Finishing Off Witch Hat Spam With Some Doodles From The Other Week Because I Am Always Thinking About

I have to say that the idea that Talon is manipulating Sigma by using the “melody” that he always hears doesn’t seem to hold weight in canon. The “the melody is a harness” whisper that people have claimed to have heard backwards in his short is actually another repetition of him saying “gravity is a harness” so that one piece of evidence isn’t correct — also, he asks “what that melody?” long before Talon ever had a hold of him. So it’s related to whatever happened to the black hole on the space station, not Talon’s manipulations.

The music he’s hearing is probably a reference to “the music of the spheres” —

Kepler wasted his entire life trying to prove this theory about the planets having a musical kind of harmony, and his attempts to map out this theory looked like Sigma’s hyperspheres.

So his weapon, that he uses rhythmically like a musical conductor is like... a reference to a life of research wasted on enormous metaphysical explanations of the universe that seem just out of reach of even the greatest minds, and the idea is that he somehow grasps these ungraspable connections by actually being able to hear this “music of the spheres”

ESPIRIT DE CORPS  — The lieutenant is aware that you adore him. Painfully so. You aren’t exactly subtle about it.

Oh god. I’m not? Oh fuck.

Good! I wasn’t trying to be *subtle* about it.

Hey. No need to get personal.

ESPIRIT DE CORPS — Sorry, boss. His thoughts, not mine.

In any case, he is aware. Your adoration is plain for all to see, even for such an island of a man as the lieutenant is. Or once was, perhaps. And his own feelings toward you are… difficult to describe, but they are there. 

EMPATHY — Strong feelings. 

ESPIRIT DE CORPS — He doesn’t know if they can be called love, but it is a thought that has occurred to him. In a broad sense, they surely are love of *some* kind, at the very least. You are his friend. He cares for you. And…

HALF LIGHT — And he is afraid of you.

EMPATHY — And he is afraid *for* you.

ESPIRIT DE CORPS — And he is afraid for himself.

YOU — Afraid? Why?

INLAND EMPIRE — You know why. Do not fool yourself. You, with the scaffold of you all awry. There is no part of you that offers him sure footing.

ENDURANCE — Even your body… One way or another, he knows that he’ll probably be the one to find you dead, and it could come any day.

I hope it’s soon.

I wouldn’t want it to be anyone else.

No! I don’t want to do that to him…

Wait a second! Who said anything about dying?! I’m turning over a new leaf! I want to live!

PAIN THRESHOLD — Oh, Harry… You still don’t understand, do you? You’re already dying. You’re a miracle, really. You know you nearly had a fatal heart attack just from stubbing your toe in the dark this morning? It’s no longer a matter of if, but when.

ELECTROCHEMISTRY — Hey, you’ve always known that you were gonna be here for a good time, not a long time! The lieutenant ought to take a page out of your book, instead of being such a miserable, lonely old man.

RHETORIC — No offense, but I don’t think that the partying has made you any less miserable, lonely, or old. 

KIM KITSURAGI — Your partner takes another long drag of his cigarette, letting the smoke fill his lungs. He holds it there for a moment, then slowly breathes it out into the night.

ESPIRIT DE CORPS — He accepted a long time ago that this ritual may very well be the death of him, too. It’s a risk that he has made far more calculated by his rigid discipline. He would find it difficult to live without these small indulgences, but nearly impossible if he granted them too much power over himself.

And so it is with *you.* He can indulge himself with questions, imaginings. What it would be like to lower his spines and be a softer kind of animal. But he cannot give these feelings any more power over him than this, or it will be the death of him.

YOU — …Am I really so bad that I would kill him?

ESPIRIT DE CORPS — No. Worse than that, you would *change* him. You or anyone. To entertain the notion of true love as anything more than a pleasant, unattainable dream would be the death of the man that he has built himself into over the decades. He would become something so much smaller and more vulnerable. An animal with a soft belly exposed to the world.

YOU — Is that really anything to be afraid of?

HALF LIGHT — It is the only thing that there is to be afraid of.

