Some Cruel Joke

Jinx is falling, but she’s not afraid. She is ready for all of it to be over, she’s been so tired for so long. She’s with Vander- or what’s left of him, and her sister will finally be unburdened of the responsibility of caring for her.

It’s peaceful.

For a moment everything goes dark, and she wonders if death is just an endless void of nothingness. She still feels whole, which is weird given her certainty that she, and everything else exploded. She can feel herself coming back into her body, feeling nauseous and lightheaded. She’s lethargic and disoriented, the way you feel when you pass out and hit your head.

She cracks an eye open, and sees that she’s in her hideout. Apart from the nausea and the slight discomfort she feels, she’s relatively ok and able to adjust to her surroundings. She lifts her head to take everything in, and flexes her hands to ground her in reality. She wonders how she got here, where Vi is, and why everything looks different than the way she’d left it.

She and Ekko had practically ransacked the place in search of supplies that could help them assemble her airship for battle. Now her work table looks somewhat organized, and fully stocked. There are also small drawings on the wall that she remembered from years ago, but had long gotten rid of in favor of new artwork.

Her hideout is like a time capsule, and she wonders if this is her punishment for everything she’d done in her life. She finally looks in the mirror, and looking back at her are two blue eyes. When they’d changed, she thought she finally got rid of whatever remnants of Powder still lived inside her. Now they are staring right back at her, taunting her with what could have been. The hair she’d cut off is now perfectly braided down her back. She knows there is no way she could have been out for that long.

Below, she hears a door open and grabs her gun. She thought it had exploded when Isha sacrificed herself to save them, but there it is fully intact.

“Jinx!” She hears Sevika yell in an unfriendly tone.

She doesn’t want to see her right now, or anyone for that matter, but it doesn’t seem like she has much of a choice. “What did I do this time?” She asks as she slinks down from the loft.

“Silco is looking for you, you’re late to give him his daily shot.” She’s clearly annoyed that she has been sent on another ‘job’ that is essentially glorified babysitting duty.

Her statement leaves Jinx reeling for a second. Silco is dead. She knows because she killed him, and sunk his body in the river. She’d mourned him, and in her mourning came to understand that he may not have been good for her, even if he had loved her. Now Sevika is trying to dig up old wounds to get under her skin. “That’s not funny, Sevika.”

“I agree, Silco’s pissed and I don’t want to deal with him so you need to get your ass over there. Now.” She’s clearly impatient, and her tone is extremely serious.

“Silco is dead.” She says, grasping desperately to what she knows is real and not real.

“Well you can tell him that yourself when we go see him. Get moving.” Sevika grabs her arm and starts dragging her toward the door.

“Ok, jeez! I have two legs that work just fine, thank you.” The taller woman is acting weird, but Jinx is too curious about the situation to argue now. Something has felt off since she woke up and she wants to get to the bottom of it.

They make their way towards Silco’s old base, and it looks far less abandoned than when she had been there last. The lights inside are on, and some of Silco’s men are leaving the building as they walk in. When they finally arrive at his office, she notices some art that she’d spray painted on the door when she was younger. She’d gotten annoyed with him after he’d blown up on her for a job she’d screwed up. He’d covered it up years ago, which doubles her confusion.

Behind the door, sitting at his desk is a very much alive Silco. He looks a bit younger, and less worn than he did towards the end. She tries to mask her shock, but she knows it’s probably written across your face.

“Jinx, you’re late. I was almost worried for a second there. Got distracted by a new invention did we?” He asks, slight annoyance leaking into his tone.

“Uh, yeah, I guess so.” She shrugs, still in utter disbelief. She knows she is crazy but this is a whole different level of insanity. This feels too real. She can taste pollution in the air, and smell the smoke billowing out of one of the chimneys.

She walks slowly behind his desk, and casually reaches for the needle, but she can't hide the shake in her hands. She missed Silco, but she also sees him for what he really was now. He was a bitter man driven by revenge and his over-inflated ego, it’s what they had in common.

In complete silence, she quickly administers his shot, and awkwardly shuffles back around to the other side of the desk. He’s looking at her curiously, clearly aware that something is wrong. Luckily, he doesn’t say anything. He probably assumes she had one of her episodes again, and can’t shake it off as easily as usual. She is grateful for the unspoken excuse despite the grief it’s caused her throughout her life.

“I have a job for you tomorrow. I need you to guard the next shipment of Shimmer being delivered to the West End Port. No funny business, I want this done quickly and quietly.” His tone is serious, but lacks the bite it has when he talks to the other members of his syndicate.

“I- I can do that.” She replies, her composure beginning to slip. She’s willing herself not to cry, at least not until she’s left the room.

“Good, I hope your new project is coming along well. I look forward to seeing it in action.” He informally dismisses her, and she rushes out of the room.

When she finally makes it outside, she begins to cry. This all must be some cruel joke the universe is playing on her. She finds a comfortable rooftop and wraps her arms around her knees, rocking back and forth slightly. When she’s finally able to catch her breath, she decides her best option is to return to her hideout. When she finally climbs up to her loft, she sags into a chair and screams.

She needs to wake up.

Without hesitating, she grabs a screwdriver off of her desk and jams it into her leg. She didn’t expect it to hurt, but the pain shooting through her is excruciating. She pulls it out with a grunt, and watches as blood pours down her leg.

“Shit- what the fuck?” She scrambles to find her soldering iron to cauterize the wound. It’s relatively shallow, so despite her poor attempt at first aid it should heal up and leave nothing but a small scar.

She stares into her mirror that is not yet broken, and wrestles with what to do next. Before she has time to consider all of her options, her stomach makes a noise of protest. She had been too focused on trying not to have a mental breakdown to notice she is starving. Getting food is better than sitting in her misery, so she picks herself up and goes to the market.

She keeps her hood up to avoid being recognized, and heads straight for Jericho’s stand. He knows her, but he’s no snitch so she doubts she has anything to worry about.

When she finally reaches the front of the line, he nods at her in recognition, but doesn’t say anything incriminating. “What do you want blue?”

“Whatever your daily special is, I guess.” She hadn’t cared to decide what she actually wanted in line, completely lost in thought.

“Fried clams all the way from Bilgewater. You want em’ spicy?” He turns away to scoop the food into an oversized basket.

“Yeah, that sounds good.” She shrugs, not at all concerned with what her food tastes like. She’s got much bigger problems, like trying to figure out what the fuck is going on.

“Everything ok, blue? You seem off.” He gives her the basket, and she can smell the spice before it’s even in her hands.

“Not really, but nothing is fine down here so it’s all the same.” She tries to brush off his concern, and it works easier than she expected. He’s far too busy to pester her about how she’s doing.

She realizes knowing when her dream is taking place might help orient her, and hopefully figure how the fuck to make it stop. “When’s the next progress day- and what number is it?”

He gives her a confused look, clearly unsure as to how she wouldn’t know. “The 196th progress day is in two weeks.”

She finds herself once again trying to veil her shock. She’s fifteen years old? There’s nothing significant about that year of her life. She went on a lot of jobs, and fucked a lot of them up, that’s it. She figured if she was being forced to relive a part of her life it would’ve held some meaning. Maybe the stagnant insignificance of this time in her life is punishment enough.

When she finally lays her head down to get some sleep, she prays she doesn’t wake up.