The Undying Oath (NSFW)
Chapter 3: It All Came Crumbling Down (SFW)
Pairing: Viktor x fem!Reader
Summary: As reader navigates her grief, she watches the rug being swept from under her. One after the other, the pillars holding together her life crumble, and she's forced to cling to her values and ideals, upholding Viktor's legacy.
A/N: This is more of a bridge chapter, connecting the setup of the two previous chapters to where I want to bring the story next. I hope you like it despite that. Happy New Year!!
Warnings: Major Character Death. Loss of a loved one. Angsty. War.
Word Count: 6.4K Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 (In Progress) Also on AO3
The few seconds it took for Jayce's words to finally sink in felt like an eternity. The synapses in her brain fought hard to soften the blow, the mechanisms of grief starting to engage as soon as the message was received.
The only thing preventing her legs from giving out was the surge of guilt rapidly encapsulating her whole body. She did not deserve to rest.
It was all for nothing.
Her mind plagued her with images of Viktor in his final days, slowly decaying. Suffering not only from his ailments, but from the pain of betrayal from the only person he sought comfort from, as his condition started preventing him from the work he often escaped to. Those tired golden eyes piercing her in accusation as they slowly closed a final time.
She could only tell Jayce's approaching her once his hand reached her shoulder. Her eyes quickly went from his hand to his face, where he wore an apologetic expression.
"It's not your fault." He said as softly as he could.
She couldn't respond. Her hanging mouth felt as dry as when she was in Shurima. Her gaze followed Viktor's statue body up to his face, the sharp corners adorning his jaw looked as pristine as they did the first time they met. He was beautiful.
Her beautiful fiancee whose thick accented voice she would never hear again.
That's when the grieving surpassed the guilt. She fell to her knees in a painful sob, her hand finding purchase on the statue before her. The tears rolling down her cheeks blurred her vision, but it didn't stop the flashing images of Viktor behind her eyes. She sobbed quietly, holding back her voice as much as she could - she shouldn't be allowed to grieve for the loss she bestowed upon herself.
Jayce kneeled beside her in silence for a moment, a hand gently placed on her back for comfort. But it wasn't long before he decided to leave her alone - he felt like she needed a moment by herself with Viktor.
As the tears started to subdued, she groggily sat beside the statue of Viktor hugging her knees together and resting her head on his feet. She spent the night in Jayce's office in a broken slumber, whispering apologies to the cold night air during the brief moments of consciousness.
She woke up the next day with Jayce's warm hand on her shoulder.
"Let's get you to your dorm," he spoke softly "You need some proper rest."
She didn't have the presence of mind to deny him, so she simply nodded before Jayce took her hand, gently bringing her to her feet and led her through the halls of the Academy.
Once they reached her door, he cooed her inside.
"I'll leave you to it, the Council needs me," he said. "I'll come by later so we can get you some food, okay? Rest well."
As soon as the door closed behind her, she was hit by a stale yet familiar scent - the scent of her life together with Viktor. The room was untouched, as if they had left it just this morning to work and she was coming back at the end of the day, the thin layer of dust covering every surface the only indication that time had passed. The bed was unmade, piles of books filled the shelves by the windows, there were some clothes discarded on the floor probably from the last time one of them jumped in bed after a long day and couldn't bother throwing them into the hamper.
A renewed wave of misery crashed onto her at the sight, she forced herself to stand her ground and not collapse onto the floor again. She walked around slowly, taking in every little detail, not daring to touch anything, as if preserving the scene could somehow bring her back to that old life from two years ago.
She stopped at Viktor's desk upon noticing his journal opened up on his last entry. She felt conflicted, there was a part of her that desperately wanted to read his journal in a feeble attempt to feel close to him again and she almost gave in to the urge, but the guilt held her in place - was she even allowed to pry into his personal notes after everything she did?
She took a deep breath. This journal was Viktor's last words, his final message to the world - there could be his will or dying wishes written in there, he was a very meticulous man after all. He deserved at least to be heard a final time. The girl sat down on his chair, pulling the journal closer to her.