INLAND EMPIRE — He is right to be afraid. The world is nothing but a series of patterns, so easily disrupted and changed and lost forever. There is no sense in any of it, no grand reason that makes any of it worth the terror and the pain. The world will swallow you both and then be swallowed whole. Après le monde, le gris. Après le gris… rien. There is nothing that either of you could offer the other to change this. In the face of it, your small bodies and your fleeting thoughts become so unbearably absurd. 

VOLITION — No. It is bearable. 

YOU — It is?

VOLITION — It is the only thing that there is to bear.

Costume. Chitons.

What do you think of Death as a character?

Death of The Endless is straight up my favourite depiction of Death in literature and media that I've seen so far. It's so good to see a depiction of Death that is sweet and compassionate for once.

But what I think is rather unfortunate about her—as is also the case for her other siblings (or every fictional characters ever)—is that people tend to only remember a part of her and forget the rest

She is one of The Endless. She is Dream's big sister. But first and foremost, she is Death itself—and I think people tend to forget that part (and I am not exempt to that either). And Morpheus being so close to her says a lot about him.

At first, you'd see her as 'the voice of reason'. After all, she has a good head on her shoulders, and what she's saying sounds reasonable. But when it comes to Morpheus, everything she said made him stride closer to her. He followed her. He followed her advice. He sought her out. He felt at peace with her. That's not just a little brother looking up to his dependable big sister; She. Is. Death. What does it say when someone has that mindset and attitude towards Death?

It's written all over (which is why I don't buy people's complaints that the ending 'came out of nowhere') but of course, people tend to forget Death or what she is—both in real life and the story apparently. Especially when Death isn't depicted as terrifying I suppose.

Also, I love that she is compassionate and caring but she's still indiscriminate. She loves everyone the same way—which, in a way, is still cold and cruel to us humans; because in our context, being kind to the cruel is being cruel to the kindhearted. But that's what she is; she is not justice. She is not mercy. She is not punishment. She is just what she is; she is Death—and she is there for all.

Also, I personally think the parts of her that many dubbed as her 'humanity' or the signs that she is 'the most human of all The Endless' has less to do with 'humanity' specifically and more about how she is so close and inseparable to life that we can't recognize her—which is, imho, what makes her so jarring as a non-human being, and what's so terrifying but at the same time, makes perfect sense about the concept she is.

Her speech bubble and dialogue font being the exact same as the regular ones in comics. Her dialogue—the choice of words—that are totally normal, casual, snd familiar (like someone we know. Like a friend). The fact that she has a house which she decorated to her taste—that she has her personal taste. How she keeps goldfishes as pets; it's all so 'human' but we recognise that because we are humans and that how we live—so maybe it's not just about being human but rather being alive.

Either way, we recognise her as one of us: be it as the same being we are or as a being who is alive. She is indistinguishable from what we perceive as normal and natural because that's what Death is: it is as natural to die as it is to be born. Nothing out of place and nothing unsettling about her that we forget that she is there amongst us—she is everywhere. She will always be there. We don't know when we'll see her. We can't recognize her until she said 'time's up'. Thus, many of us live our lives as if she doesn't exist. But she will be there for all.

And forgetting and denying that she has always been there and always will be might make it even more agonizing when she does come for us than it would be if we were to accept that. But either way, she is just what she is. We live our lives because she will be there for us. We live our lives according to how we see her. She is the reflection of our lives and what defines it, but our lives are our own.

That's such a cool depiction of Death, methinks.

Doomfist must have to deal with a lot of shit in Talon between everybody. Like a 7 foot tall HR manager. Could we get sone interractions reflecting this?

I love Beleaguered Manager Doomfist so much you don’t even know. 

-----

Doomfist: I always love hearing about your side projects, Sombra, what are you up to these days?

Sombra: Oh I keep myself busy. You hear about the mysterious disappearance of that Axiom hedge fund manager and all of her assets?

Doomfist: ...I must admit, I have not.

Sombra: Exactly.

----

Doomfist: So... how is your list coming along?

Reaper: *snarling scoff*

Doomfist: I’m not saying there’s a deadline, I’m just wondering about your progress.

