judgement, a judgement strong enough to see me instantly expelled without understanding my work. No, it's far more likely that, instead, he'd come to the conclusion that I'd somehow convinced you to lie for me, as, while that would make you regrettably weak and ill-suited to work as my minder, it would also mean that he was still right. This way he sees me as cowed, and you as a proper stand-in for himself, and, hopefully, will back the fuck off as we continue."

Viktor stared at me for a long moment, before sighing and looking away. "I feel as if you are being overly harsh to the Dean."

"Possibly," I shrugged, "but probably not. Unlike him I'm open to being wrong, if presented with convincing evidence. Until then, do you see anything different with the hexite this time around?" I questioned, and my partner looked over it curiously, before shaking his head. "Me neither," I stated, motioning for the button, which he dutifully hit, powering the proto-matrix back down.

"Okay," I nodded, "test seven out of twenty-four. Hopefully we can get these squared away before lunch, because I really want to see if I'm right about step two, but now, if we skip these, Heimerdinger'll probably be even more of a nuisance."

Viktor grimaced, obviously wanting to disagree, but didn't, hitting the button to, once more, power up the crystallized Mana.