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Caitlyn hasn’t been sleeping. She lies awake with a hand under her pillow, curled into a fist, thinking. Everything is wrong. The world, the beautiful and bright world she knows—made of glass?
She isn’t stupid. The foul dungeons beneath Piltover’s council building don’t evidence a city state that treats the enemies of its leading houses with justice. Of course there are problems with the system. The nearby presence of an impoverished sister city makes the believability of Piltover’s renown as a progressive centre of culture seem quite frail. So yes, she’d always known it was flawed. But rotten to the core?
It doesn’t compute. Her grief is a barbed thought spiral that cradles her mind and loops down to grip her heart, always squeezing. It’s nothing compared to what Vi’s lost, a quiet voice whispers.
“She lied,” Caitlyn mumbles, eyes flickering open to her dark chambers. “Didn’t she? She said...she said take the shot. Nothing else matters.”
She sits up abruptly, throwing her soft quilt off her body and staggers to her desk. A half-full bottle of Noxian red wine sits there atop a small stack of papers. She turns on her desk lamp and the vividity of the red liquid is magnified by the light. Her bright hair. The sound of her gauntlets hitting the floor and her desperate hands and her soft kiss. Don’t change.
A sound of frustration tears from Caitlyn’s chest. She picks up the wine and takes a swig. It goes down smoothly. Full bodied, perfectly dry. Liquid gold.
She wishes she had something that would scrape at her throat. A drink with a bite. Her thoughts whirl. Don’t change. Don’t change. Caitlyn presses her eyes closed. She was meant to take the shot. That was the plan. That was the fucking plan. Vi was the one that changed her mind.
Why had she ever tried to protect her feelings? She should have incriminated Jinx in front of the council as soon as she realised she was responsible for the attacks. Caitlyn had the shot on Jinx, she had the shot, and she failed. Jinx didn’t die. And Jinx made a bomb.
The only reason she hesitated to shoot was because Vi begged Caitlyn to spare her life. But she couldn’t be allowed to go free, not with Caitlyn’s mother in the ground. She had to be brought to justice somehow. Uncontrollable and psychotic, she couldn’t be stopped by anything lesser than a bullet.
The law holds everything together: cities, families. Vi upset the balance. She made it all fall apart.
Caitlyn has pictured it so many times. Her finger on the trigger, Jinx’s blue head in the sight of her gun, a gunshot ringing out, the sway of her braid. The soft thud of her small body hitting the ground.
Caitlyn’s thoughts don’t move in a line anymore. They jolt around, pushing and shoving. Perhaps eliminating Jinx would make it all go quiet.
She lifts the bottle again, and takes another long drink. She wants to shoot something. To feel that surge of power, that control, as she breathes out and pulls the trigger.
Vi, the only constant in her life, begging Caitlyn not to leave her. So sincere, so unthreatening, even with the heavy gauntlets hanging at her side. Don’t change. Don’t change. The words ping around inside her skull like wayward bullets.
The harsh-but-soft lines of Vi’s face. Caitlyn’s gloved hand rising to hold her. Console her.
Don’t change.
She downs the rest of the bottle. Wiping her face on her sleeve, she lets it fall to the ground. She slings on her command jacket over her vest. Her cotton pyjama trousers do not comply with dress code, but she doubts anyone else at the shooting range this late will care.
Caitlyn walks into Piltover’s enforcement training facilities with tunnel vision, heading straight for the sniper range. She doesn’t bother with the noise cancelling headphones. Adjusting her settings—long distance, a second per target—she hoists her rifle, setting the butt snug against her shoulder. Her hands fall into place with the ease of muscle memory. A click, and the scope pops up. “Start sequence.”
“Three, two, one,” the machine drones. She breathes out. A target pops up over a ridge. Fire. Breathe in. Another target. Breathe out. Pull the trigger. Again. Again. Clockwork. It’s so easy; a childhood of running shooting drills after school instead of ballet can do that for you. Another target, closer this time. She fires. The paper sizzles, a perfect round hole. She can see through it. Darkness, and the flash of a blue braid.
Caitlyn’s breath catches. She fires again, again, trying to track the movement of an interloper slipping away. She’s going to escape. The bomb. Her mother. “Stop running,” she shouts desperately. She keeps firing until the magazine is empty. “Stop! Stop.”