----

Moira: I must say, this organization seems put to right now that Vialli isn’t around to obsess over every penny. 

Doomfist: Ideology must always come first, Moira, I know we can agree on that. Though I must ask, does the R&D department really need six different acid tubs?

Moira: Incompetent labtechs must be made example of--er--I mean it’s very important to my research.

----

Sigma: I deeply appreciate my new accommodations, Mr. Ogundimu, and I don’t mean to intrude, but I don’t know who else to ask about this and there seems to be a consistent issue with a lack of coffee stirrers in the break room. I don’t know who keeps using them all, but--

Doomfist: ...you literally can create angular velocity with your gravity powers. You can stir with your mind.

Sigma: Yes, but it’s the principle of it---and I find the gesture calming.

Doomfist: *sigh* I’ll look into it.

I had a little project but I was lazy so I only made a doodles of it. it’s about them explore their pasts.

Trying to simplify Yondu for easy drawing for this personal project Imma be working on because I have problems and I need to get help but I’m doing it anyway. 

Descriptions of Stannis' eyes throughout the books

Thinking of a decidedly non-fixit Arcane AU where Silco and Vander both live, but now have to navigate negotiations with Piltover for the nation of Zaun, and the fallout in their families.

Eight years ago, when Marcus spirited Vi away to rot in prison, unbeknownst to anyone he managed to take a just-barely-alive Vander, too. Vander remains Marcus’ best-kept secret, but after Silco and Jinx are arrested, he’s yanked from the bowels of Stillwater and reinstalled as leader of the newly declared nation of Zaun.

Reeling from his change of circumstance and the paths his family has taken during his imprisonment, Vander must now navigate the aftermath of the very different plans Vi and Silco have laid for an independent Zaun. 

But after five months of negotiations, all Zaunite prisoners are released from Piltovan prisons, and Vander and Vi must confront their siblings, and grapple with the base violence necessary for change. Takes place at the end of an alternate Act III.

Vander survived like Vi did, but Vi does not realize this at the time. She spends her entire time in Stillwater believing he died of his injuries.

Shimmer did allow him to survive, but he remains Vander rather than Warwick the robot-zombie-werewolf/living embodiment of the Hound of the Underground he will almost certainly be in canon.

The plot of Arcane proceeds pretty much normally. Caitlyn does not initially learn of Vander, as he wasn’t involved in the incident with Silco’s henchman. Few Piltovans know about Vander, and prior to Jayce and Mel’s initiative, even fewer care enough about Zaun to bother with him. After Caitlyn and Vi address the Council, Marcus’ dealings are discovered, and the idea of Zaunite independence is floated, some rusty gears start turning, but Jayce isn’t privy to this and still attempts to negotiate with Silco.

Silco still spirals when offered independence at the price of his daughter, and still monologues to Vander[‘s statue] about it. However, word of the terms, and Silco’s refusal of them, somehow gets out to the other Chembarons, and then to Zaun at large.

Fortunately, this manages to head off Jinx’s tea party of horrors.

Unfortunately, this leads to a (very understandably) enraged mob of Zaunites willing to drag both father and daughter to the bridge of Piltover for the price of one, and/or stone them in the streets.

Silco has precious few moments to assure Jinx he’d never forsake her. When the mob comes for them, he tells her to go and tries to cover her escape, but Jinx refuses to be separated from him. The mob washes over them.

Jinx, as she always does, fights like a woman possessed. Silco may be rusty, but he is and will always be a son of Zaun, and he is scrappy. When a man cuts off one of Jinx’s braids and starts tearing at her clothes, Silco stabs him to death with his own knife. But when the first stone is thrown, at the foot of the Bridge, all he can do is throw his scrawny body over hers in a desperate attempt to shield her.

Meanwhile, Cassandra Kirammen has just seen fit to reveal Vander’s survival to Caitlyn, who races to tell Vi (who is in Zaun hunting Sevika).

Vi is nearly overcome with joy at his survival and the prospect of rebuilding Zaun with a stable adult, and almost as pleased when they hear an angry mob has come for Silco. However, her joy turns to horror when she realizes Powder is with him, and Jinx is just as much a target of the mob as Silco is.

