the_earth_trembled @theearthtrembled - Tumblr Blog

Forgotten

My bad. I finally read There is No Antimemetics Division and got an idea for an angsty CaitVi fic, so Tumblr gets the taste test before I commit to a third IP in AO3. This would be set in the Arcane universe, with an event that basically makes it the Powder AU.

___

There was rarely a dull moment at The Last Drop, but Vander had managed to find one anyway.

The gap between lunchtime and the happy hour crowds was a curse of silence. Usually he’d be content to have a few minutes of peace land in his lap like this, but today his hands ached for want of a task.

They prob’ly ached from a bit of arthritis as well, if that fuzzball professor Ekko insisted on bringing round knew half as much as he claimed to, but Vander attributed it to needing to keep himself busy just the same, because he was old, but not that old.

At least he hoped he wasn't that old.

Tankards and glasses had been well-polished to a near-mirror shine. He’d already tidied and sorted the pantry twice, then decided to do it a third time to keep his mind from eating itself alive out of boredom. His desperation for a task had become so bad that after spilling a bit of dottle on the bar while cleaning his pipe, he’d decided to break out an ancient jar of paste wax and give the bar a good buffing.

Across the room, the jukebox randomly plucked a new record, and Vander couldn’t help but softly sing along to the tune as he worked the wax into the scarred wood of the bartop.

“There’s a girl in town and word’s gone around she’s just fine. So I don’t worry my head ‘cause I know her heart is tied to mine. The life that we live and the love that I give to her—FUCKING HELL!”

Vander’s whole body flinched at the sudden presence of another person.

No more than two stools down was a young man in a red jacket, sleeves shoved up past his elbows, forearms wrapped down to the palms in boxing tape. A black hood had been pulled up and over his head, obscuring his face from view.

“For the love-uh…” Vander huffed out a breath, and began again. “Look, uh… sorry about that young fella. Didn’t realize I had company. Hope my pitiful attempts at singing haven’t run you off.”

His new companion reached up with both hands and slid their hood back and over their shoulders, revealing a young woman’s face, framed by a shock of deep pink hair that’d been cut short and swept messily to the side.

“Ah, sorry, lass. I stand corrected. Still, neat trick-a yours you got there. Quiet as a church mouse you are.”

“Yeah,” the young woman said. “Old habit at this point. Sorry.”

Hoping his voice was steadier than his heart rate, Vander waved her off. “S’no trouble at all. I’ll admit: I’m impressed. Not many folks who can sneak on me like that, not even my kids.”

“Maybe they haven’t tried hard enough yet,” she dryly replied.

He tipped his head side-to-side as he pretended to think it over. “Maybe you’re right. Think I should give ‘em a few more tries to get it right?”

The woman shrugged.

“Right,” Vander said, feeling his usual powers of social connection coming up woefully short. “Well, uh… welcome. You know what you’d like, or is this your first time here?”

“Nah, I’ve been here before.”

“That so? You’ll have to come ‘round more often then. I always remember my regulars’ orders.”

She managed a weak smile, but Vander couldn’t help noticing it never met her eyes.

“Turns out I’m not an especially memorable person,” she said

“I wouldn’t go that far,” Vander opined. “Not sure I’ve met anyone with hair quite like yours. See you’re a fellow boxer as well, which I’d be keen to learn more about. Though I’m a bit worried for your safety if you need to wear that tape outside the ring too.”

She lifted her hands, turning them over, clenching her fists and flexing her forearms to stretch the tape.

“Gotta be ready for anything,” she murmured.

“You any good, lass? Hopefully win more fights than ya lose.”

“I do alright. Pretty decent for a southpaw. Learned from the best, though he liked to hassle me for leading with my head.”

“Didn’t realize I’d taught you,” Vander quipped.

“Maybe you did,” she replied, her smile fading.

A growing sense of unease forced Vander to pause and take a closer look at his curious new guest.

He figured she was old enough to drink, but not by much. Clearly not having the best go of it by the depths of sadness in those storm-grey eyes. She somehow seemed much older than she was, though that might’ve been on account of her clothes having seen better days. A pink scar stretched from her lip to her brow in a way that hinted at the slice of a knife rather than the swing of a fist.

“Hope you don’t mind me askin’, but, uh… you alright, lass?”

“Sure. Just peachy.”

“Pardon me sayin’ so, but I don’t believe you for a second.”

“And pardon me for saying so, but I thought bartenders were supposed to pour drinks for customers.”

“Sometimes they lend an ear when it’s needed.”

“Sounds boring.”

He shrugged, adopting a gentle smile. “It’s a living. And I don’t mind boring.”

“You hate being bored.”

Vander chuckled. “Maybe so. But I like helping folks too. So tell me: What sorta help do you need today?”

