Nope. Instant nope. "No way, I would never!"
"Ekko, m'boy, you need to use your shimmer lab. Miss Jinx can touch any shimmer produced, and well, to use her own phrase, jinx it for you. The people who buy, will buy no more," Heimerdinger tried to convince him. "Once you have Jinx in your employment, they will trust it."
What? "Jinx. Under my employment. Of my shimmer factory." He looked at the letter. "The Firelights shimmer factory? You really expect me to set the Firelights up like this?!"
Not to mention, he brought a ton of Firelights to help. They were yelling towards Heimerdinger too. "No way, never," Ekko made that clear. "The Firelights will never stand for shimmer." His group yelled in agreeance.
"Ekko, Lad! You've got six months, a full factory, and people that you can explain things to! The one you can't, is Miss Jinx. That is what the letter is for. Edited by Sevika, and handwritten by a professional forger, letters from Silco to Miss Jinx."
"Jinx couldn't stay in control," Ekko pointed out harshly, once again the Firelights agreeing. "Look. Paper is one thing, she is-"
"Still under control," Dr. Swords interrupted him, still holdinging Shield's body. "Medicine is still running through her. We can adjust the time she takes it if necessary. Thinking it's the past will make her swing in different directions, true, but that two years of meds and . . ." he paused, not wanting to say it in front of the kid. "And professional talking." It was still enough that Cake knew what it was, and she cried even more. "It's still in there. Everything is just an illusion, but that's real."
"Without using your shimmer factory, and Miss Jinx's connections, you are going to do this how?" Heimerdinger pointed out. "You can't take the younger version of her, she isn't a base. You can't take Powder-Jinx, she isn't a base. The only one who can convert is that Miss Jinx."
"It'll work," Sevika said to Ekko. "I know how Silco writes, how he acted, and how he addressed her. We just gotta tell her that he's laying low instead of dead. If she doesn't want to cooperate? All you gotta do, is threaten to give an assignment to me instead. She'll bend over backwards for you."
"But a shimmer factory? I would never, and she knows that."
"There was a big war," Sevika tried convincing him again. "The Firelights are starving."
"Then we'd starve!" A Firelight yelled out loud off the cuff.
Sevika ignored the outburst. "You took the gift in desperation to save your people. That's what shimmer was for, to be an industry to keep us going."
Ugh. "She won't believe that from me."
"Who does she know better, you or Silco?" Sevika pointed out. "You were kids together. Cute. Silco was her life for many years. He raised her. Get pouty and keep making that face all you want. She probably knows the customers, the locations, the dropoffs and more. She was even trying to get hextech for him. Hell, I wouldn't be surprised if he was raising her to take over for him one day."
"Ksh!" He didn't want to hear that.
"He did leave her the factories. You got one. You can't deny it."
"Ff!" He exhaled.
"And that anger? Is exactly what you'll need to deal with Jinx."
Ekko looked down at Jinx in his arms. He reached her once, but she was at a . . . different kind of precipice when he did that. He did have the Z drive with Jinx, and it was a lifesaver. He did still have it. Now I know why Heimerdinger wanted to remake it.
"It's true," Heimerdinger agreed. "You'll start soft with Little Miss Jinx and hard as nails with Miss Jinx. Eventually, you will flip around between them, until . . ."
"She's fixed."
"No," Heimerdinger said. "There is no 'fixed' when it comes to her. She can be herself again, Miss Jinx, like she was a few minutes ago before this whole mess."
"Before she's Pajamas again," Ekko corrected himself.
"Ekko." Vi threw in her two bits. "You can't do that."
Exactly, I can't! Somebody had their head on straight. Actually, everyone there did except Heimerdinger and Sevika.
"It would ruin your whole reputation, and that isn't what Powder would have wanted," Vi said.
Ooh, he felt PJ twitching again. Hopefully she didn't change yet.
No, those soft eyes weren't hard yet. "What happened to me?" She looked around. "Why are you holding me?"
Oh. Uh?
Then her eyes definitely got that sharp quality to them. "Shields!"
Hearing the name, Cake started to cry harder again.