Vi races over the rooftops in the mob’s wake trying to reach her sister. She’s horrified to see a dead man, stabbed and trampled and still clutching a bright blue braid.

The mob surrounds Silco and Jinx at the Bridge, hurling stones. They are dispersed by a warning shot from Cassandra Kiramman, backed by a squad of Enforcers. The first thing Silco sees, when he’s able to lift his head, is a Piltovan gun pointed at him and his daughter.

Vi arrives at the rooftops overlooking the scene to hear Cassandra Kiramman tell them that Violet was right, their own people did turn on them. The anguish in Jinx’s cry as she buries her face in Silco’s chest and he tries to comfort her will haunt Vi for years. For a moment, Silco sees Vi above them, and the accusation and rage on his face as he holds his battered, traumatized daughter is chilling.

Cassandra then drops the bombshell than not only has Vander survived, he’s now poised to become the new leader of Zaun (provided cooperation with the Council). Cue Silco breakdown.

Vi watches the Enforcers arrest Silco and Jinx as Zaun processes this news. Having all but traded places with her sister after all these years, her reunion with Vander takes a bittersweet cast as she, Vander, and Ekko set about rebuilding Zaun and dismantling Silco’s Shimmer empire.

The chembarons put up a fight, but not as much as they might’ve, at least openly. Sevika managed to avoid the mob and she quickly emerges as one of the voices Vander knows he’ll have to negotiate with. Ekko and especially Vi are not happy with this, but the fact remains that Zaun is sorely lacking in any remaining competent leadership who’s been in the Lanes for the past 8 years and is even remotely trusted by the people.

Meanwhile, Silco and Jinx have had near-simultaneous breakdowns with the reveal that Vander is alive, Vi “betrayed” them to Piltover, and both of them are now working with Topside for the independence Silco’s (allegedly) been working for for the past 8 years. Convinced more than ever that everyone else betrays them, they become, if possible, even more codependent.

They are separated during intake (Jinx’s other braid is cut so she's not lopsided), and their frantic reunion in the canteen attracts attention, and some crude suggestions that Jinx should find herself a younger man. Silco, disgusted, says she’s his daughter.

Silco has failed to stand up to Piltover, failed to keep power in Zaun, and now apparently failed to kill Vander. His single-minded devotion to Jinx is all that stands between him and a complete breakdown, but his power to protect his child is severely limited in prison; in Zaun he was a king, here he’s just a sump-rat. And he’s fading.

Like the mutant fish that prowl the waters, Silco is adapted to the chemicals and pollutants in Zaun, and when cut off from the Shimmer, like a fish out of water, he gets very sick, very quickly.

Silco and Jinx see each other at meals and outdoor hour (no effort is made to separate men and women), but otherwise prisoners are left to rot. Neither engage with any other prisoners, even their henchmen. But Silco gets weaker, and as the months turn colder, he becomes too sick to leave his cell. When he doesn’t show at the canteen, Jinx takes it upon herself to go to him. She locates his cell and sneaks in at night (with some lockpicking help from Mylo’s ghost?). She can evade the guards, but she tells Silco they’re more concerned about keeping prisoners in Stillwater than what they do in there. Silco is more concerned about the implications of who might be able to get into his teenage daughter’s cell.

Silco is not doing well. Guards bring food to his cell, but don’t bother to see if he eats it. He can’t keep it down, and he’s becoming too weak to try. He tries to give it to Jinx, telling her not to waste it. It’s the only thing he can do for her.

He’s dying, and despite his attempts to reassure Jinx she’ll be alright, he’s terrified at the thought leaving her alone. Jinx is determined to keep him alive though.

She makes it to his cell every night, rumors be damned. When be becomes too weak to eat, she feeds him, doing everything she can to keep him fed, keep him warm, keep him breathing through the night. Fluid fills his lungs, leaving him in a state of constant drowning. He lapses into delirium, raving about Marcus and Vander and Vi, about Piltover and Shimmer and the nation of Zaun. Eventually, he can barely keep down water, and all Jinx can do for him is draw sharks on the walls and ceiling of his cell, to guard him when he’s trapped in nightmares he can’t wake from (she gets it.)