“I don’t need help.”

“Hmm… not sure I believe you on that count either. Ev’ryone who walks through my doors needs something. Usually a drink, but I don’t think that’s what you came here for. Now if I’m wrong, you go right ahead and tell me so. I’ll believe ya and fetch your drink. But you’re gonna have-ta tell me I’m wrong first.”

The woman worried at her lip with her left thumb as she looked up at him. She was the first to break eye contact, turning her eyes down to stare at nothing on the bar.

“Figured as much,” he said. “Come on then, out with it. I’m quite the expert at hearing the grievances and troubles of you young folks. Got a daughter of my own who’s nearly your age.”

“There’s nothing quite so undoing as a daughter,” she muttered.

“Hah! Well now you sound like my partner. Practically a second father to her. Wasn’t always that way, though. He and I used to be at each other’s throats—and I mean that literally. Nearly took a lotta dying to convince us to hash things out—”

“—So,” she interjected. “You said you had some advice.”

“I’m all ears if you’re sharin’.” He leaned forward onto the bar top.

She sighed, then rubbed a hand down her face. Her left hand pinched at a loose thread in the boxing tape on her right, slowly unraveling it line by line.

“See the thing is… when uh… when I was a kid, I got in trouble with my dad. Well, not my dad dad, but he’d taken us in after my parents were killed, so he basically was my dad. By choice. On both our parts I guess.”

“So sorry for your loss, kiddo. That must’ve been tough.”

“Yeah, um… yeah. It’s—that’s not—It’s just, when I got in trouble, it’d almost gotten my sister and our brothers hurt. So he sat me down and he told me that when people look up to you, that you don’t get to be selfish. That whatever happens to them is on you. And I thought I knew what that meant, you know? I’ve tried to live by it all these years. So I don’t dump my shit on other people, and I make sure to fill everyone else’s plate first, and I’ve tried to take on this… this thing that’s happened without dragging anyone else into it. But it turns out that doing all that is really fucking hard,” she said, her voice cracking on the last word. “So I guess what I was wondering is… any thoughts on all that?”

Vander nodded slowly, scritching at the underside of his bearded chin. “Well,” he finally said, “I think your father—or whoever he is or was to you—gave you a bit of excellent advice in the dumbest way possible.”

The woman laughed, a thick, wet sound that died almost as soon as it’d arrived. She swiped the back of her taped hand across the corner of her eye.

“Look, I’m not saying he’s wrong per say, but I’m not convinced he meant what you thought he meant, either.”

“How so?”

“Well for starters, if people look up to you, there is power in that, and you have gotta respect it. So no, you don’t get to be selfish, because being selfish can get those people hurt. But where I think you got it wrong—and where he should’ve made sure you got it right—was what that actually means. Because it… Look, I don’t usually share this, and hopefully this was before your time, but there was an afternoon around two decades ago when I got mad. And I let that mad make me impatient, and I let that impatience make me selfish. And in my selfish, impatient anger, I led a crowd I’d whipped into a frenzy of that same anger across a bridge to Piltover. What I’d wanted was to demand equitable treatment and better rights for us all. I’d wanted to be heard. What I got us instead was a massacre. I buried some of my greatest friends as a reward for my selfishness, for my impulsiveness. And that’s what I think when I hear what you say your father said. If you act on your own impulses without considering who’s paying attention, and who’ll jump when you say ‘Jump!,’ then yeah: Those consequences are on you.”

The young woman nodded slowly, but didn’t look up.

“Here’s the thing though,” he said. “None of what I heard you say would ever mean you’re solely responsible for everything that happens to everyone else around you. And none of it would mean you have to live your life as a martyr, or that accepting some happiness and comfort for yourself means you’re robbing someone else of the same. You’re just as entitled to joy as anyone else. And love. Love from your friends, and spectacular, earth-shaking love from someone you love just as much. Would be an awful hard life depriving yourself of even an ounce of it just because you can’t carry any more with that world of yours hoisted up on your back.”

A tear spattered on the bar top. Vander smoothly plucked the rag from his shoulder and swiped it away as if it’d never been there.

“Sorry,” she muttered, sniffling.

“No trouble. Just waxed the bar. But I take it I didn’t too bad with my advice-giving?”

She clicked her tongue. “Would’ve helped to have heard that a long time ago.”

“Wish you’d heard it from the source. What happened to your father anyways? He pass, or you two just not find much time to catch up?”

“I’ve tried talking to him a bunch of times, but nothing ever sticks.”

“Ah. Well, there’s always next time.”