She lets out a sob and drops the rifle. There’s nobody there. Still, the photochemical afterimage of Jinx’s vibrant, flashing eyes burns away her precious detachment until she tastes salt in her mouth.
The following day is her day off, so Caitlyn sleeps. She wakes up gasping a couple of times, but she always seems to wear herself out and drift off again. When she finally wakes for good, the red-orange sun outside her window hangs low over the city’s horizon.
She takes a shower and polishes up her appearance. There’s no space for rest. Her mother’s voice echoes in her ears. When you start to doubt, my dear, follow justice.
Justice. The foundation of stability. She walks purposefully to Ambessa Medarda’s chambers and knocks.
One of Medarda’s servants greets her. “Commander Kiramman.” He nods respectfully.
“I’d like to speak with Ambessa. Is now an acceptable time?”
The servant grimaces. “I’m afraid she’s indisposed. But I can bring her a message…?”
With a huff, Caitlyn pushes past. She finds Ambessa slumped at her desk with a bottle of whiskey, and slams the palm of her hand onto the table. “What the hell are you doing?”
Medarda’s jaw is locked in a pained expression. “They've taken her. My daughter.”
“Mel is gone? Why haven’t you called a meeting?”
She shakes her head. “Can’t let them…get to me. Bastards.”
“What are you talking about?”
Mumbling something, she lets her head thump onto the desk. “Your city’s poisonous underbelly. We can’t—not in their territory…We’ll have to…flush them out…” She reaches for the bottle of whiskey on her desk, but Caitlyn snatches it out of her grasp. At that, Medarda’s dark gaze finally flickers to her own. “Why are you here?” she bites out.
“To sober you up, it seems.” She passes Medarda a flask of water from her belt. “Drink this. I’ll find you something to eat.”
It takes an hour, but Caitlyn manages to coax Medarda into a more lucid state. She doesn’t seem to care enough to be embarrassed about her previous inebriation. She simply washes her face, straightens her embellished uniform, and tightens her boots. It’s an enviable display of strength. “Come, Commander. Walk with me.”
It’s a little annoying to be told to walk when Caitlyn was the one who sought her out, but she falls into step. “I’m very sorry to hear about Mel. It’s a foul crime, and incredibly concerning. You can rely on me to utilise every contact and asset at my disposal—”
Medarda interrupts. “Have you heard of the Black Rose?”
She pauses. “They operate in Noxus. A secret order.”
“Yes. An order that guides politics, alters the line of succession. They have been incredibly influential for centuries. Why do you think they exist, Caitlyn?”
“I’m not sure. Every government needs an opposition, I guess.”
“Exactly, Commander. Balance. The most critical tenet of a society, and the most shakeable. For there to be law, there must be crime. Science and religion. An eye for an eye, a hand for a hand. But this order has never paid for the pain they’ve caused. Do you understand now, Caitlyn?”
“Your son. And now...” She trails off.
"And now Mel. But that isn't what I was talking about, Commander."
Medarda’s pace slows, and she stops in front of an arching window to survey the view. Caitlyn halts. Her gaze drifts over Medarda’s shoulder. Some areas are still charred and smoking, marred with debris from Jinx’s bomb. “Mel’s kidnapping could have been the work of Zaunites,” she mutters.
“No. I know my enemy. You must know yours. I am wary of the balancing act in Noxus, but your undercity? The poisoning down there isn’t only threatening your justice. If unchecked, their sickness will destroy the foundations of Piltover’s balance. Jinx and others like her would destroy everything your mother built and start anew.”
Caitlyn jolts. She remembers her mother’s memorial, the disruption and violence of the hidden Zaunites. A memory, stained. A facade, broken. She clenches her fists to stop them trembling. “Jinx upset the balance. She made everything fall apart.”
Medarda places a solid, warm hand on Caitlyn’s shoulder. “Jinx is a Zaunite. Do you really believe she had honourable motivations when she fired that bomb? She isn’t like us. They aren’t like us.”
“I know that,” she grits out.
“I know you do.” Medarda squeezes her shoulder, once, before her hand returns to rest on the grip of her katar.
Caitlyn shudders. “She’s only one of them, Ambessa.”
“You will handle it.” It helps, a little. That conviction. Caitlyn wishes she could hear her mother say those words again. “Tomorrow morning, your police force and my special officers will convene. But before that, I would like to hear your plans.”
