#ekko: 🙂🖕

[misfits-of-zaun]

“You really don’t get it. Do you?”

Jinx almost sounded as tired and fed up as he felt. Maybe he wasn't the only one who'd had a sleepless night over this, then. Albeit probably for very different reasons.

The side of Ekko's mouth twitched infinitesimally; the faint ghost of a wry smirk.

"I could say the same about you," He returned without any real bite, taking advantage of this temporary lull to sweep his gaze over the room for signs of any damage, missing or moved objects that could grant further clues as to her headspace - or indicate any efforts to construct traps.

After all, if Jinx had been effectively trying to pull the pin on all of this, she would have likely been expecting the next set of feet entering her room to belong to her executioner. And whether it genuinely was the outcome she'd decided she wanted or not, Ekko found it impossible to believe she'd accept anyone coming to kill her without putting up one final fight and going out with a - probably literal - bang at least.

The back of his neck prickled as Jinx finally sat up and fixed him with the full weight of her attention. Reflexively, Ekko felt his chin lift upwards and his shoulders shift back a fraction as he met her gaze, emulating the unflinching confidence he so desperately wished he could manifest. At least he had the muscle memory to carry him through.

Keep your shit together.

For a horrible heartbeat, he thought Jinx was going to fly at him again. His stomach tightened; the ache in his chest intensified, like the cruel heel of a palm pressing into a deep bruise.

Then Jinx was up and moving towards the window, making a point of peering out as if to survey the bloodthirsty mob surely waiting for her. She made a sound of scornful disappointment at the obvious lack of an audience, and paced back away again, directing a spinechilling look over her shoulder at him as she went.

Swiftly stomping down on how that made him feel and stuffing it into his bulging box of Things To Deal With Later, Ekko made a point of remaining precisely where he was, and raised a single challenging eyebrow at her.

What, were you expecting me to bring backup? Go fuck yourself. I'm not scared of you.

On the other hand, the concept that he could be about to get forced into a kill-or-be-killed stand-off with what was left of his childhood best friend, purely because being dead with Silco was that much more preferable to Jinx than being alive with him?

Yeah, that fucking terrified him on a deep visceral level.

Don't think about it. Just keep your damn shit together.

“Hmn.”

In an unexpected turn of events, Jinx elected to flop back onto her bunk and stare up at the ceiling with a reticent sort of expression - a disarmingly unthreatening move.

“We both know I don’t wanna do that.”

With anyone else, in any other context, this behaviour would have demonstrated a tacit surrender.

But something about Jinx's expression, about about her tone of voice, about the way that neither of them defused the oppressive tension lingering in the air, just made his stomach curdle in grim anticipation. Ekko couldn't put his finger on why.

He knew better than to question such a strong gut feeling, though.

"Well, it's your choice. I'm not here to make you do stuff you don't wanna do." Admittedly, the choice of words was rather pointed, and there was a note of faintly acidic exasperation seeping through into his voice now.

Don't you dare. Whatever it is you're thinking about, don't you fucking dare.

"Instead of talking about what we already both know, then, are you gonna tell me whatever it is you do wanna be doing? Because you were on such a roll about your thoughts before - you might as well get it all out."

@f1shbonez

Charred Bridge

Ekko splashed some water on his face, and resignedly set about re-applying his face paint. Sunlight was filtering through his window now; he had to face the day and whatever came with it, whether he felt ready or not.

He hadn't slept. He'd spent hours unpicking what had happened. Repeating the memory in his mind over and over, analysing every freeze-frame in his memory, in an effort to glean some new detail he'd missed - as if the key to what to do next was buried somewhere, waiting to be gleaned from the right scrap of information.

Mostly it had felt a lot like going blindly in circles and clutching at empty air.

His friends had tried to help. Eve in particular had been surprisingly diplomatic and compassionate about the whole thing. There had been no "I told you so", or any pressure towards a certain specific decision, in spite of what he knew they were all thinking.

Is this it, then?

The redness was gone from his face now; there was no lasting physical mark, only a little residual tenderness. Just like last time, the real damage from the blow was in the resounding devastation of what it represented.

A lot of the violence Jinx committed was from a distance. Shooting, blowing things up. It was easy to be detached with that kind of distance. A slap was up close and extremely personal. It wasn't her style.

And yet she'd gone for precisely that with him twice now.

He now knew where she'd learned it from - and it made it sting so much worse, that she was trying to hurt him and push him away in the exact way Vi had hurt and rejected her.

I don’t wanna be rescued. I'm Jinx now.

You’re not my family. You’re not! You’re not -!

Ekko shut the glass cabinet above his sink with a little more force than was strictly necessary, and turned away from his reflection. He could fix up his hair and clean up his face to make it look like he hadn't been up all night over this shit, but the real armour he needed was calm, decisive action.

By the time he reached the stairs, that strange, seething feeling started up under his skin again. He felt twitchy, on edge, as he descended the steps on autopilot. He didn't know what he was heading back into. The quiet on the other side of the door told him nothing.

It took a moment to spot her (was not getting immediately attacked a positive sign or not?) But when he did, fhe sight of her triggered a strong gut reaction - a violent swooping sensation in his stomach with a sharp pang, not unlike missing a step on the way down the stairs and then getting impaled with a broken piece of the bannister while trying to regain his balance. A jolt of apprehension and hurt and bitter grief that he had to swallow down, down, down.

You get one shot at this. Make it count.

"...So, are you coming down for breakfast, or are you still feeling like an asshole?"

The query was dryly sardonic, his expression deliberately neutral and bordering on nonchalant. But his eyes were unflinching, shrewdly evaluating.

He made a point of folding his arms and leaning against the doorway, as if this was business as usual and there was absolutely nothing to be afraid of. As if his heart wasn't absolutely hammering, as if he wasn't waiting to find out whether the childhood friend he'd worked so hard to reach for was about to drop another match and send his world up in smoke for a second time.

This was the only card he had left to play.

Either this would work, or it wouldn't.

Either she'd understand what he was trying to say, or she wouldn't.

Do I look like I'm running away?

@f1shbonez