"I am afraid I might be living the twilight of my life and I'll soon be headed to that good night.
Despite working tirelessly to find a way to prolong my days, to cure this wretched ailment that fell upon me, I still can't see even a glimpse of a solution in the horizon.
And this growing decay inside me doesn't seem to want to stop anytime soon, expanding the distance between us in this morbid race I've been forced into.
The only thing keeping me sane is the light and warmth of my hearthfire that is [Y/n]. The possibility of a future where we get to grow old together side by side keeps the darkness at bay. I'm sure I'll find a way to get there.”
She hastily closed the journal back to save the pages from getting stained as the tears began falling copiously down her face again. Her knees gave out and she fell down, holding her torso up by the edge of the desk.
The tears turned to sobbing and then to wailing. In the uncanny familiarity of their bedroom, she finally allowed herself to grieve.
As the tears started to subside, she felt the weight of exhaustion pull her down. It hit her that she hadn't had a proper night of sleep on a bed ever since she left on her expedition. For a moment, the lethargy she felt paired up with the self-loathing festering inside of her had her considering curling down on the floor where she knelt and sleeping right there, but something tugged at her.
She felt a warm gentle humming radiating from her left arm, traversing its extent in waves. She quickly pulled back the sleeve of her coat and saw the golden veins on her marbled new arm faintly glowing. The sensation was gone as quickly as it came, the luminescent golden quality of the appendage dying down. and she realized she didn't feel as tired as before.
Her new magic came to her aid.
She chuckled dryly. “You would have loved this, Vik. A way to prolong your working hours without any chemical additives.”
She pulled the sleeve back down, standing up. Shedding the garments from the trip unceremoniously, she opted for a pair of sweats and a shirt whose sleeves fully covered the new arm. There was too much weighting at her mind at the moment, unpacking the stuff she went through with anyone just wasn't on the docket.
As the second wind her arm provided her died down, she grabbed Viktor’s journal from his desk and hopped onto bed. She fell asleep holding the journal tight against her body, lulled by the faint scent of him that still lingered onto the unmade bed.
The next five days happened in a daze. She laid in bed for hours, unable to leave, with energy to only to switch between silently crying, sobbing or sleeping. Jayce would come when he could, bringing her food and consoling her for as much time as he was able to spare. She was grateful for him, but would often leave a lot of what he brought untouched - she felt chronically nauseated.
On the sixth day, Jayce found her sitting up on the bed.
She was unkept, drained, yet there was a glint of something else behind her eyes. Something different from the ruined state she had been in. The sides of her mouth even curled up in a forced half-smile when she noticed the man.
“Good morning,” he muttered gently, placing the tray of food on the desk. “How are you feeling?”
“Not good,” she answered, looking down. “But a bit better than before.”
“Good to hear,” Jayce responded, sitting on the edge of the bed with her.
“I need to leave this room and do something,” she muttered, turning to the window. “Occupy myself a bit.”
“I think that’s a wonderful ideal,” Jayce said, reaching for one of her hands. She flinched for a second, avoiding his contact at first. But then quickly relaxed right after, offering her right hand out to him. He took it in earnest.
“They say that's good for the grieving process.”
“Yeah, it wouldn't be fair to Viktor’s memory either,” she chuckled. “I wonder what he'd say if he saw me like that.”
It was Jayce’s turn to chuckle. “I think he'd understand.”
“I might head back to the UDS, the Undercity model definitely needs to be updated after two years.”
Jayce didn't respond. How odd.
She searched his face and saw apprehension, his eyes fixated on a corner of the room.
Finally, with a deep breath, he met her gaze.
“The UDS has been dismantled.”
A couple of seconds passed before his words fully sank in.
“What?”
“With the growing conflict with the Undercity, priorities shifted,” he explained. “It didn't make sense to allocate funds to it any longer.”
Yet another pillar of her life tumbling down in front of her. All the work she's done over the past decade was discarded on a whim.
