(blue - that's all one can see once the door opens. her hair is loose, so she can rebraid it, and it's a sea of strands and somewhere, lying in it, is jinx with a gun to her hand pointed at the door.
she doesn't know who it is, so it was instinct over thought, until she realizes it's him. it spins around her finger before it goes to the nightstand.
shit.)
See, that's... That's what I was apologizing about.
[ Involuntarily, a flutter of his heart, a beat where he can't control the fear. It's mapped across his face, plain as day. He can't stop it, because he hardly realizes he's doing it, before it's wiped clean. Drug back down underneath the surface of cold water. ]
Come now.
[ He chides, his tone more level than his heartrate. He stepped in, and closed the door behind him. Nobody needed to see that Silco would sit down and braid his daughter's hair (badly) or hug her.
What would that do to a reputation he'd hardly been able to build? ]
You have your instincts for a reason, Jinx. [ It's maybe softer than anyone would ever hear him. Even Jinx rarely gets this tone. ]
Come on, do you want to get cleaned up?
[ Do you want to; a tactic Jinx has heard before. He'd learned early on that he couldn't just tell her to quiet down, he needed to ask her, cajole her. ] I'll help.
(he is right, it's instinctual and by no means unwarranted. like any other zaunite, she has to be tough, to not be weaken, and if someone she doesn't know about enters her personal space, they are met with what makes her a zaunite in the first place.
but she puts the gun down, replaces it with a brush that she just offers him instead. once he sits on the bed, she climbs to his lap, body horizontal to it so her side can rest against his chest.
[ It's all so routine in its own way. They'd done this a million times. It was a different brush, but it didn't matter. It was a different place, but it didn't matter. They were different, but did it matter? She leaned against his chest like she always had β there is no lead in his belly β and her long, long hair is out in waves. ]
We won't talk about home. Tell me something you've seen so far here.
[ He coaxed her into talking, his fingers already cording through her hair, before he started to take the brush to the ends, to start to work his way up. Jinx had always had so much hair, since she was little. It's like a blanket of it, getting all over everything.
Stupid robots, mostly. I've been... Preoccupied, with the whole thing. Do you think we can do it, Silco? Save everything, with them. And don't-- don't get all political here, alright? I know what you think, but we're not talking about home.
(her face sinks a little further into his chest as she speaks, it's another way to ask him to focus. if there's anyone who knows how silco feels about piltover, it's jinx - and her views are not unbiased, she grew up hearing it, she reproduces it. she knows, because she stood by it, even after silco was no longer there to tell her about it.
so, she relaxes into his hold, arms loosely wrapped around him as he deals with the ocean of blue that sprouts from her head.)
[ He opened his mouth automatically, and then closed it.
Well, she knew him, because of course she did.
So he took his time, a few moments of thought, actually stopping and considering. Silco has all of his scripts, after all. The things that he likes to say, the things he does say to manipulate, to cajole, all of that nearly-fifty years of practice in convincing people to actually step up for once in their horrid little lives. ]
I think it will be difficult.
[ He won't lie to her. Not... not about this. He brushes her hair. It's slow and methodical. ]
I think everyone will have to give up something. Even you. [ A sour note. ] Even me. It will require us to put things aside. You know how people are, how we are. They want us to restore the world as it was, and whether it has value or not...
[ He doesn't know what his answer would be, if he was on his own. (i do) Is it worth saving? All of it? The misery, the pain, the suffering? The early deaths and the fact that they had only recently been able to breathe? Even still, the enforcers won't come down without masks. He hates them. He recognizes that at some level, the fact that they are all here together is a feature of what they are trying to do. ]
If we're even saving it. [ He still... there will always be doubt. ] They chose the lot of us on purpose. Likely because it would be hard.
(she wasn't sure what she was waiting for, but definitely not this. perhaps a jab he would give in between crooked lines, a way to slide some snark comment on the type of people they're working with, all things she could recite by heart, eyes closed, no cues.
it doesn't come. in a way, this is as honest and focused as she can get, considering the subject, and the people surrounding it. she'll let him talk, taking in each word, letting his voice fill the air with the sound of bristles through hair as her eyes close in full relaxation.)