"You've got to be careful, he made you kind of brittle," Ekko warned her. He watched her doctor whispering in her ear. Probably explaining it better. Now that she was up, maybe they could get her some power.
She looked toward Swords and then Cake.
"You need to stay still," Ekko warned her. "Your power is like ten in your arms, neck, and legs." He thought it would be like an overall power control, but this guy could get so specific.
"Do you want me to hold you, Powder?"
Oh yeah, Vi just had to butt in. Now was really not the time. PJ had been close to Shields and Cake. All she wanted to do was probably . . . yeah . . . those eyes tell it all. She wanted to get over there and be there for her. That was desperation.
"Are you okay, Powder?" Vi asked her.
Her eyes were so intense. They didn't care one bit that she was being held like a fragile doll, her whole focus was on Cake.
"You still have one," Sword said to her.
"Yeah. We can still . . . cut the Cake," she said hoarsely. "I fucking hate you, Sword."
She wanted to reach, but Ekko had to stop that. "Don't move. Until we get your power figured out, don't move much, okay?"
"Dr. Jinx," Heimerdinger said for some reason to her. "It's good to see you again."
PJ moved her head slightly to look at him. "Heimerdinger."
"We've got thousands of containers," Sevika said from behind them. "Enough to pull off this charade and hopefully cure some of these people."
"If we got really good at it, we could go back and cure most of them," Heimerdinger said. "Not all though. Not all. Some of them go because they can't live on their own for long."
PJ was starting to move, she was forgetting again.
"Vi." She called for her sister.
Okay. "You've gotta be really careful with her," Ekko warned her. "She is super fragile, Vi, a tough hug could break her arm."
Vi didn't answer back, just stroked her hair. "It's okay, Powder. I'm right here."
"I need power."
"No you don't," Heimerdinger said. "You need to stay exactly as you are. No power until you are supposed to take it. You are in a difficult transition, we do not want to mess this up."
Damn.
"What happened?" she asked. "Someone just tell me what happened? I know that . . . what happened?"
"We escaped," Vi said trying to ease into it.
That wasn't what she was wanting though. That's never the way she wanted things. Jinx didn't like easing into things, she wanted to be in the thick of things as soon as possible. "Anatoly's got memory power. He split you into three sort of . . . moments in time. This, as you, PJ, will be a little while Later it'll be Jinx, and then young Powder. Each of those will get the majority of your time."
"Don't divide her like that!" Cake yelled from Vi's grip.
"Normally, they are just names. This time, they aren't. They are what she was called in certain moments in time," Ekko explained to Cake. "It's easier for her to understand this way."
"We could have done this a little slower." Vi wasn't happy with him picking up the speed like that. "We are going to make sure things are okay though, Powder."
"She might fall out of consciousness again," Heimerdinger said. "Say what you think is most important."
"Mph." Vi moved closer. "Powder? I promise. I am going to come and see you everyday. At least an hour, every day."
At least an hour?
"But . . . you have a cure for shimmer inside of you. If it was just you and you when you were smaller. We could handle that, but Jinx is too hard. You want to help restore everything, right?"
Pajamas managed to nod her head once.
"Then. You'll have to face your responsibilities, but I promise, I will get Swords to keep seeing you too. You aren't just going to rot in prison without help."
What? "What?!" No. "Don't worry about that Pajamas, you aren't going anywhere."
"She has to," Vi said to Ekko. "Sevika, you are part of the council. If they know Powder has the cure, it would go out in record time, wouldn't it?"
Sevika snorted. "Yeah. To Piltover. They would drag their feet on Zaun." She glanced at Ekko. "I helped with those letters for a reason. You've got two choices. Her rotting in prison and Piltover using her as it wants to-"
"-it would get out faster, and we only have six months before things get-"
"-or you use her and me, to get you the best clients possible, quickly! Cut the price a certain percentage. New specials. Employ Jinx and use her, don't just lock her up. She will stir the business, get the word out."
Once again, the Firelights booed the hell out of her, and she didn't care.
"Ekko runs a decent group!" Vi shot back toward her. "Okay? He is not Silco. He is not going to suddenly run a shimmer factory and become some chem-baron, okay? We need to be ready as fast as possible."