How Piltovan of them.
“That's my life's work, Jayce,” she barked, yanking her hand away from his grasp. “What about all my documents? My blueprints? My model? Was it all just discarded?”
He paused again.
“No,” he responded apprehensively. “Look, I tried arguing against it…”
She narrowed her eyes at him.
“Jayce…”
“You have to understand the circumstances, everything changed after the Council was bombed…,” he trailed off.
“Spit it out, Jayce!”
He swallowed dryly before speaking. “Everything that was in the UDS room is being used in the effort against the Undercity, including your model.”
“WHAT?” She almost jumped out of the bed. “With whose authorization? This is absolutely preposterous, I can't –”
She fought to find the words. Pressure started to build beneath her skin as an onslaught of thoughts plagued her mind, one more preposterous than the other. She could feel her jaw clenching, her breathing getting labored.
Her marbled arm getting warmer.
“Everything I mapped and cataloged about the Undercity was to help them, to better their lives,” she said between her teeth. “Not to brutalize them.”
“I know, but the intel the UDS could provide was detrimental to the conflict effort. The Council voted for it almost unanimously,” Jayce tried justifying. “There was nothing I could do.”
Likely story.
She scoffed. “And what would the Council have me do then? Escapading through the Lanes to gather more intel for their war effort? Because you know I won't do it.”
“No…
Jayce paused, taking a deep breath.
“With me out of the Lab and Viktor gone, you are the only one left with decent knowledge to continue developing projects on HexTech…”
She glared at him.
“What are you suggesting?”
Jayce swallowed dryly once more, unenthusiastically meeting her gaze. And with the same lack of intention, as if he couldn't believe his next words himself, he blurted out.
“They want you to develop HexTech weapons.”
Jayce's words brought their exchange to a standstill. With knitted brows, he waited for her response, trying to gauge her reaction from her countenance. All the while, she waited for his next words. Because there needed to be next words.
Because the nature of this proposition was so absurd, Jayce couldn't be serious.
“No.”
“(Y/N)-,” Jayce tried arguing, but she abruptly cut him off.
“I won't do it, that's final,” then pressure bubbled back up, each word pronounced like a punch. “Honestly, I feel offended you even considered bringing this to me.”
Jayce huffed. “You think I don't understand how this sounds? I don't like the idea either, but the conflict with the Undercity has been escalating to a degree that's getting out of hand.”
“Oh, so the solution is to bomb them with HexTech explosives? To litter their underground with HexTech mines?”
“We need the upper hand to put an end to the conflict!” It was Jayce’s turn to get worked up. “It would issue their rendition and we would be sparing lives!”
“We would be taking lives!” The swell of ire poisoned her words, building them into a vile crescendo. “To paint it as a panacea to the conflict is wishful thinking at best.”
“It is not ideal, but we’re far past the peaceful negotiations phase,” he retorted. “You would know that if you were here in the past two years.”
Jayce had a terrible habit to resort to petty comebacks whenever a discussion wasn't going his way. She saw it happen more times than she wished to whenever he and Viktor got stuck working on particular complex projects for far too long and exhaustion made everyone cranky.
Right now, dealing with the socio-political calamity at hand was clearly turning him into the worst version of said Jayce. And, like she did in the past, there was a world in which she'd brush it off and simply reel the conversation back to the topic at hand. To douse the flames so as not to get them both burned.
This was not such a world.
In the next second, she violently got up, lifting a finger at Jayce. “I will NEVER willingly participate in the genocide of my husband's people!”
Jayce did the same, barreling towards her, shoving a finger to her face. “He WASN’T your husband. You LEFT HIM at the altar to DIE!”
That was the last straw.
---------------------------------------------------
Jayce had realized he went too far the moment he noticed the tight knot in her brows and the lack of glimmer in her eyes, a blend of hurt and rage. He’d apologize, said he didn't mean it and the words that came out of him were mere fruits of the spur of the moment.
