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Live by a couple of deadly sins;
Just to make sure I finish what you began.
And I ain’t afraid to lose a life or ten;
If it means that I get to win in the end.
- Fever 333, Hellfire
The Hexgate was high up. Really high. No wonder it needed all the columns and beams to support and stabilize it. She wouldn’t even know where to begin to make her descent, but fortunately, Ekko came around soon.
He had taken one look at her face and knew, but she was too damn tired to explain to him that her face was just of exhaustion and pain of perhaps never seeing her sister again. She didn’t have the energy to tell him that she noticed a pink streak amidst a plume of blue – that the connection in her chest to her sister was inexplicably still present.
Sisterhood – it was a weird thing.
She had to hold on to that connection. The little string that was pulled taut and fraying, but still there.
Right now, there were other things to worry about. Primarily a navy-haired woman who was all legs and brains and sacrificial tendencies with whom she’d lost contact after being flown up here. A huge part of her was terrified to find out what was down there.
She let Ekko pull her onto the hoverboard. Let him pull her good arm around his waist. Let him ask her questions without answers.
He knew where she needed to be.
“Oh shit.”
Vi’s weak grip on him tightened as she finally allowed herself to be pulled to the present. She followed his gaze to the ground below and exhaled sharply.
Scenes of wreckages and deaths unfolded before her eyes. The bodies piled up. There were arcane-fueled atrocities alongside those bodies, deactivated from whatever had happened at the top of the Hexgate with Jayce and Viktor.
But she easily zeroed in on a flash of navy and gold figures at the platform. Ambessa was undeniably dead, laid carelessly next to the two figures. And there was a lot of blood. Too much.
Ekko didn’t slow as they descended, weaving between crumbling Hextech debris and the occasional spark of arcane energy still flickering in the air. She slid off the board before Ekko even fully touched down, the impact jarring her already aching limbs, but she didn’t care.
“Cait!”
Mel was holding Caitlyn in her arms, speaking to her too softly for Vi to hear anything, but she could see it. The woman’s hair was matted with blood, her once-pristine uniform torn and stained. Mel had palm pressed against her abdomen – there was no mistaking the red flowing between her fingers.
The councilor looked up first, her usually composed face etched with lines of weariness and something unspoken – guilt, perhaps. It didn’t take rocket scientists to figure out her mother had done this to Caitlyn.
“She’s alive,” Mel murmured as soon as Vi had reached them and collapsed on her knees, finally taking note of the extent of Caitlyn’s injuries – a stab wound and a closed eye that was also bleeding. “But she needs help. Now.”
“You look like hell, Cupcake,” Vi bemused painfully, trying to make light of a situation that scared her to death.
Caitlyn groaned. Her crystalline eye – the one still intact – flickered. Her lips twitched, half a smile and half a grimace. “Took you long enough.”
Vi huffed a humorless laugh and moved to take Caitlyn from Mel’s arms. She was as banged up as a person could be banged up, but she would never allow anyone else to take point from here on out. She needed to be there – to be present and make sure that Caitlyn was still breathing, however weak.
Something passed between her and Mel at that moment as they stood, Ekko ready to guide them to the medical bays. Not friendship, exactly – a mutual recognition. Two women who understood that survival sometimes looked like holding on, sometimes like letting go.
The Hexgate loomed above them - a monument to what they'd just survived, to the thin line between victory and total destruction. Blood. Arcane energy. Broken technology. And here they were. Still breathing.
“She was almost publicly executed. A girl – Maddie Nolen, I believe her name is – betrayed her. Held a rifle to her head. I stopped her before she could pull the trigger. I kept her alive.”
“Thank you.”
When Tobias managed to pull himself out of the grief of losing his wife enough to be present for his daughter, Vi left them alone in the hospital room and asked Mel to take her to Stillwater. There were still loose ends left untied, a lot of them, but this was the only one that mattered at the moment.
Maddie Nolen had threatened the one person Vi would burn worlds to protect. And she was going to make that very, very clear.
Vi watched as the prison building became larger. The place gave her mixed feelings. It held her behind bars, abused her from adolescence to adulthood. Warped her perception of the world. Of law and order. Of authorities and people in power.
But it was also the place she managed to resolve things with Caitlyn. The place she first met Caitlyn. The place.
The air around and in Stillwater was stifling. Suffocating. Like the weight of all crimes and punishments it housed had seeped into the atmosphere. Like the weight of innocent criminals and their agonies had permeated through the walls.
Her footsteps echoed through Stillwater’s concrete corridors like a promise. Each footfall carried years of pent-up rage – memories, traumas, the raw nerve of almost losing Caitlyn to a twink.