... We have to do it, Silco. I'll give up, but if I find out it's bullshit, then I'm taking it back. But, until then, that means we can't kill each other, either.
(if he knows, he knows. stop stabbing vander, sir.)
[ She told him not to get all political... or else he would. ]
We may be forced to. You saw how the Pilties acted in the same room. All the moral high ground, none of the compromise.
[ A sneer, but still he brushes. This was at least normal. ]
As for me, I've been keeping my head down. You should, too, if we want this to work. I'm working on my plans to make this work. I could use your capabilities.
[ He'd always look to her, for that. Does it matter that she shot him with her own inventions? No, he would always forgive it from her, and her only. ]
Don't worry about me, Jinx. I've only been as violent as has been thrown at me. I do not intend to go further.
[ Which means: hey he'll only stab if Vander's attacking him.
... They can't do it without us, so I don't think it will last too long. We got the numbers, anyway. What do you need me to do?
(it's guilt that drives her to ask. the guilt that she didn't follow their plans, the guilt that he wasn't there to guide her through this uprising... and yet, there is no regret. she did what she could, for those who she could still do it for.)
... Don't let me catch you two squabbling like two idiots. Do not.
I need you to be yourself. You're the one who can throw the wrench into the entire thing, challenge them. They don't expect you, so you must continue to be unpredictable. Adept.
[ He pauses in his brushing, only to reach out for her, and hold his hand to her cheek. ] You're perfect, Jinx. Let them see that, and understand that we are the ones that they need. They need to come to our table now.
[ don't get political, she says, but it is as easy as breathing for silco ]
I have been avoiding him, Jinx. I have no interest in it. [ As if he isn't going to give as good as he got. ] Maybe you should be leveling this at the person starting them, instead of me.
[ HE would just as soon ignore him. (he would NOT) ]
(that, she definitely is doing, considering the state of shakey peace that they found themselves in. it's not perfect, and she's waiting for any shoe to drop at any moment, but she couldn't be anyone but herself.
her arms do hold tighter, as if she is too waiting for him to leave her. it had never been his choice, he left out of her own actions, and yet, she knows if this place wishes to, it could take him. it's a silent beg for him to not let it, however that goes.
... but she did tell him not to get political, so she pokes him on the back as a reminder that she told him!!!)
You want me to put both of you on a get-along shirt, Silco? Don't let it escalate, that's what I'm asking. You two can kill each other after we know we're not completely screwed up. Or did you not teach me patience, mhm? Going back on it now?
(she's sure. because while silco might not brandish a knife so openly, nor pull the trigger as easily as she would, his words are as good as any weapon in her arsenal. that's always been his strength, while his muscle? his muscle is here, letting him be horrible at braiding.)
[ His braiding work is never going to be good, exactly, but that's kind of not the point, is it? He starts to pull out the first section, and separate them. He at least knows the principles. ]
Considering he's tried to kill me, threatened me, and stabbed me, do you think I have been amenable to simply taking anything else?
[ To be fair. Silco has stabbed him back. ]
If you talk to him, tell him to stay out of my way, and don't talk to me. Then you'll get your way.
[ Jinx is really getting the child of divorce experience β serving as a communication intermediary. ]
You two are really going to give me a headache. Did you know, Silco? He wrote you a lovey-dovey letter. I found it in the mines.
(there's a hope, albeit small, that this soothes something. a long shot, one of the furthest there can be, but it's there, somewhere.
or it isn't. it most likely isn't, but wasn't she trying to put things back together? if she fucks this up, well. it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, anyway.)
[ The brush catches a snag. His hands don't still in time, and it tugs her hair a bit, before he stopped. ]
What are you talking about? A letter in the mines?
[ No.
Surely not. What did it matter anyway? What words were going to do anything? Silco couldn't imagine anything that wouldn't incense him, because he remembered distinctly what had happened.
Was it an effort to trick him?
It must have been. It was the only real answer. Vander had said he regretted it, but Silco knew better. The man had let him become a specter, a cautionary tale. He'd used his memory to make him out to be the villain in this story. The dirty little thing that had tried too hard, and had gotten people killed.