But it was the last pillar holding up the home she built in Piltover. And it came crashing down before her eyes, the falling rubble sending debris all around her. And as the dust settled down, she saw the only possible way forward.
Or downward.
She started packing as soon as Jayce left her room, sliding a large over-the-shoulder bag from under the bed. She made quick work of stuffing some clothes, her journal, and some other light equipment. She finished up by carefully placing Viktor's journal atop her belongings, slotted between some fabrics for safekeeping.
She put her coat on, pulled the hood over her head, slinged the bag over her shoulders and sneaked out of Academy.
And she was suddenly back to when she was a kid.
The divide between Topside and the Undercity seems abrupt at first glance. A clean cut, where one could easily pinpoint where one ended and the other started.
However, someone from The Fringes knows that there are a lot more shades of gray in this black-and-white picture Topsiders like to paint.
Much like the intricacies of the socioeconomic relations of the sister cities, exist capillary breaches connecting them. Crevices invisible to the eyes of Piltovans, that in their hubris, never made an effort to look into. Alleyways a little wider than a foot that always remained unpatrolled by enforcers before the conflict and that she was sure wouldn't be patrolled now.
From checkpoint to checkpoint, she slipped between those cracks until there were no more blue uniforms in sight.
Truth be told, the Enforcers were much more worried about preventing trenchers from moving up than making sure no topsider was sneaking into the Undercity.
She stopped sneaking once the familiar smell of stale urbanity air hit her nostrils. The streets were eerily quiet, much different from the neon-bathed everlasting nightlife she was used to - if it wasn't for the humming of machinery or the eventual person walking hastily by her, she'd assume it was a ghost town.
Apprehension took hold. She wasn’t sure exactly where to go, just hoped she'd stumble upon a friendly face at some point. Maybe people who’d recognize the Architect from all the on-site data gathering she used to do as part of the UDS. Maybe even someone who'd remember her walking around with Viktor.
Pain rose from her chest at the memory.
In the new relative calmness devoid of the fear of being perceived, her mind raced. There was a cacophony of emotions roaring inside her, sadness that her place in the academy was no more, grief from the very recent loss of her fianceé, guilt from breaking her promise and leaving Viktor to die alone.
But on top of it all was rage. Pure molten ire for Piltover taking over her life's work, which she toiled over for years on an underfunded (due to pure disinterest of topside on the matter) section of the academy, and twisting it, completely stripping it of its original purpose, perverting it at its core.
And Jayce, of all people, not vetoing it?
She fumed, clenching her jaw as she made her way forward. Her marbled arm tingled erratically every time a new painful memory resurfaced, but she was far too engulfed in her righteous wrath to take notice of that.
Or of the quickly approaching footsteps from behind.
In an instant, she felt the loss of the weight of her bag as someone swiftly took it off of her shoulder. The figure then held her bag tight against them, never faltering in their stride. It took her a second to snap back from the astonishment before dashing behind the thief.
She ran as fast as she could, not worried with her clothes, her equipment or any of her belongings inside her bag - only Viktor’s journal. But as the chase continued, her lungs burned, not used to the thick, polluted air of the Lanes anymore. Soon, every fiber of her body started screaming for her to stop, her legs started faltering and she watched as the distance between her and the thief grew.
She was going to lose the very last piece of him she had. Have it mercilessly snatched away from her grasp. And again, she was gonna be unable to prevent it.
The very thought made her sick, like a humming uneasiness in the pit of her stomach. And it quickly expanded, hot and incandescent, every cell inside her igniting in a chain-reaction until it engulfed her in a golden inferno.
Her marbled arm flew forward on instinct, the veins glowing an intense golden hue. With a scream, as if all the pressure that had been building up exploded, a burst of energy went flying from her outstretched palm, hitting the thief squarely in the back.They fell on the floor, rolling around from momentum, before stopping.
She stopped at their prone body, falling to her knees as she tried to catch her breath. Gazing down down at her marbled arm, she notoced the vein’s glow was already dimming. As soon as her breathing normalized and the nausea from exertion subsided, she grabbed her bag back and slung it across her torso.
