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Following the jagged line of the Sump-stream, Chen finally found it—a hidden, moisture-slicked entrance that led into the dark heart of Zaun's alchemical underground. He burst through the heavy iron doors of the laboratory, his breathing ragged, his eyes searching the shadows.
"Save her! Please... you have to save her!"
A tall, gaunt man with a bandaged face and a cold, analytical gaze looked up from a microscope. Singed, the "Mad Alchemist," didn't ask for a name or an explanation. He lived in the gray area of morality, a chaotic neutral scientist who treated the human body like a puzzle to be solved. He immediately cleared a slab, secured Jinx with reinforced leather straps, and pulled on a pair of surgical gloves.
"Who are you?" Singed asked, his voice a dry rasp.
Chen's mind raced. He needed to establish trust with a man who trusted no one. "Viktor sent me," Chen lied, a flash of inspiration hitting him. "He said you were the only one who truly understood the cost of progress. He'll probably be looking for you soon himself."
Singed paused, his eyes narrowing behind his goggles. "Viktor... yes. He will understand eventually. We aren't like the long-lived Yordles of the Topside. We don't have the luxury of waiting centuries for a breakthrough." He looked back at the dying girl. "But saving a soul this far gone comes at a high price."
"Anything," Chen said without hesitation. "Name it. Just don't let her die."
"I can stabilize her, but the process is... traumatic." Singed stepped behind Chen, a needle glinting in the dim light.
Chen knew the script. In the original timeline, this was where Silco got knocked out so the "doctor" could work in peace. But Chen wasn't Silco. He wasn't about to go into a "grey screen" while Jinx was under the knife.
"COUNTER STRIKE!"
Chen's arm blurred, parrying the needle with the head of his streetlamp. "I'm staying. I'm watching."
Singed looked at the streetlamp, then at Chen's resolute expression. "I'm afraid your 'feelings' will make you a liability during the procedure."
"I won't do anything stupid," Chen promised, his voice hard. "But I'm not leaving her."
Singed let out a short, mirthless chuckle. "Interesting. Fine. You can assist. But if her heart stops because you flinch, the responsibility is yours."
"As if you'd take the blame if it were yours," Chen retorted.
The procedure was brutal. It was the kind of visceral, gore-heavy scene that would never pass a Piltie sensor board. Singed didn't use stitches; he used Shimmer. He cut into the entry wounds, his scalpel moving with terrifying precision, as he extracted the lead bullets one by one.
Throughout the process, Jinx was in a state of violent, agonizing struggle. Chen had to watch as her body convulsed against the straps, her screams muffled by a leather bit. Every time Singed injected a fresh vial of refined Shimmer, her mutations flared, her strength and speed spiking dangerously.
CRACK. Two of the reinforced straps snapped under the pressure of her thrashing.
"Hold her down!" Singed shouted, reaching for the final, most concentrated dose. "The last one is the most volatile!"
Chen lunged forward, using his full weight and his Unbreakable Will to pin her shoulders to the slab. He grabbed her hand, his fingers interlacing with hers. "Powder! Jinx! Look at me! Stay in the game!"
Inside Jinx's fractured consciousness, the ghosts were screaming. Mylo was laughing; Claggor was crying; the memory of the bridge was a carousel of fire and blood. She wanted to let go. She wanted to sink into the dark.
But then, she felt a warmth in her palm.
A vision appeared in the void—a handsome, yellow-skinned guy telling her a ridiculous story about a monk, two Vastayans, and a "Mediterranean" man from Bilgewater traveling to the Shojin Temple. She remembered arguing with him about whether Gromp stew or Raptor thighs were the superior "meta" food. She remembered him stealing her bird meat and the way his streetlamp always glowed in the dark.
One happy memory after another procced, creating a shield against the darkness.
"Impossible," Singed muttered, his eyes wide.
The final injection was usually the "execute" phase—the pain was so intense that most subjects' hearts simply gave out. But Jinx had stopped struggling. She lay perfectly still, her hand gripping Chen's with a strength that defied biology, a small, peaceful smile touching her lips.
"What is this?" Singed asked, genuinely baffled. "What power is keeping her anchored?"
"It's a passive ability," Chen whispered, his voice thick with relief. "It's called 'Not Being Alone'."
Minutes later, Jinx's breathing leveled out. The Shimmer had worked its dark miracle, knitting her flesh back together and leaving her skin with a pale, violet hue. She opened her eyes.
She didn't scream. She didn't lash out. She just sat up and leaned forward until her forehead touched Chen's.
"I'm back," she whispered.
"Welcome back," Chen replied, his heart finally slowing down. "So... are you Jinx or Powder now?"
"What's the difference?" she shrugged, her voice regaining its playful, chaotic edge. "It's all me. Just with better stats."
Singed coughed, interrupting the moment. "You survived the 'Shimmer Baptism' without a single scream. Logically, the pain should have shattered your mind. Why didn't it?"
Jinx jumped off the table, squatting on the edge like a bird of prey. She pointed a thumb at Chen. "Because of this idiot. Every time I was about to suffocate in the dark, he stood up. He always stands up, hehe."
Chen blushed. "You've saved me plenty of times, too."
"Our lives are intertwined, aren't they?" Jinx laughed, patting his shoulder with a speed that Chen's 19 points of resistance couldn't even track.
Chen looked at her and realized he had achieved a "Hidden Ending." She wasn't the broken, friendless Jinx who eventually kills Silco. She wasn't the helpless Powder who cries for her sister. She was something new—a fusion of both, tempered by the fact that someone had stayed.
"Professor?" Chen turned to Singed.
"It's been a long time since anyone called me that," Singed said, his tone unreadable.
"We know your history with Heimerdinger," Chen said with a respectful nod. "And we know Viktor. Thank you for saving her."
Singed's eyes narrowed. "Consider the fee waived. I've seen enough interesting data today to last a year. You may leave."
As they walked out into the foggy alleys of Zaun, Jinx started re-braiding her hair. "So, what's the plan, Mr. Strategy? We've officially tilted everyone in Piltover and the Lanes. Our 'Good Citizen' run is over."
"We go back to the Firelights," Chen said, flicking her forehead. "The Topside is a 'No-Fly Zone' for us now. We're going underground."
"Is it my fault?" Jinx asked, her eyes suddenly welling with "Powder" tears.
"No, it's—"
"HEHE! Kidding!" Jinx burst out laughing. "Did you really think I was having an episode?"
Chen let out a long sigh. He was going to be living on the edge of a heart attack for the rest of his life.
Suddenly, Jinx whipped out her pistol. BANG!
Chen jumped a foot in the air. "Jinx! What are you doing?!"
"I shot that crow," she said, coolly blowing the smoke from her muzzle. She pointed to a mangled heap of black feathers on the cobblestones. "Every time something goes wrong, that bird is there. I kill it, it comes back. I kill it again, it stares at me from a different roof. It's annoying."
Chen frowned. He'd heard the fan theories back home—that the crows represented Jinx's misfortune, a symbolic motif in the anime. But this wasn't an anime. This was a world of stats and bonds.
He opened his Cloudtop Bond System and focused on the dying bird. A series of icons flared to life in the air:
[Empire / Dark Mage / Divine Emissary / Shapeshifter]
Chen's blood went cold. Empire? Shapeshifter?
He looked at the dead bird and then at the shadows of the alley. It's not symbolism, Chen realized. It's Swain. The Grand General of Noxus is watching us.
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