After five months of negotiations (~December?), Vander and Vi secure the release of all Zaunite prisoners from Piltovan prisons. What to do with them presents a challenge, as Zaun has no criminal justice system and next-to-no legitimate economy. Many of the prisoners are petty criminals by Piltovan standards, but ordinary citizens caught by Topside in Zaun. Then there are prisoners like Silco and Jinx, considered personae non gratae even (or especially) in Zaun. No one knows what to do with them, but it’s agreed they should face Zaunite justice.

Piltover knows that “Zaunite justice” could involve another mob, but they don’t care enough to object. Vi and Vander also know this, and care very much.

Vi is still in denial that Powder/Jinx is hated as much or more than Silco.

The prisoner transfer comes with little warning in the bowels of Stillwater, as the guards round up all the “sump-rat” prisoners one morning and send them to the Bridge, where the leaders of Zaun have assembled.

Vi is overcome with relief when she sees Powder among the released prisoners, but Jinx can’t find Silco.

He’s at the end of the crowd. As per the agreement, Piltover will release prisoners at the bridge, but he must cross it himself, and he’s barely able to walk. When he tries he immediately slips on the icy ground and doesn’t get up. Guards are laughing, Jinx is becoming frantic, and Sevika senses danger. 

Lying face-up on the bridge, Silco looks up at the flag of the new nation of Zaun and almost gives in. And then he hears Jinx screaming his name.

Silco can’t walk and Jinx can’t carry him. But she won’t allow anyone near, and Vander and Vi just agitate her more. Sevika finally steps forward to carry him to a van that will take him and Jinx back to Zaun.

Sevika takes a moment to assess their condition before making the executive decision to drug Jinx unconscious and carry Silco into the Last Drop

 Vander takes one look at him and calls for a doctor. When it becomes clear that Singed expects him to die and is a little too enthusiastic at the prospect of dissecting his eye, Caitlyn offers her father’s services as a doctor and escorts him to Zaun.

Vi stays at Powder’s bedside. When Jinx wakes asking for Silco, Vi tries to assure her she’ll never have to see him again, only for Jinx to punch her in the face and rush to Silco’s bedside calling for her father.

The first thing she sees is Vander standing over him, and she wrenches him away with strength that shouldn’t be possible. When Vander comes face to face with his youngest daughter after 8 years he can’t help but flinch.

Powder was his kindest of his children, the sweetest, gentlest, always trying to please. Jinx looks at him with rage and fear and accusation and betrayal and hate. She looks at him with Silco’s eyes, the last time he saw him.

Then she has him on the ground, too fast for him to react, going for his knife as Vi and Sevika try to separate them. Jinx and Vi briefly square off to defend their fathers, before Silco stirs.

Tobias Kiramman arrives to find the leader of Zaun battered and brooding, Caitlyn comforting a tearful Vi (who’s sporting a black eye), and Silco and Jinx reuniting for the first time in an independent Zaun. Both are weeping. It would be touching, if they weren’t who they were.

He recognizes Singed as a disgraced former doctor turned serial killer, and is concerned by the Zaunites’ unsurprised reactions. He’s the only doctor in Zaun, and the good ones wouldn’t come to the Undercity if they had any choice.

He’s also disturbed by the condition Silco’s in. It should have been obvious he was ill, but it’s clear he received no medical care in prison.

When Vander slashed his face open, chemicals in the water leached into the wound, formed crystals in his flesh, in the back of his eye. His eye’s turned black, the flesh of his cheek underneath caved in and rotted away. What was in that water? Singed would love to find out! Some phenol maybe. Shimmer kept its spread at bay, but now…

He’s so weak Tobias warns Vander he may not live, but Vander tells him he will, because Silco’s a survivor, for better or worse.

Silco and Jinx’s move back in the Last Drop goes about as well as Sevika expects. They put Jinx in Powder’s old room, leading to disturbing, violent meltdowns that Vi and Vander are unprepared to deal with, while Silco’s health crashes several times in one night.