She got up and was about to leave the scene, but something told her not to. She glanced back at the thief's form, still prone on the floor. Worry nagged at her, she had no idea what had just transpired and how whatever that was could've affected the thief outside of stopping them in their tracks.
She took a deep breath before kneeling back down beside the thief and turning them on their back. She was met with his eyes, wide and scared, frantically looking at her. The rest of his body was completely still. Whatever she's done, seemed to have paralyzed him. Locked him in his own body.
She panicked. The thief, a man probably in his early 20's, didn't deserve this fate. Glancing over her marbled arm, she wondered if she could somehow reverse it. She was supposed to be a healer mage now, right? She did it before, sort of.
Taking another deep breath, she placed her marbled palm on his chest. With her eyes closed, she tried to envision him running earlier, tried to perceive her own guilt for his fate, tried to beg the Cosmos, the Immortal Flame that made her its Aspect, to heal the man and grant him back his movement.
And then she started feeling a warmth blossoming in her gut, slowly travelling through her body up until her marbled palm. She opened her eyes and watched as the golden veins on her arm glowed, bathing her and the man in a cozy warm light. As soon as the light subsided, the thief gasped, quickly sitting up and scooting backwards.
“It's ok-,” she faltered, being suddenly overtaken by vertigo. Whatever healing she did paired with the chase seemed to have taken its toll, rendering her unable to continue. Her body stumbled forward, heavy with exhaustion. She barely had the presence of mind to catch herself with both palms to the floor.
From her peripheral vision, other figures started approaching the scene.
She heard their conversations.
“Be careful, she's a mage.”
“Go check if Nadir is OK, I'll deal with her.”
“Look at her clothes, she's a Piltie.”
“Quick, grab her stuff before she's back up again.”
Don't . But the words wouldn't come out. The figures kept closing in. She held her bag with as much force as she could muster, but her arms felt amorphous. There was no defending the bag anymore.
“Wait! Don't harm her! That's (Y/N)!”
A familiar voice rang from a figure further back. She looked up from her curled state on the floor, spots dancing in her vision with the motion.
“Ralph-,” was all she could muster before passing out.
---------------------------------------------------
The next time she opened her eyes, she was on a bed. The ceiling above was wooden, planks held together by bolted steel.
“Ah, you're awake.”
She quickly sat up trying to find the source of the voice. On a chair on the far end of the room sat a tall, lean man with light brown hair.
“Ralph?”
He beamed at her, dimples forming at the sides of his mouth. The same smile that would grace her all those years ago, when she was still just a kid of The Fringes. The first in command of the little band of misfits that she called her friends.
The man that used to have her heart.
“I really wasn’t expecting to see you down here,’ he said. “I'm sorry about the debacle the boys put you through, they didn't know.”
Memories of the chase came back at his words.
“My bag!” She frantically looked around. “Where's my bag!?”
“Woah, woah. Easy there!” Ralph cooed, motioning with his hands in an attempt to calm her down. “It's right there, on the floor next to the bed.”
She sighed in relief upon looking down and spotting the leather bag with gold and white accents she brought from Piltover.
Ralph chuckled. “So, how are you feeling?”
She lightly shook her head with a sneer. Such a mundane question felt almost comical at this point. She exhaled before responding. “A bit tired, but nothing to write home about…”
“Glad to hear it,” there was a shift in his eyes, as if a mask fell off. “Now, can you tell me exactly what you are doing back here in the Lanes?”
She frowned. “Why's that important? It's me Ralph, the Undercity is basically my home.”
Ralph leaned over, a more serious expression adorning his features. “You have to understand, (Y/N), the Undercity and the Topside are basically at war. It is very suspicious to have a Piltie wandering around the neighborhood.”
“I'm not a Piltie!” She scoffed, clearly offended. “You fancy me a spy or something?”
“Not me, I know who you are,” he continued. “But the others don't. And I need a good explanation to give them about someone from up there just happening to be here, especially with the little trick you pulled on poor Nadir.”
