#sure without singed vander and viktor would be dead for good

[swagging-back-to]

i also feel worse about rectis's death than i do about viktors.

yeah rectis served noxus and was ambessas right hand, sure he tortured various zaunites.

but his death scene was truly brutal and you can see the emotional toll it takes on ambessa. she reacts stronger to rectis dying than she does about mel's suspected death and/or kidnapping.

[wingedshadowfan]

"you mourn the dead and scorn the living"

or, what i find so fascinating about the arcane alternate universe ekko and heimerdinger got sent to:

there is very little we know for sure about what happened in the alternate universe, other than the fact that the explosion caused by the hexstones in jayce's apartment killed vi, that silco and vander forgave each other somehow, that hextech never got invented, and that the lanes are flourishing.

those things are all intrinsically connected.

imagine a headline about a bunch of rascals from the undercity blowing up an inventor's penthouse after robbing it and escaping, and about an orphan from the undercity dying in a tragic accident in a topside inventor's penthouse. depending on how it's framed, even if it's public knowledge vi, powder, mylo and claggor tried to rob the place, even if jayce and caitlyn also got injured, vi's death would've earned sympathy and shed light not only on jayce's dangerous experiments, but also on the situation in the undercity. what would've cassandra done when she found out kids in the undercity are so deprived that they'd go to these lengths (putting themselves, but also her daughter and jayce in danger) just to steal some junk from topside? what if caitlyn had actually died? would cassandra meet with vander? or powder? go down there herself? what would she say to the council not as a kiramman, not as a councilor, but as a mother? what would greyson have said and done, someone who thought so highly of caitlyn, and worked with vander, fully aware of the situation in zaun? it's unclear in the au, but judging by the fact that silco isn't "evil" anymore, it's likely that zaun somehow got its independence eventually.

i think vander would've turned to silco when vi died. in vander's head, even if silco chose to never forgive him (because vander doesn't know silco never found his letter), silco knew vi as a baby or even as a kid. even if he hadn't seen her in years, he was just as close to felicia as vander. vander would've blamed himself for what happened, would've wanted to tell him, to seek comfort in an old friend, feeling like he owes him the truth. we know silco wasn't actively trying to kill vander but just jumped on the first opportunity he got, so what would've happened if vander approached him first, and in this context? maybe that's how they found out about the letter and decided to reconcile in grief, which also must mean silco abandoned singed's experiments. he only needed shimmer to get power, an edge to topside, a way to scare them and earn their respect, so he could achieve a free nation of zaun. what if vi's death already started a discussion on that front, so he didn't have to continue going that route?

what if the lanes are doing so much better in the au not just because hextech never got made, but also because shimmer never got made? what if industrialist silco, who reconciled with vander in grieving what is effectively his niece, actually used his money for good, and not to accumulate even more power and control against piltover? or maybe jayce, affected by the situation and the near death experience, listened to heimerdinger the first time (met viktor perhaps) and changed his experimental focus so his work actually helped reduce inequality between the twin cities without meddling with the arcane?

the difference between a juvenile thief and a victim child is such a fine line, but you wouldn't speak ill of the dead, you wouldn't blame them post-factum like you'd do to the living, would you? you'd want to know who they were once, what happened to them, how it can be avoided in the future. instead of witch hunting and looking for someone to take the blame, piltover would also be forced to look within, to take at least partial blame. i think delving into the reasons for the differences in the canon and alternative universe, even speculatively, tells us so much about human psychology and the world of arcane, if not the real world.

EDIT: just wanted to add this here