Enforcers were at fault, yes, but it was the tale of what happened if they pushed too far, to keep the lot of them quiet. ]
It was probably a trick. A last-ditch effort to draw me out to finish me off. [ It had to be that, the alternative was... was... worse. ] He would have killed me, if he had the chance.
(it does not surprise her that he doubts the veracity of it, or any good intentions written in the curves of the letters, but truth be told, she didn't feel it when she read it - and she's the first one to yell 'betrayal' when she sees it.
her hands, as gently as she can muster, rest upon the thin cheeks, as if she was trying to put his whole attention on her. get his mind off his own misery loop, which she's familiar to a little too much, and convince him to listen.
as gentle as she can.)
Silco. I don't think so.
(not about the latter, because considering what happened to silco's eye, that does track. it was a chance that silco never took upon, because he had never known the olive branch existed in the first place.
and she can't blame him for not taking it. she didn't, for so long.)
[ He doesn't pull away from her fingers, because Silco doesn't pull away from his daughter, but his hand encircled her wrist, reaching out to grip her, tight. ]
He tried to kill me. When I tried to escape, he tried to grab me and pull me back under the water. Does that sound like anything other than a ploy to try again?
I'm sure he wrote it just well enough. [ His fingers tighten, just a hair more. ] Apologized, justified it, and then begged me to come back, because if I was the same man I'd been before, I would have been foolish enough to.
[ It's why he'd never returned to that place. To the mines. No, Silco had slid down into the forgotten places, the parts of Zaun that the Lanes wanted to forget. It is where he'd found the Doctor, and it is where he'd found out about Shimmer. It's where he'd started to put together a plan to fix this, while he watched Zaun stifle itself, beholden to whatever the lanes wanted. ]
He was always good at playing at genuine. Even when it didn't quite reach his eyes.
[ After all, that must have been how it happened, he'd never seen it coming. He should have, he was not stupid, even as a boy. ]
(she didn't miss the way his bony fingers gripped against her. all this time, she physically could yank it off, and yet, the hold he has on her runs much deeper than muscle and bone. it's the reason why she can't.)
I killed you.
(she can't hurt him again, but she can remind him of that fact. vander tried, she succeeded. and she's here, sitting on his legs, her hair half-braided, an effort he will have to restart due to the pause they are taking to go on this little ride.)
I think he wanted to fix it, Silco. I want to fix it. You, us, them. I can fix it.
[ He holds her there. Even when she says the words they both know exist, but aren't saying. ]
That's different.
[ He says. That she killed him. It is, in his mind. She was...different. It was always going to be a possibility. It was an accident, wasn't it? It hadn't been intentional.
It was their fault, he'd already decided. Jayce Talis, Topside, the topsider girl who'd let Vi out of jail. He hated them all. So, somuch. He could hate them easily. He could never blame Jinx. ]
It's long broken. [ Is there a flicker of something else there? Underneath the fervent hate, the anger, the rage, and the desperation. Is there something else that lingers just under the surface? It doesn't quite rise to it. His fingers falter, loosen. ] I don't think that is something that can be fixed.
[ He reaches up, to hold her cheek. ]
There's nothing to fix, with us. We aren't the broken ones. Maybe we were, once, but we put it all back together. On our own. Without them to force us into what they wanted. To shape us into something weak, and wanting. You already fixed yourself.
(it was different, but the result was nearly the same. what vander couldn't do, trying, jinx has with her extreme luck, fast reflexes, and a string of jixing to everything she puts her hands on. it was an accident, and some days, she is fine with saying it. she will proudly announce it with how much of a screwed up individual she ended up being; others, she won't bear to even say it. as everything in her life, she fluctuates, and she can't make up her mind.
and yet, she just wants silco to understand. the grip loosens on her wrist, turns into a carress, and yet, she can't make herself say it now. instead, she'll just go back to nesting on him as she were, tapping her hair to tell him he screwed up and that he should start over.)
[ She taps her hair, and he gets right back to it. Silco isn't exactly great at it, her braids never turned out quite right, not unless she did it herself, but there's something to the ritual. He used to do it for her when she'd been younger, and couldn't. It's like a little piece of what they'd once had. Something they did together, because it was a reminder that she was his daughter, that he would do anything for her.