“She’s in isolation. High-security.”
“Yeah, I’m familiar.”
“For her safety,” Mel added, her tone edged with incredulity.
Vi scoffed, meeting Mel’s eyes as they reached the door that would lead to the cells that once held Vi – and now the woman that Vi intended to confront. Mel raised her brows and shrugged, as if saying that she hadn’t been the one to make that decision.
The guard recognized Vi. Of course, he did. Vi remembered vaguely that he’d been the one to actively spit in her food for years. She glowered at him, daring him to deny her entry.
The whir of heavy locks and the faint hum of magic-infused restraints echoed down the narrow hallway. When they reached Maddie’s cell, he hesitated, but Mel was there, and he wouldn’t dare to defy her after witnessing what she could do post-reappearance.
“Just…try to keep it civil.”
Neither Vi nor Mel responded. Civil wasn’t on her mind.
This wasn’t the cell they kept her or Jinx in. But all the cells were the same. Dimly lit. No windows. Stone bed. Clogged lavatory. Sloppy food that could barely classify as food. They didn’t care about prisoners’ wellbeing down here, just as long as they were alive.
Maddie sat with the calm of someone who didn’t yet understand the danger that stepped into the room. Young. Noxian. The kind of soldier who believed orders were a shield against consequences.
Mel had opted to stay outside, discretions of a councilor and all that.
It took a moment, but Vi eventually recognized her. The redhead who had approached her at the memorial. Told her pretty things to convince her to take the badge and put on the uniform. All bubblegum and righteous. She should have known.
“You’ve got some nerve,” Vi voiced in a low voice, pulling a rickety chair from a corner slowly and deliberately. She sat, leaning against the back of the chair. “Tell me about the moment you thought you could shoot her in the head.”
“Not the head. The neck,” Maddie corrected.
Vi tilted her head – she didn’t study biology.
“She wouldn’t die easy. She would have lost feeling from the neck down. She wouldn’t be able to move until she drowned in her own blood. She would die. Slowly. Painfully.” Maddie’s voice was methodical, coming only from ignorance or arrogance – to Vi, they were one and the same.
Vi’s fingers curled into fists, knuckles white against the coarse wood of the chair. She forced herself to stay seated and keep her expression unreadable.
“Why?”
“I would say I was following orders, but mostly because she gave me no warmth at all. Because of you.”
Vi blinked, realizing all at once. Maddie wasn’t just a spy or an enforcer. She was the someone.
She huffed a laugh. “Jealousy?”
“You had everything I wanted,” Maddie replied, tinged with bitterness. “I thought I could play the game. Be the spy. Offer my body in exchange for information. But Caitlyn –” She snickered, shaking her head. “She’s determined. Good. Even when she was not good, she was still good. And I – I couldn’t keep it together. You would know.”
Indeed, she knew. Caitlyn, despite being clouded by anger and resentment, was still the kindest person Vi had ever met. Even under Ambessa’s influence, even with the chance to do a lot worse, Caitlyn didn’t take any unnecessary lives when she had been commander.
And the best thing was that she understood she had been wrong. It was all proven in the way she allowed Vi to choose Jinx over her again.
“The orders came at the right time. I was following orders and I made it personal. Caitlyn – your precious Sheriff – should have known better than to get in the way.”
The name was a spark to dry kindling.
Vi stood so fast that the chair toppled over behind her, the noise echoing in the small cell. She crossed the space between them in two strides, grabbing Maddie by the collar with a bare hand, hauling her to her feet, and shoving her into the wall.
“I’ll show you strategic,” she growled.
The glove on her other hand whirred – a sound she would make sure Maddie would hear in nightmares. She wasn’t losing control. This was calculated. Every movement deliberate; every pressure point chosen with surgical intent.
“You don’t get to say her name. You don’t get to threaten her. You don’t get to be anything near her.” Each word was punctuated by a slight increase in pressure. “Not her. Not ever.”
One of Maddie’s hand was struggling against Vi’s grip, but her composure didn’t crack. “You think you’re better than me? You’re just another thug, clinging to whatever scraps of justice you can find. Piltover has rules,” she added proudly.
Vi smirked. “You forgot – I’m not from Piltover.”
It was only then that Maddie’s eye flickered with a combination of fear and uncertainty – Vi could see her struggling to maintain her composure.
“I’m not from Piltover,” she repeated. “But that’s the last thing you’ll learn about me. Ever.”
