UNDOING

UNDOING

The Sickness That is a Daughter: PART TWO (drabble) // Part One //

WORDCOUNT: 1.4k

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.

Powder feels better enough to run off in the morning, only to send Silco into a panic - not just when he can't find her, but in the moment he has to catch her.

I wrote both parts for me and only me. Dad Silco who loves Jinx so much and it doesn't mean anything because love doesn't equate goodness lovers unite! And this is really nothing of plot just Silco being a Dad without a handbook or morals.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.

Powder's doing better, much to Silco's relief.

"Powder? You cannot leave like this. Powder."

Or not, because what other way would he have it? Would he have Powder stay in one place for an hour at the least? Just to spend that hour without worry? A bit of time that exists outside of her and her safety? Of course not.

She's taken to sleeping in his bed in her recovery, kicking him while she dreams and sniffles and talks to herself. Silco doesn't know when she's sleep-talking or when she's very much awake as she's talking to someone. But impossibly, he was the one to wake up last.

Little Powder was gone. Is gone. Silco didn't think much of it. In fact, what little of his spirits that could be lifted was at how her morning absence meant she was able to get up and out, as he imagines children are...up. And out. His child, especially.

But she was nowhere to be found. Not in any place he checked.

"I'm gonna ask it, Silco. Does it matter where she is? The kid's not getting far in her state, even if she's better. And if she ran...or just doesn't come back, she's doing us a favor-"

"I didn't ask for you to find her, Sevika. There's no need for unclever quips. Wipe it off the mouth. I'm simply asking if you've seen her."

Sevika sighs.

"That's all it was. A quip. And no. I haven't."

Powder wouldn't leave willingly. It's a quip that has not sense on its word - the little girl was the one who fell into his arms the moment he saw him. At this point, it'd take hell pulling her away to get her to leave, even if it's only been a year and some.

And Silco would never let that happen. Not for anything.

So the quip's as cruel to him as it is ever-lovingly stupid.

"Thank you, my colleague. That's all you had to say."

Silco thinks he'll look around the first floor of the last drop again, but with all its ongoing renovations, there's not much in terms of hiding places for Powder. He turns the corner.

Then it hits him. The man feels foolish for not thinking it in the first place.

She hasn't been in the rafters of his office since she got sick, so it's out of sight, out of mind for him, but of course the little blue thing would take her mind there - just to climb and exert any energy she's managed to gain after her illness.

They'll be back to their errands parallel to each other. Powder will be throwing things from her high spot. He'll be telling her to quit it before he climbs up there himself. She always calls his bluff with a giggle. It's unfortunately valid, Silco can't remember the last time he's climbed anything.

He opens the door to his office, eyes already up.

"I'd prefer you to tell me when you go off and hide. If you care for me as I care for you, you'll do that from now on."

He stands where the chair of his desk is supposed to be, arms behind his back. His lips flatten into something that would be a smile.

She's lying flat on her stomach on a plank far above and over him, scrawny arm hanging off.

"I see you're feeling better already. Did you eat like I told you to?"

There's a there's a pitched mumble. Silco tilts his head.

"Is that a no-"

And in the second, the man thinks his ward is turning over with intention - that'll she sit up with swinging legs with words that'll tease him, or eyes that'll make him feel too harsh for asking the question in the first place.

But in that second, the whole of her - so small, falls so fast.

Silco yells out something that isn't a word, but it isn't just a noise either. But it's instinctual, somehow.

Is Janna trying to kill him? Probably. If she existed.

The man bends his body with the swiftness of someone with tens more the speed to fully come under the rafters, arms stretched out. In his quick catch of Powder, his hands hold the stiffness of someone with tens more the strength.

Silco gives credit to whoever gave him said speed and strength in this damning moment.

His stomach isn't un-sunk when he realizes he's caught Powder before she cracked her blue little head on his desk.

"Powder! Wake up!"

It's an order fired from his throat. Instead of turning over, she kicks like a monster in her sleep, unless she's thirty feet above the ground . Then of course she'll turn over!

"Powder!"

It's ridiculous how she's barely stirring until Silco shakes her.

The little one rubs her eyes, none the wiser to her near death on mahogany.

She picks at his tie when she fully comes to, yawning.

"...What happened?"

"What happened? Would you like to tell me that? Would you like to relay what you were dreaming about that would cause you to swing yourself down? You could've gotten seriously hurt not even just ten seconds ago!"

Powder's brow furrow over her grey eyes. Silco feels his stern on his face, nose flared to aide the show of his frustrated, panicked worry.

"...Is that what happened?"

Panicked feels like a weak word. He doesn't know what to do about that.

"What if I wasn't here to catch you? Then what? I find you with your skull all over my trading records?"

The image of that does not dare to flash in his mind, even in the anger.

He can see the image flash in hers, though. Her lips pout. Her eyes go soft under the furrow.

No.

"I can't even do anything right when I'm sleeping! I don't know what's wrong with me! Why is it so easy to hate me?! I-I-"

"Stop. Stop it. What you are saying are lies. I thought you hate liars. I'm-" Silco's head tilts slightly, eyes looking to whatever is not Powder's harsh face, as if he's a bird in thought. "I was only scared. That's all. I've projected. For that...I cannot find you with your skull all over my desk, little girl. I cannot. That is all. Do not spiral."

Tears that he or she could not stop from welling fall still, but Silco believe he's managed to prevent an episode.

Powder presses her head into his chest.

"I'm sorry." Her voice goes high. "I don't wanna be a jinx. I don't know how if I can't even...not, not, not, not, not!"

Her little fist punches her thigh. Silco manages to take one hand to grip hers when she tries to bring her fist down onto herself again.

She whines, but it all falls into sniffles and mutters.

"...not, not jinx myself while I'm dreaming. I'm sorry."

Silco takes silence for a moment. He doesn't know what to say...just until he does. It is no lie.

"Do not be sorry." He holds her tighter. A guide to his order for her. An assurance. "Never be sorry. I promise you, you'll never have to be sorry...and jinxes - they are not death sentences. Not mines, anyway."

Silco puts the both of them in his chair, still her in his hold. The chair creaks, falls back a small slight.

"A jinx is whatever you want it to be. And if you are one as you've been saying, then it must be something better that we could ever imagine. You. Me." Silco shifts his arms, trying to find a position more comfortable. He assumes they'll be like this for awhile. "Zaun. Piltover. The world."

He couldn't know if it's a conscious movement, but the pale-coated man takes the back of his middle and pointer finger to brush the round of Powder's cheek.

"It's only right I know it before anyone else. Who else is to teach you?"

The little girl doesn't blink in her stare up at him, Silco doesn't do anything but brush her cheek again, and again. And then the other once over.

And there it is. A smile.

"...Can you promise me something, Silco? Please?"

Powder's hand curls over her stomach.

"You have to be there to catch me. Always. You can't not be there."

And finally, Silco takes a much needed sigh. He scoops her up a little closer.

"That's too easy of a promise."

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。. .・。.

SPOILER ALERT: A jinx is his death sentence...and Silco is not there to catch his girl for hers.