No matter what happened. No matter if she killed him, she wasn't to blame for it. The enforcer, the sister. They were the ones at fault, in the end. Not her. Not him. Topside, topside, it's always topside. ]
Don't worry. I've done everything I can to avoid him, and I don't intend to go looking for trouble.
(This conversation will age very poorly, but as of now, she's enjoying being taken care of. It's been a little while since she has had this, and while she is fully aware of the fact she will have to redo these braids as soon as he is out the door, there's something very soothing about having his long fingers against her hair.
It brings out some memories that have been coming up to her ever since he has passed. Grief is funny, it comes with pangs of rage when tied to her less than pleasant memories, but when they're good ones? They make her return to his office, search for that same warmth that no one else knows exists.
[ He promised not to go looking for him!! That part he held to!
So he just hums a note of acquiescence, no false promises, or anything like that, but he sifts his fingers through her hair, because it's a memory for him too. Before everything went wrong, before it was turned sideways by everyone else. Vi. The enforcer. The firelights. Marcus. The Chembarons.
They were all trying to take it away from him. They'd succeeded in their own way, they'd driven a wedge between them. He wanted to remove it, fast as he could, before Vander tried to drive it in deeper with all of his might. He could. He knew it. He didn't know Jinx like Silco did, though. He didn't know his daughter, or what she needed to function. Only he did.
This wasn't something the did often anymore, but it's at least something. A ritual they have that makes the world feel a little bit more like it should. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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she doesn't know who it is, so it was instinct over thought, until she realizes it's him. it spins around her finger before it goes to the nightstand.
shit.)
See, that's... That's what I was apologizing about.
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Come now.
[ He chides, his tone more level than his heartrate. He stepped in, and closed the door behind him. Nobody needed to see that Silco would sit down and braid his daughter's hair (badly) or hug her.
What would that do to a reputation he'd hardly been able to build? ]
You have your instincts for a reason, Jinx. [ It's maybe softer than anyone would ever hear him. Even Jinx rarely gets this tone. ]
Come on, do you want to get cleaned up?
[ Do you want to; a tactic Jinx has heard before. He'd learned early on that he couldn't just tell her to quiet down, he needed to ask her, cajole her. ] I'll help.
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but she puts the gun down, replaces it with a brush that she just offers him instead. once he sits on the bed, she climbs to his lap, body horizontal to it so her side can rest against his chest.
unharmed chest.)
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We won't talk about home. Tell me something you've seen so far here.
[ He coaxed her into talking, his fingers already cording through her hair, before he started to take the brush to the ends, to start to work his way up. Jinx had always had so much hair, since she was little. It's like a blanket of it, getting all over everything.
He doesn't mind that. He never has. ]
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(her face sinks a little further into his chest as she speaks, it's another way to ask him to focus. if there's anyone who knows how silco feels about piltover, it's jinx - and her views are not unbiased, she grew up hearing it, she reproduces it. she knows, because she stood by it, even after silco was no longer there to tell her about it.
so, she relaxes into his hold, arms loosely wrapped around him as he deals with the ocean of blue that sprouts from her head.)
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Well, she knew him, because of course she did.
So he took his time, a few moments of thought, actually stopping and considering. Silco has all of his scripts, after all. The things that he likes to say, the things he does say to manipulate, to cajole, all of that nearly-fifty years of practice in convincing people to actually step up for once in their horrid little lives. ]
I think it will be difficult.
[ He won't lie to her. Not... not about this. He brushes her hair. It's slow and methodical. ]
I think everyone will have to give up something. Even you. [ A sour note. ] Even me. It will require us to put things aside. You know how people are, how we are. They want us to restore the world as it was, and whether it has value or not...
[ He doesn't know what his answer would be, if he was on his own. (i do) Is it worth saving? All of it? The misery, the pain, the suffering? The early deaths and the fact that they had only recently been able to breathe? Even still, the enforcers won't come down without masks. He hates them. He recognizes that at some level, the fact that they are all here together is a feature of what they are trying to do. ]
If we're even saving it. [ He still... there will always be doubt. ] They chose the lot of us on purpose. Likely because it would be hard.
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it doesn't come. in a way, this is as honest and focused as she can get, considering the subject, and the people surrounding it. she'll let him talk, taking in each word, letting his voice fill the air with the sound of bristles through hair as her eyes close in full relaxation.)