The first punch landed like a promise. Controlled. Precise. The kind of violence that knew exactly what it wanted to communicate. Maddie would have keeled over if not for Vi’s firm grip around her neck.
“You thought you could hurt her and get away with it?”
Another punch.
“You wanted Caitlyn to hurt? Pay for the kindness she showed when it would have been so easy for her to just walk away from you?”
Another.
“Caitlyn’s a smart girl – you think she didn’t notice your sleaziness?”
Another.
“You’re wrong.”
With that, she threw Maddie on the floor. Before the other woman could react, she made to press her boot against the redhead’s knee. Not stepping; just…positioning. Years of training and months of pit fighting endowed her with knowledge of exactly how she could inflict the most damage.
“You don’t get to walk away from this.”
She applied steady, unrelenting pressure, leaning her weight into the pressure and watching Maddie grimace. The sound came first – minuscule, then a resounding and satisfying crack.
The redhead screamed. Yowled, actually. Music to Vi’s ears.
“The femur,” Vi announced, clinically. “Takes about 16 weeks to recover. If it heals right, and with proper medical intervention. And what do you know? Stillwater has the worst medical team ever. I should know.” She let go, ignoring Maddie’s whimpers as she knelt on her haunches to make sure she could look her in the eye. “Bet you think I was stupid street rat.”
“You’re still…just a…street rat,” Maddie insisted between painful rasps.
Vi shrugged. “Well, what about it? I’m the street rat that she loves.”
She stood up, took one last smug look at Maddie, and walked out, letting the fearful guard lock the door behind her again. Mel was facing the opposite wall, arms crossed and expressionless.
“Got what you came for?”
“Not even a little,” Vi muttered, detaching the glove from her injured hand.
“Don’t worry.” Mel finally turned to take a glance at Maddie in the cell. “I’ll make sure to finish the job.”
Vi closed her eyes for a moment, memories flushing.
Caitlyn’s cries and screams as the healers treated her, having run out of morphine. Her heavily bandaged eye that could never see again. The twin scar on her abdomen that reflected Vi’s.
She remembered feeling helpless in the chaos of it all. Refusing to let anyone else touch or treat her until she knew that Caitlyn would be safely alive. Sustained to sustain Vi’s last surviving thread of hope.
She opened them again to give Mel a look of gratitude. She had a feeling they would turn out to be great friends, after all.
Calloused fingers traced the outline of Caitlyn’s hand, careful to not disturb the IV line. Another hand held Caitlyn’s face gently, brushing the edge of the bandaged eye ever so often.
The hospital room was quiet now that they were deep into the night. Tobias had been chased back to that big mansion of his after a day of looking after his daughter. It wouldn’t be difficult to imagine what it was like to feel the potential of losing a daughter after losing a wife.
She didn’t know how long she sat there, but eventually, the one good eye flickered and opened, blinking in confusion before looking in Vi’s direction.
“Hey, Cupcake,” Vi whispered, her voice rough from disuse.
“You’re here.”
Vi nodded in affirmation, her fingers threading through Caitlyn’s to emphasize her presence in the room. By her side. Not going anywhere.
“Water.”
Reaching for the pitcher, the Zaunite poured and held the straw to Caitlyn’s lips with a gentleness that belied her boxer hands. Caitlyn took small sips, her eye never leaving Vi’s face.
Assessing. Anchoring.
That color – Vi didn’t know how she even distrusted it weeks ago, when this woman bumped her out of Stillwater and offered her freedom again. Somewhere along the way, this color became the very thing that kept Vi tethered to the ground, even when they were at loggerheads.
She didn’t say anything once Caitlyn was done. Only placed the glass back on the bedside table and laced their fingers together again. Her lips met the skin of Caitlyn’s knuckles, closing her eyes in gratitude.
“You went to see her,” Caitlyn stated. Not a question. An observation.
Vi took a shaky breath and nodded. “Yeah.”
Caitlyn sighed. “You shouldn’t have.”
“I didn’t – she’s still alive, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“I don’t care what happens to her.”
Vi looked up and inhaled again. The navy-haired woman didn’t look angry or offended or disapproving. Merely concern.
Her throat tightened. “I can’t lose you too.”
“You won’t,” Caitlyn promised, her hand coming up to meet Vi’s cheek. “We find each other. You’re stuck with me.”
Vi chuckled and leaned in to place a soft kiss on Caitlyn’s lips, lingering a little before withdrawing.
“Go to sleep.”
“You’ll be here.”
“Always.”
Their hands remained connected. The world faded away. Whatever battles lay ahead, Vi didn’t want to think about them now. She would sit here.
Watching. Protecting. Loving.