She grimaced as worry tugged at her.
“The one who took my bag,” she whispered. “Is he ok?”
“He's fine, just a little shaken. He'll live.”
She sighed in relief. Ralph kept eyeing her, suspicion still heavy on the pinch of his brow.
“Let's start with that,” he continued. “Was that some new fancy weapon Piltover developed for us?”
She blinked in bewilderment. “Of course not! Why would you think I'd be the one to contraband Piltovan weapons to use on Zaunites?”
Ralph didn't answer. Instead he studied her face, seemingly checking if it betrayed her words.
“Then what was it? Nadir said that he couldn't move after you shot him. And that somehow you undid it with your hands.”
She exhaled, looking down at her hands. At this angle, one could assume her marbled appendage was but a glove or some form of accessory, and not her actual limb.
Would it be wise to lay everything out to Ralph? That she was essentially a mage now, something unusual enough to be anyone's guess what kind of reaction the Zaunites would have?
On the other hand, what would omitting her newfound abilities really do? Was this sort of preservation even necessary at this point? She didn't have anywhere to go, no reputation to uphold, no legacy to keep.
Maybe this new identity might put a bigger target on her back. But could also be the key to open new doors on her path.
She was willing to take the risk.
“There's a lot I need to tell. Bear with me.”
She told Ralph about Viktor. How she indeed became romantically involved with him. How his health drastically declined during the last years of their relationship. About her research on mages and the subsequent quest that it led her to.
Ralph listened patiently without a word, his expression unreadable.
“I ended up in Targon and, although I couldn't bring a mage back with me,” she pulled her sleeve up, fully revealing the marbled arm. “I brought back a neat souvenir.”
With a knitted brow, Ralph got up from his seat, carefully getting closer to her. His eyes locked on her arm.
“What is that?”
“An arm,” she said matter-of-factly. “That's also a conduit for magic.”
She offered her arm up towards him. He studied it, carefully touching her marbled forearm with sheer curiosity, her words gradually sinking in.
“You became a mage?”
“Yes. Well, technically a host for an Aspect,” she replied. “Supposedly, I can heal people now.”
“Were you able to heal Viktor?”
The tightness in her chest returned. Guilt tore her insides, like a knife between her ribs. She swallowed back a lump forming in her throat before speaking.
“When I got back, he was already gone.”
His eyes shot up from her arm, acknowledging her words.
“I'm so sorry to hear that.”
Ralph let go of her arm, sitting beside her on the bed. He shed whatever guarded facade he was putting up until now, instead wearing a familiar soft expression. She found comfort in that.
Enough to break her own facade down as tears began rolling down her face.
Ralph wrapped his arms around her at the sight, pulling her into his chest. The gentleness of the act paired with nostalgic familiarity that was him made her feel unusually safe. And she let go, the tears crashing down like a downpour, staining his shirt in its wake. She sobbed as he soothed her, gently running his fingers through her hair.
She felt so weak, as thin as paper. Coming undone on a moment’s notice. A house that wasn't a home, with no beans, pillars or columns - standing on its walls alone. The whole of it coming down on the slightest of breezes.
She pulled herself away from him after calming down, sitting up straight again.
“I'm sorry about this…”
“Don't be,” he cooed. “You went through a lot, I'm not sure what I would do with myself if Lyanna d-.” He paused, rethinking his next words. “If I lost Lyanna.”
They sat in silence for a bit, not knowing what to say next. But somehow it was comfortable, as if time hadn't passed and they were still two kids again, without a care in the world. She was glad, she desperately needed some semblance of normalcy.
Ralph was the first to break the silence.
“Tell me more about this arm of yours,” he turned to her. “How does it work?”
She held her marbled arm, studying the golden veins on its surface. “Honestly, I'm not sure. The most I did with it was what happened with that Nadir guy.”
Ralph hummed, a wishful glint behind his eyes as he once again analyzed her limb. He then looked down as his own right arm.