... We have to do it, Silco. I'll give up, but if I find out it's bullshit, then I'm taking it back. But, until then, that means we can't kill each other, either.
(if he knows, he knows. stop stabbing vander, sir.)
At least for now.
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We may be forced to. You saw how the Pilties acted in the same room. All the moral high ground, none of the compromise.
[ A sneer, but still he brushes. This was at least normal. ]
As for me, I've been keeping my head down. You should, too, if we want this to work. I'm working on my plans to make this work. I could use your capabilities.
[ He'd always look to her, for that. Does it matter that she shot him with her own inventions? No, he would always forgive it from her, and her only. ]
Don't worry about me, Jinx. I've only been as violent as has been thrown at me. I do not intend to go further.
[ Which means: hey he'll only stab if Vander's attacking him.
Unfortunately, they WILL fight again. ]
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(it's guilt that drives her to ask. the guilt that she didn't follow their plans, the guilt that he wasn't there to guide her through this uprising... and yet, there is no regret. she did what she could, for those who she could still do it for.)
... Don't let me catch you two squabbling like two idiots. Do not.
(because she knows. they will fight again.)
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[ He pauses in his brushing, only to reach out for her, and hold his hand to her cheek. ] You're perfect, Jinx. Let them see that, and understand that we are the ones that they need. They need to come to our table now.
[ don't get political, she says, but it is as easy as breathing for silco ]
I have been avoiding him, Jinx. I have no interest in it. [ As if he isn't going to give as good as he got. ] Maybe you should be leveling this at the person starting them, instead of me.
[ HE would just as soon ignore him. (he would NOT) ]
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her arms do hold tighter, as if she is too waiting for him to leave her. it had never been his choice, he left out of her own actions, and yet, she knows if this place wishes to, it could take him. it's a silent beg for him to not let it, however that goes.
... but she did tell him not to get political, so she pokes him on the back as a reminder that she told him!!!)
You want me to put both of you on a get-along shirt, Silco? Don't let it escalate, that's what I'm asking. You two can kill each other after we know we're not completely screwed up. Or did you not teach me patience, mhm? Going back on it now?
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[ A sneer for her, but it isn't directed at her. He goes back to brushing her hair, working it back into order slowly. ]
He's liable to kill me just for being close. Or do you think I've initiated anything? [ A scoff. ]
I'll only respond in kind. I promise.
[ Which is a nice way of saying: I won't just take it. But again, not starting it. ]
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(if she THINKS)
(she's sure. because while silco might not brandish a knife so openly, nor pull the trigger as easily as she would, his words are as good as any weapon in her arsenal. that's always been his strength, while his muscle? his muscle is here, letting him be horrible at braiding.)
Sure, Silco, sure.
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Considering he's tried to kill me, threatened me, and stabbed me, do you think I have been amenable to simply taking anything else?
[ To be fair. Silco has stabbed him back. ]
If you talk to him, tell him to stay out of my way, and don't talk to me. Then you'll get your way.
[ Jinx is really getting the child of divorce experience β serving as a communication intermediary. ]
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(there's a hope, albeit small, that this soothes something. a long shot, one of the furthest there can be, but it's there, somewhere.
or it isn't. it most likely isn't, but wasn't she trying to put things back together? if she fucks this up, well. it's a self-fulfilling prophecy, anyway.)
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What are you talking about? A letter in the mines?
[ No.
Surely not. What did it matter anyway? What words were going to do anything? Silco couldn't imagine anything that wouldn't incense him, because he remembered distinctly what had happened.
Was it an effort to trick him?
It must have been. It was the only real answer. Vander had said he regretted it, but Silco knew better. The man had let him become a specter, a cautionary tale. He'd used his memory to make him out to be the villain in this story. The dirty little thing that had tried too hard, and had gotten people killed.
Enforcers were at fault, yes, but it was the tale of what happened if they pushed too far, to keep the lot of them quiet. ]
It was probably a trick. A last-ditch effort to draw me out to finish me off. [ It had to be that, the alternative was... was... worse. ] He would have killed me, if he had the chance.