“I’m…” She shakily exhaled, then sucked in a new breath. “I’m not sure I want there to be a next time. I think I’m really fucking tired, Vander. I think I’m just about done with,” she gestured around them. “I think I’m done with all this. I think I need to accept that life won, you know? I’m down for the count, and I don’t wanna get back up again.”

The hair on the back of Vander’s neck prickled out, concern flooding his mind.

“And what’s that all mean, exactly?”

“It means…” She sighed again, rubbing at her eyes. “It means… nothing. I’m just tired of trying over and over again and nothing ever changing. It’s fine. It’s nothing.”

“Ah,” he said, entirely unconvinced. But he did believe, with all the certainty he possessed, that he could not let this young woman leave without making sure she got help first.

He tapped the bar top twice with one of his knuckles. “Well, your guard needs work. I wish I could say it gets easier, kiddo. But I’d be lyin.’ So you mind if I ask you something else?”

“Sure.”

“When’s the last time someone else did something kind for you?”

She laughed, loud and hard, with more bitterness than any brew he’d ever served within these walls.

“That long?” Vander asked.

“I was 15.”

“And how old are you now?”

“Not 15.”

“I figured, on account-ah you sitting here at my bar.”

“I sat at your bar when I was 15, too,” she said.

“Then I’m sorry for forgetting,” he offered.

“Don’t sweat it. I learned a long time ago it’s not your fault.”

Confused, he looked her over once more, noting the pain she wore across her features now.

“Look, kid, d’you have a safe place to stay? Somethin' to eat? If you need a place to crash for the night, we’ve got a couch downstairs, plus some old bunk beds if that’s no good. I’ll admit it’s not the comfiest place in the world, but it was good enough for my kids. And it’s safe. You have my word that no one’ll bother you here. I can even get you set up with a good, hot meal. Well… it’d be hot anyways. Can’t always guarantee the ‘good’ part. Let’s say a hot, edible meal, yeah?”

“I don’t have any money to pay you.”

“Did I ask for money?”

“No, but—”

“—Then it’s settled. If that world you’re hauling around on your back can’t find any kindness in its heart for you today, then let me share a bit of mine with you for awhile.”

“Yeah,” she finally said. “Yeah, maybe.”

“No maybes about it. Now lemme get you a drink—shot of whiskey I’d reckon—which you desperately need by the looks-uh you. Hell, I’ll even join you for this round.”

Vander turned around to the back bar, fetching two rocks glasses from a tray tucked beneath the counter.

“D’you grow up around here? You said you sat at my bar as a kid. Way I figure, your parents must’ve lived close by then, yeah?. They work the mines at all? I might've known 'em. Maybe you even played with my daughter when you were both little. Name’s ‘Powder.’ She got into enough trouble for two kids, so the way I figure, maybe you’re one of ‘em.” He chuckled, then grabbed a bottle of well whiskey and measured a finger pour in each glass. “Her name sound familiar to you? You two ever cross paths?”

“Who in the blazes are you talking to?” Silco asked as the door to the kitchen swung shut behind him.

“Well I was—” Vander turned to find an empty bar. His mind felt shrouded in fog, something important on the tip of his memory that was just out of reach no matter how hard he tried to brush his fingertips against its edges.

“I… I was…”

“Vander, are you alright? I daresay I may actually be concerned. You’re certainly putting the ‘old’ in ‘old friend’ this evening. Oh! Lovely, thank you,” Silco said, plucking one of the glasses from Vander’s hands. “You shouldn’t have, but I’m glad you did.”

“I…” Vander started, unable to pull his thoughts back from when they’d gone. He felt like he’d walked into another room to grab something, only to have forgotten what it was the moment he’d stepped through the doorway.

And that the something in this case was incredibly important.

The cool back of Silco’s hand pressed itself against his forehead, then his cheek. “Well you don’t feel like you’re running a temperature. You sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah,” Vander replied, clearing his throat and giving his head a good shake. “Yeah, yes, sorry. I must’ve heard you coming in and my body was shuffling along without my brain. Apologies. Just feeling a bit… distracted at the moment. It’s just… I can’t shake this feeling. It’s like I’ve forgotten something important, but for the life of me, I can’t remember what.”

“Well the stove’s off if that’s what you’re worried about.”

“Not the stove.”

Silco tapped the tip of his pointer finger against his chin. “Supply orders? Maybe prep work for the kitchen tonight?”

“All handled,” Vander replied, his mind already clearing, the mental fog burning away as if nothing had been wrong to begin with.

“Did you lose your keys, again? You know how you’re always losing your—”

“—I didn’t lose my keys,” Vander said with a smile. “At least not this time.”

“Well I’m out of ideas,” Silco said as he took another sip of whiskey.

“That makes two of us,” Vander replied. “But if I can’t remember, it must not’ve been that important.”