“May I ask you to try something?”
With his left arm, he pulled the jacket he wore off, just enough to unveil his right arm.
Or what was left of it.
Her eyes grew wide in stupor at the sight. His arm was missing from the middle of his biceps down, the limb crudely bandaged up at the bottom. The tissue was tinted red with dried blood.
“Oh gods, what happened!?”
He chuckled dryly. “Enforcer bomb went out right next to me, I was lucky it only took my arm.”
“Ok,” she exhaled in resolution. “You want me to try to heal that wound?”
“Actually… Can you try bringing my arm back?”
Her eyes shot up to his face in exasperation.
“That's one tall order!”
“Could you at least try?,” he pleaded. “You said you weren't sure how those powers worked, but you did heal a man from being paralyzed.”
She scoffed. “Paralyzing that I inflicted in the first place!”
“All the more reasons to try then, that arm seems to be packing quite a punch.”
“I'm not sure about that…”
“Please, (Y/N),” the vulnerability in his voice caught her off-guard. “I need both my arms to work. We've been fighting for scraps ever since the conflict with Topside broke out, the loss of my arm only made providing for my family that much harder.”
With a deep breath, she reached Ralph's damaged arm with her marbled hand. Carefully as not to hurt him, she pressed her palm on top of the bandages.
“Here goes nothing.”
Closing her eyes, she tried to perform the same method she did when healing Nadir. She pictured Ralph with his right arm outstretched, the bottom part of his stump free of bandages, all the innards exposed. His humerus slowly regenerated, growing out of the upper arm region until it was complete, the radius, ulna and the hand following right after. Once the bones were settled, all muscles, tendons and ligaments acted the same way, until his whole arm was good as new. She then prayed, begged to the Celestials and the Aspect of the Immortal Flame to regenerate Ralph's arm. To bring back his full range of motions.
Her marbled arm hummed with energy, like an electric current traveling from her core to her palm in waves. Her breath hitched, weariness setting in as if she was on a jog, her energy getting steadily drained. But she persisted as much as she could, until the lightheadness she felt verged into a fainting spell.
Letting go of his arm, she panted as she caught her breath. She blinked a few times after opening her eyes in an attempt to get rid of the spots dancing around her vision. She glanced at Ralph's arm once she composed herself.
Where once was a badly bruised stump, with bloodied scars still inflamed, was a stump smooth and completely healed. The skin all around it even seemed fuller and healthier.
But there was no new arm in sight. Whatever healing she could muster couldn't create new flesh.
Her eyes met Ralph's, whose crestfallen expression told her he had arrived at the same conclusion.
But he quickly shook his head, smiling at her.
“At least you sped the healing process. It's a relief to get rid of the soreness.”
He then proceeded to take a big stretch with a loud yawn, before making a thespian show for getting up.
“If you don't have somewhere to stay, you should come to my place. I think Ekko would be interested in having you and those powers join his ranks.”
---------------------------------------------------
Ekko was indeed interested to have her and her powers join his ranks. Ralph led her to what she'd learn was the Firelight’s hideout - an oasis hidden at the upper level of the Undercity. A resistance group that once fought against the exploitation of Undercitizens in the hands of chembarons, and now fought back against Topsider’s occupation and forced pacification.
The people of the Hideout had mixed feelings towards her at first. There were those suspicious of someone who came from the Topside, hosting magic inside a bizarre arm. However, there were also those who knew her from when she was known as the Architect from the Academy, responsible for leading urban projects for the betterment of the Undercity. Soon, the suspicion thinned out, thanks to the vouching of Ralph and Lyanna, and she started to use her newfound powers for the sake of the community the Firelights had created.
Having a purpose again helped her navigate her grief better. With each smile her healing helped provide, each burden she helped lift, her consciousness felt a little less heavy. Viktor would be pleased, having his legacy survived in her, despite the suffering she'd previously caused him.