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her hands, as gently as she can muster, rest upon the thin cheeks, as if she was trying to put his whole attention on her. get his mind off his own misery loop, which she's familiar to a little too much, and convince him to listen.
as gentle as she can.)
Silco. I don't think so.
(not about the latter, because considering what happened to silco's eye, that does track. it was a chance that silco never took upon, because he had never known the olive branch existed in the first place.
and she can't blame him for not taking it. she didn't, for so long.)
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[ He doesn't pull away from her fingers, because Silco doesn't pull away from his daughter, but his hand encircled her wrist, reaching out to grip her, tight. ]
He tried to kill me. When I tried to escape, he tried to grab me and pull me back under the water. Does that sound like anything other than a ploy to try again?
I'm sure he wrote it just well enough. [ His fingers tighten, just a hair more. ] Apologized, justified it, and then begged me to come back, because if I was the same man I'd been before, I would have been foolish enough to.
[ It's why he'd never returned to that place. To the mines. No, Silco had slid down into the forgotten places, the parts of Zaun that the Lanes wanted to forget. It is where he'd found the Doctor, and it is where he'd found out about Shimmer. It's where he'd started to put together a plan to fix this, while he watched Zaun stifle itself, beholden to whatever the lanes wanted. ]
He was always good at playing at genuine. Even when it didn't quite reach his eyes.
[ After all, that must have been how it happened, he'd never seen it coming. He should have, he was not stupid, even as a boy. ]
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I killed you.
(she can't hurt him again, but she can remind him of that fact. vander tried, she succeeded. and she's here, sitting on his legs, her hair half-braided, an effort he will have to restart due to the pause they are taking to go on this little ride.)
I think he wanted to fix it, Silco. I want to fix it. You, us, them. I can fix it.
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That's different.
[ He says. That she killed him. It is, in his mind. She was...different. It was always going to be a possibility. It was an accident, wasn't it? It hadn't been intentional.
It was their fault, he'd already decided. Jayce Talis, Topside, the topsider girl who'd let Vi out of jail. He hated them all. So, somuch. He could hate them easily. He could never blame Jinx. ]
It's long broken. [ Is there a flicker of something else there? Underneath the fervent hate, the anger, the rage, and the desperation. Is there something else that lingers just under the surface? It doesn't quite rise to it. His fingers falter, loosen. ] I don't think that is something that can be fixed.
[ He reaches up, to hold her cheek. ]
There's nothing to fix, with us. We aren't the broken ones. Maybe we were, once, but we put it all back together. On our own. Without them to force us into what they wanted. To shape us into something weak, and wanting. You already fixed yourself.
[ Because she's perfect, remember? ]
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and yet, she just wants silco to understand. the grip loosens on her wrist, turns into a carress, and yet, she can't make herself say it now. instead, she'll just go back to nesting on him as she were, tapping her hair to tell him he screwed up and that he should start over.)
... Just don't make this harder, Silco.
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No matter what happened. No matter if she killed him, she wasn't to blame for it. The enforcer, the sister. They were the ones at fault, in the end. Not her. Not him. Topside, topside, it's always topside. ]
Don't worry. I've done everything I can to avoid him, and I don't intend to go looking for trouble.
[ He means it, too. ]
Let's hope he gets the word as well.
[ He expects Jinx will spread it to him too. ]
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It brings out some memories that have been coming up to her ever since he has passed. Grief is funny, it comes with pangs of rage when tied to her less than pleasant memories, but when they're good ones? They make her return to his office, search for that same warmth that no one else knows exists.
It's just not there anymore.)
I believe you.
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So he just hums a note of acquiescence, no false promises, or anything like that, but he sifts his fingers through her hair, because it's a memory for him too. Before everything went wrong, before it was turned sideways by everyone else. Vi. The enforcer. The firelights. Marcus. The Chembarons.
They were all trying to take it away from him. They'd succeeded in their own way, they'd driven a wedge between them. He wanted to remove it, fast as he could, before Vander tried to drive it in deeper with all of his might. He could. He knew it. He didn't know Jinx like Silco did, though. He didn't know his daughter, or what she needed to function. Only he did.
This wasn't something the did often anymore, but it's at least something. A ritual they have that makes the world feel a little bit more like it should. ]