Over the next month, Caitlyn tries to restabilise. Training with Medarda helps her expel anger, but after each session she feels more hopeless than before. It’s like the world has become a hurricane, consuming every measure of hope she tries to save.
The comfort Maddie offers is like a bandage over a rotting wound. Caitlyn has been aware of Maddie’s blossoming crush on her for a while, but she has never flirted back until recently. Her hugs are nice, her room is orderly, and she sometimes brings Caitlyn hot cocoa when she can’t sleep.
One night she leaves Maddie in bed to go and stand in the wind on her balcony, half-covered in a dressing gown. It’s been a grim day of work. Watching Medarda’s puppets beat information from Zaunite detainees sometimes leaves Caitlyn with white noise inside her head.
She isn’t thinking. The air is cold and it scrapes at her bare skin, but she’s so numb that it doesn’t occur to her to go inside. She just stands, unmoving, staring at the pavement below. It’s a long way down. A hard fall. Maybe her mother would meet her on the other side.
“You’re not thinking about jumping, are you?” The door to the balcony creaks on its hinges as Maddie’s voice rings from behind her. The question is posed as a joke, but when Caitlyn turns around, she’s met with a poorly masked look of concern.
“Of course not.” She summons a smile. “Hold the door, I’m coming.”
Caitlyn is tracking a Shimmer monster into the crevices of Zaun when she sees Vi. She tenses. Torrents of anger and grief and self-hatred bubble up within her.
Vi's grunt of pain. Vi, clutching her winded stomach. Vi, right there, with smudged makeup and slick black hair. She’s not as vivid as before. It's evident that she's lost weight, her form now more lean than muscular.
When she tackles Vi, she wants to scream, Don't go.
She defects. She isn’t sure why. Her conscience, or her misery? The discomfort, the wrongness, has been within her for a while.
Caitlyn thought she believed in justice, balance, peace—the things Ambessa Medarda is always talking about—but the strength of her convictions crumbles a little more with every Zaunite she sees knocked to their knees by an officer of the law. It’s just like what she did to Vi.
Fear. Torture. Neither should be part of a just society.
The show of terror at her mother’s memorial service and her own invasion into the broken streets of Zaun suddenly click together with ease. Caitlyn's vision is clearer than it’s ever been, and her mind is eating itself.
Vander dies for the second time. Vi is shutting off. Jinx is inconsolable. Isha, the little kid that saved everyone, is badly injured. Jinx spends almost every minute of every day in their hideout by his sickbed, holding his hand and forcing medicine down his gullet.
Caitlyn doesn’t know what to do, so she hovers on the sidelines. Sometimes Vi looks at her like she did before it all happened. Sometimes she looks through her—like a ghost.
Nevertheless, they slowly inch closer together like weak magnets. Caitlyn tries to set up a bed away from Vi to give her space, but without a word of explanation Vi moves her mat next to her own. She wakes up once in the night from an anxious dream to Vi absently touching her outstretched hand. Only half awake, Caitlyn laces her fingers into Vi’s before she realises what she’s doing.
“I can’t sleep,” Vi whispers. With her black eyeshadow washed off, she looks somehow more open. More vulnerable. Her pale eyes are just visible in the dark room. “What were you dreaming about? You kept mumbling. Your face was all tense.”
“I don’t know,” Caitlyn rasps on impulse, but then she remembers she shouldn’t lie to Vi. “It was the night I left you, I think. Just—the feeling. I was so twisted up; I still am. I feel like a snake with my own tail in my mouth, these days.” She squeezes her eyes closed. It’s too much to look at her. “I’m sorry for so many things. For giving you the badge. For manipulating you. Making you believe it would help. For—gods—for hitting you.” Her voice breaks. Her throat is closing up. She starts to stammer out fragments of the tangled-up pains she wants to address. “You were...I shouldn’t be—you deserve—”
“I don’t know what I deserve,” Vi interrupts. “But I know what I want. Can I have that, at least?”
There’s a rustling movement. When she opens her eyes again, her vision is blurry. Vi has shuffled closer. She moves over to make space and Vi flops down onto her mat, slipping an arm over her. Quietly, Caitlyn whispers, “Are you sure?”
“You hurt me, now hold me."
So she does.