She learned of a mural on which the Firelights would paint the faces of notorious Undercitizens lost. After a while, she convinced them to add Viktor's face to the roster - a fellow Undercitizen Scholar who fought tooth and nail to make the Lanes s better place. She'd find herself looking up at him often; somehow, it brought her comfort to see his face among his people again. It kept her resolve firm in assisting Ralph and the Firelights.
Although the community was very self-sustainable, she learned that the conflict between Topside and the Undercity had created scarcity. One method they found of somewhat countering it was stealing as much as they could from the people outside the Hideout - especially from Pilties. That was what happened to her on her first day back - Ralph’s team spotted her gilded bag from a mile away, and so she’d become a target.
One day, after one of these expeditions, Ralph came up to her as she was doing some healing on an elderly Lady.
“Hey.”
He called from behind her.
“Give me a second, Ralph.”
She had her eyes closed, as she gently pressed her marbled palm on the lady's upper back. After a while, the glow of the veins on her arm faded out as she exhaled.
“There, Mrs. Siva. You should be able to breathe better now.” She beamed at the lady. On cue, Mrs. Siva took a long and unobstructed breath and smiled.
“Good heavens, the rasping is gone,” the Old Lady exclaimed. She turned around, taking both of the girl's hands. “Thank you kindly, my dear.”
The girl smiled back. “Don't mention it. Come back to me whenever you need.”
As Mrs. Siva left, the girl turned to face Ralph. Her eyes widened as she saw him.
“Your arm!”
Ralph smiled, waving at her with his hand. His new right hand. Connected to his new right arm. From the middle of his upper arm, where once was nothing, a mechanical prosthetic arm sprung, in steel and copper.
Prosthetics and augmentations were common in the Undercity, but with conflict causing both scarcity and destruction, rendering more and more people in need of mechanized limbs, they had become difficult to come by. That in itself would be enough cause to be surprised at Ralph's new acquisition, but this one also had a… refinement that was not commonly seen. She watched him wave at her, his movements natural and smooth, as if it was a real arm. If she didn't know, it could've easily been mistaken for a weird over-the-elbow metallic glove and not a prosthetic.
“That's amazing! Where did you get that?”
“It is, isn't it?” He twirled his wrist around, opening and closing his fingers. “I heard people talking about this guy’s workshop at the Entresol level and I decided to check it out. Turns out he was the real deal!”
“It must have cost a fortune,” she commented, getting up from her stool, and reaching for his new arm in awe.
“Would you believe me if I said it didn't cost me a single penny? The dude's doing this from the goodness of his heart or something.”
“Oh, wow,” she muttered. Instinctively, she glanced back at the painted mural, spotting Viktor. “I'm glad there's still people out there just making people's lives better.”
“Tell me about it, although… “ he scratched his chin, his eyes looking away from her. “He was mighty impressed with how the arm had healed before he did the procedure, and I ended up telling him about… Well, about you.”
Her eyes shot back at him with a scowl.
“Are you insane?”
“Wait wait, hear me out. Do you see this?” He brought both of his hands close to each other, touching each finger from his flesh hand to his prosthetic one rhythmically, with an impossible precision. “This kind of finesse is not a thing when it comes to prosthetics, and he theorized that life-like movements are a direct result of the interface between his tech and your healing magic.”
She hummed in response, eyes trailing his prosthetic arm again. Failing to bring Ralph’s arm back had pained her. It made her reminisce of her own time being an amputee, how even the most simple of tasks suddenly became a hassle in the face of her disability. She also watched him being often cast aside in the hideout, even when done not maliciously - the lack of his limb made him a liability. But now he had his arm back - and a damn good one at that.
Imagine if all of the people in the hideout in need of a limb had a fine prosthetic like Ralph now possessed.
“He said he was interested in meeting you.”
She blinked a few times out of her thoughts. With a long exhale, she turned to look at Ralph.
“I’m interested in meeting him too.”
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Chapter 1 | Chapter 2 | Chapter 3 | Chapter 4 | Chapter 5 | Chapter 6 (In Progress)