Vander concedes that it’s unsustainable and, on Sevika’s suggestion, eventually puts Jinx with Silco over Vi’s objections, as he’s the only one who can halfway calm her during meltdowns and she's the only one with experience with his healthcare.

Jinx has become Silco’s sole motivation to go on, and their dynamics subtly reverse. Clinginess and insecurity are traits readily associated with Jinx, but not obviously with Silco. Jinx has always been dependent on Silco, but in Stillwater and after she cared for him. This wasn’t to pump up her feelings of importance, or even a child’s desperation to avoid losing another parental figure; Jinx sincerely cared for her father out of concern. When he tells her she saved his life, she tells him children can take care of parents when they grow up. 

The threat to their relationship was never Vander. Vi is another story, but Silco is Jinx’s father, not him.

Vander is unwilling to ask anyone else to care for Silco, and whatever Jinx can’t do Vander does himself. Silco alternates between vicious cruelty and such obvious physical and mental agony it’s impossible to fake, and he can swing unpredictably from one to another. He doesn’t need to accuse Vander; he knows.

Silco’s necessarily feeling overwhelmed and emotional after learning of Vander’s survival and Zaun gaining independence. He’d finally understood and and even forgiven Vander when he believed him to be dead, but the reality of confronting him alive is very different.

Vander: Sweeps in to gain independence and claim leadership of Zaun after 8 years in solitary confinement 🙌

Silco: half-carried out by his teenage daughter after 5 months in prison

Yeah, Silco doesn’t like that.

On one night, Vander freezes outside Silco’s door, listening to his brother curse Marcus and his deception, writhing and crying in pain from the wounds Vander gave him, as Jinx tries to soothe him by describing how she killed Marcus in graphic detail and offering to kill his 5-year old daughter. He curses Vander too, and Vander flinches when he hears Powder offer to kill him as well, if it would make him feel better. But even wracked with pain, Silco realizes how dangerous this could be and that he needs to be the adult in this situation. He declines, and tells Jinx to be absolutely sure he’s lucid before carrying out any hit jobs he issues. 

On another night, Vander finds Silco passed out covered in vomit and carries him to the bathroom to clean him up; as he puts him in the tub Silco comes to and panics at the combination of Vander and water, struggling violently enough to injure Vander and himself. Vander in frustration finally asks if he would burden Jinx with all of his care, and Silco begrudgingly surrenders. When Vander makes him admit he hasn’t kept any food down all day, he brings him new food for to eat and watch him eat it. Silco tries to tell him not to waste it and give it to Jinx, but Vander snaps at him that it’s not a waste.

They begin to speak, a little, about their children. What to do with Jinx? Redeem her as Powder or prosecute her as Jinx? Silco credits Jinx’s theft of the Hex gem and threat to Piltover for Zaunite independence, the base violence necessary for change. She’s perfect, he tells Vander, a true daughter of Zaun. She’s done what we never could.

Vander’s learned a lot about the things Jinx has done, what Powder’s turned into. He can’t tell if Silco is truly that blind to her faults or if he’s in denial. When he presses Silco about what role he played in making Jinx, Silco riles, but not at the accusation he corrupted her. He genuinely believes that becoming Jinx was the only way to heal Powder from the pain of betrayal, something he knows well.

He tells Vander that after Vander tried to kill him, he returned to the mines, through paths even Vander never knew. He stumbled for days (though he admits that he might have been hallucinating, as there are things in the mines that can make you “see things”) before he came to an underground clearing filled with impossible flowers sustained by a mysterious glowing fluid. He collapsed there, and it was there Singed found him. Singed asked him if he wanted to live, and Silco tells Vander he wanted revenge.

Vander’s heard enough and turns to go, but Silco becomes more agitated, snarling at Vander not to turn away from him, to look at him. But to Vander’s surprise, her doesn’t seem motivated by anger or possessiveness or a disagreement in ideology; he’s terrified for what will happen to Jinx if they try to force her to become Powder again, reduced to begging Vander not to do that to her.

When news comes that Piltover has officially recognized the nation of Zaun, most of the surviving adults of the rebellion generation are overcome with emotion at the news. Silco breaks down as Jinx comforts him and Vi finds Vander weeping it the Last Drop and goes to him. Caitlyn spies Sevika crying quietly in a back room and slips away before she sees.