"They will take care of Piltover first," Sevika warned her. "Factories have slowly been moving into Piltover too, they will take it, curb it up there, and then maybe give something to Zaun. Take care of Zaun instead! Jinx can do it."
"Jinx cannot do it! Okay? If she remembers when she got better! No, when she remembers who she really is, then we could attempt something," Vi tried to reason with her. "Without an actual prison system, nobody can lock up Jinx. No one can hold her back."
"Why would you?" Sevika looked confused. "She can't protect shipments and her boss that way! She doesn't need locked up, that is what the letters are for! She'll protect the shimmer and get it out there, because it's her duty!"
"She's only here for half the time!" Vi continued to fight with Sevika. "She could be out who knows where and doing who knows what! And what if she changes while she is out there too? Weak little Powder on her own."
"Part of her job can be to be somewhere between these and these hours. You add in the stipulatons, it's not hard! Jinx treats it like any other job and then some. Silco was like a father-"
"-Shut up!-"
"- to her, and she does not like to disappoint him! When she did mess up, it's because her head was all topsy turvy, or she was doing something special for him, that made him forgive her afterward."
"Oh, fuck Silco-"
"- Locking her up as Jinx in Piltover's prisons will get you fights each day with guards and eventually killed! Locking her up as Jinx in Zaun? She is gonna break free anyhow."
"Sevika was her partner. I suggest listening to her," Heimerdinger warned Ekko.
"When Jinx has more memories. When she can turn a corner, then fine, we can get her out," Vi reasoned. "I already said that."
"She doesn't need to turn a corner, she just needs to do her job for Silco," Sevika argued again. "I know Jinx!"
"Well I knew my sister for a lot longer!"
"Not that much longer."
"Hey." Pajamas spoke up. "Shut up." She groaned. "More yelling doesn't help Cake."
"Ekko," Heimerdinger called his name. "You can't split one person. Just, be honest to yourself. You are the one to make the call. This will affect everything for the rest of your life though, and hers. I set things up for the best results in all facets."
"I get that," Ekko said to him. "But you forgot one important one. The Firelights would die before we ever bowed to Silco. We put our lives on the line to stop shimmer, and there's nothing, there is no way that that would ever change!"
Everyone cheered and yelled, agreeing with him. Heimerdinger was brilliant, but not for that part.
Yeah, neither Heimerdinger or Sevika looked pleased.
Ekko looked toward Jinx again. "This hair curtain is getting in your face."
She still looked like her whole world fell apart. Well, no. He saw what that look had been when she fought. An image he could never erase. This look though. It wasn't far from it.
Jinx didn't give one shit about their conversation just then. She was focused on what Swords told her. When she woke up again, finding herself in Ekko's arms, and trying to piece what happened together? Swords pointed out two things. One she knew and one she didn't.
The one she knew. She was so overwhelmed that she didn't see it. Though Shields wasn't moving, she wasn't devoid of life yet. People under Anatoly's power always died with their blood becoming like tar and burning out. From their eyes, mouth, ears or all three. Shields had none of that happening, which meant some part of her was alive. She was on the cusp.
The one she didn't. Shields was pregnant. She knew that Swords and her had some kind of tiff about something before she left. He didn't even want to watch Cake for her when she agreed to go to Piltover to support her. Not far along enough to show. Those two actually made a Scabbard.
Screw them. Screw them both! Shields should have told her that! He should have told her that! But? It came down to two things.
Shields was still alive, but she'd be dying soon. She was dying pregnant, no stopping that. A baby though, meant that her power level was messed up. Anatoly didn't know about her pregnancy either. He thought he'd killed her.
Life inside someone messed it up. There was a chance to fix her, but she was losing that baby. Still, it was a chance. Charlotte Kay deserves her momma.
There was something people with Anatoly's magic running through them could do. It would be like a roulette, but she would create the spin with a rapid change in her own power level. Since they couldn't physically manipulate power levels like Anatoly? They had to make due with what they could change.
Swords wanted a finger. He asked it like it would be a big favor. Breaking anything right now was easy though, and there's only one thing she wanted to give. Cake thinks she watched her mom die. She's being held by Vi, and she doesn't even know her. No. Not a finger.