Silco and Vander have achieved everything they once wanted with the nation of Zaun, but they cannot share this victory together, not now. The truth they are unwilling to concede is that Zaun’s independence took both Silco and Jinx’s “base violence necessary for change,” and Vander and Vi’s diplomacy and compromise with Piltover. They need to be united, as they once were, as they always planned to be, if they are to move forward. But they won’t. They can’t. Not anymore.

Vander was never meant to be the diplomat. Silco was supposed to be the clever one, the negotiator, who wove his way through a trail of paperwork and legalese, who’d gain the respect of the Pilties once Vander was done cowing them from the Undercity. It takes more than a revolution to build a nation. Vander needs his brother now.

But that’s just it, isn’t it? Silco’s there, he’s right there, down the hall, on the other side of the door! But his brother is gone.

On top of that, wanting Silco dead is one of the few things that unite most in Zaun (and Vi and Ekko aren’t inclined to deny them). Vander insists he will stand trial once he’s strong enough to stand, but many would prefer a quicker end to justice. Fear of Jinx is all that stands between Silco and a very easy death.

Sevika: You’re welcome to try. It’s just a matter of how many of you Jinx will take with her.

Vander is between a rock in a very hard place. One night, Silco wakes to Vander crying silently over him, but gives no indication that he’s awake. Silco and Jinx are monsters, but they are monsters of Vander’s own making. It is not possible for Vander to pursue justice for Zaun without betraying his brother and his daughter, again.

Silco gradually becomes aware that a significant factor in independence negotiations was the return of the Hextech gem to Piltover, and it hasn’t been returned yet, because Vander and Vi can’t find it in the Undercity. When Jinx confides that she hid it before the mob took her and knows its location, for the first time since Stillwater, Silco has some hope.

 For better or worse, Silco is back in the game. He starts to pull himself together. His hair’s grown out, hanging unevenly to his jaw, clipped back with Jinx’s sparkly barrettes. He's lost so much weight his dress shirts no longer fit, so he wears them wrapped around, held in place with a belt that needed a new hole worked into it, and what look like pinstriped pajama bottoms. Tobias Kiramman hears one Zaunite comment that “at least he’s dressing normally now.”

At one point he also watches in horror as Silco, barely strong enough to walk, lights up a cigarette. When Dr. Kiramman protests, citing his lungs, Silco coolly asks Jinx to open a window, allowing a haze of greenish smog to enter. As Tobias chokes and coughs, the two Zaunites remain impassive, and three glowing eyes stare at him through the haze.

Sevika also pays Silco a visit. She denies being a traitor, as she worked for Zaun, not Silco, but tells him she wasn’t the one who exposed his deal with Piltover to the Chembarons and to Zaun (That was Renni, and I honestly can’t blame her). She also tells him he looks like shit, but he looks more like himself than he has in years.

Silco’s plan is to use knowledge of the Hex gem as a bargaining chip. Not to avoid prosecution, he knows that’s impossible, but his goal is to get a sentence that’s survivable rather than being left to rot in Stillwater, with a guard bribable enough to allow Jinx visits (and potentially explore other means of leverage).

He also seeks to shield Jinx from prosecution, taking all blame for her crimes however implausible. Everyone in Zaun knows it’s a lie, but Silco’s hoping that apathy will save them rather than ignorance. 

Ironically enough, his and Vi’s goals are completely aligned, had they ever considered coordinating their assertions that Jinx was blameless and acting solely on Silco’s orders.

However, all his plans fall to nothing when, on trial by the leaders of Piltover and Zaun, Jinx lives up to her name, threatening them with Hextech weaponry in a bid to protect Silco. Sevika later finds him crumpled in a corner, helpless and out of options to save his daughter or himself.

(This family is so doomed by the narrative).

lol now im just imagining voldemort in the middle of brutally torturing snape to death stopping and being like 'oh sorry my bad'

no but seriously. i love how snape has such a calm and understated way of recounting what must have been a tremendously harrowing experience.