Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

Act I: The Enemy You Remember

It turns out that getting shunted through space and time fucking sucks. 

Ekko understands universe-breaking math to a theoretical extent, (because fracturing the universe is generally a bad thing and near the top of his list of problems he avoids causing) but throwing the Arcane into the mix apparently turns theory into something real. It’s like adding a new, unfamiliar factor to basic scientific theory. Problem, hypothesis, testing. 

Only the Arcane bends the rules of reality, so he has to adjust. 

If he’s picked up one important thing from Jayce, it’s that Arcane runes and Hextech are mathematics at their core. Incredibly advanced mathematics, granted, but their function is determined and controlled by numbers. Calculations. 

Wild runes and the anomaly that has formed in the Hexgate tower should act in a similar fashion. They are different, yes. But they are still of the Arcane. 

Wildfire next to a contained campfire. Both remain fire, true to their nature, despite one being leashed and limited. 

Ekko feels himself fracture. Not a physical thing–though his body doesn’t respond properly when he tries to move it–but something else. It’s…like a piece of himself that he wasn’t aware of splits in a thousand different directions. 

But it isn’t ripped away. It’s all still there, it’s just jumbled. Like a puzzle cube, or something of that nature. Scrambled. 

He can’t speak. He can’t move. But his mind works. 

He pokes and prods at the new sensation. Pieces shift, sometimes in ways that don’t make sense, but he’s not survived this long by being rigid in his understanding of the world. 

The more you learn, the more you realize how little you actually know, so the saying goes. But that’s ok. That’s how life is meant to be. 

He can figure this out. 

Ekko isn’t sure how long he’s suspended as a fractured mess of a creature, trapped in the anomaly’s astral plane. Time might not even exist here. 

His understanding of it is that the anomaly is like…accumulated potential? It’s sort of like Arcane runoff from the Hextech, at least from what he can tell. It’s possibilities, what could have been there. Energy of things that didn’t exist, but might have. 

And it all gathers in one spot, like a black hole. 

Hm. Maybe not like that. Black holes eat all they touch. Even light. Nothing escapes the crushing gravity, the inevitable destruction.

The anomaly doesn’t destroy. It… warps. Changes. Alters. It’s like a spaghetti junction of space and time, reality shredded through the Arcane like a cheese grater. 

Everything at its core remains true to its original nature. Fractured, but true. 

It’s why he’s still (technically) in one piece and not a cloud of atoms. 

He’s aware of Jayce and Heimerdinger close by, yet here that could mean they’re entire galaxies away. But of the two, Jayce seems more distant somehow. Ekko plucks at a string of reality that he’s calculated attaches him to Jayce and it doesn’t quite reach him. 

There’s something else there. He considers the feedback he receives and arrives at a strange conclusion.

Not some thing. Some one. 

Someone else is present. 

The awareness of a being he cannot properly comprehend (he’s only just noticed them, after all) points in his direction. Reality plucks back at him, like curious tendrils. Ekko, hesitantly, meets the contact with his own.

Pulsating surprise. Recognition? Satisfaction. Relief. Pride. 

It’s not words. It’s…sort of like code, like sign, sent in reality-bending sequences. A feed of numbers he figured out how to calculate ages ago.

Might have been ages. Might have been four seconds. Time is all fucky here. 

It’s cosmic energy moulded into a mortal vessel. The being was, at one point, something Ekko might have recognized. But it’s been transformed by the Arcane, by that fathomless potential. 

Making contact with the being opens his eyes to a bigger universe for a moment. Ekko sees things his mind is not meant to comprehend, so he barely perceives most of it.

There are other such beings as this one, scattered across the little speck of a planet they exist on. Others exist beyond it, in the emptiness of space. Ekko tries to keep his focus on that tiny pinprick he calls home. Stretching too far will probably break him.

Actually, there are a lot of other beings similar to the Arcane entity still communicating with him. Or…there are echoes of them? Some that were, some that are, and others that have…not quite been born. Or changed? Maybe they’ll take shape, maybe they won’t. 

Some of them are permanent in a way even reality can’t reject. Old and powerful. Others are fleeting and more ethereal, like they’re only just hanging on. Some exist in an odd in-between of those two, and yet others seem to linger in separate layers of the world he wasn’t aware of until now. 

There’s a gaping, gnawing tear in reality chomping at the bit of whatever leash is keeping it from expanding. A shadow cloaking the sea to the southeast. A collection of sunlit beings to the southwest, and more beyond that. 

He becomes aware of twisted amalgamations of Celestial creatures, warped almost beyond recognition, but their core remains. They’ve been shaped by…Arcane starlight?

Something turns its focus on him when he pieces that together. The strange Arcane entity he’s touching takes pause.

Words that should not work in this plane of fractured reality purr at him, lilting and mighty and old as the universe.

“Well, aren’t you adorable?”

It is amused and Ekko is fucking terrified. 

“Like a kitten playing with a ball of string,” it booms through every last atom in his body, reverberates down to his astral soul. He catches a glimpse of something like a constellation.

But constellations do not move like this. They don’t have– eyes. Or a gaping, starfire-flecked mouth that’s growing wider–

It might be laughing at him. 

“Tangled in a mess, not knowing which way is up.”

Ok, fair. But that does not help him. Then again, this being seems to have absolutely no interest in helping. Ekko feels like a particularly interesting bug, or a speck just different enough to be noticed for a fleeting moment. 

Stars move–a hand made of stars? The galaxy ripples at the being’s command. The Arcane entity seems content to observe, though Ekko feels a certain wariness from its plucking strings.

Claws that warp reality open up like the palm of a hand. Energy twists in the center. Arcane. Space. Time. The physical as Ekko knows it. 

Watching this might break him. He’s not sure. He knows he doesn’t want to find out.

There’s a singular point, a glowing flux. Something in his brain clicks and he understands a little better. Even that tiny change makes a massive difference to his predicament. 

The fractured pieces of Ekko in the anomaly reach out for Heimerdinger as he connects a map in reality to the Yordle far faster than he had with Jayce. 

A star forms in the being’s palm. Light. Life. Magic and reality, tethered together in a way he could not have imagined. 

It’s as enlightening as it is horrifying. Ekko’s brain feels like it’s melting. 

The Star Forger laughs. Ekko’s tendrils reach Heimerdinger at last.

He is sucked away.

He crashes into something hard and heavy– physical, real –and has exactly one second to feel relief before he throws up. 

Ekko groans, spits bitter bile. He’s got a splitting headache, the wind’s been knocked out of him. His ears are ringing. 

He reminds himself to give Jayce a concussion for this. Dumbass! Not noticing something as monumentally fucked as breaking reality!

The ringing in his ears fades and he becomes aware of people close by. Ekko blinks. He’s seeing double. A shape crouches down next to him and he looks up. 

It’s Jinx.

His body reacts without thinking. Ekko hurls himself back–too close, she’s gotta have a Chomper or a gun in her hands already–and slams into a wall. Not enough space to get away. He staggers, his feet haven’t found their balance yet. 

Ekko fumbles for anything he can use as a weapon, finds something, and throws it. 

A hand reaches out and swats it away from Jinx’s shocked face before it can make contact. 

It’s him. 

Ekko stares. The sound fully comes back as the mirror image of himself–not a mirror, he’s different –shouts at him.

“What the hell, man?!” 

He’s running on adrenaline. His chest is heaving. He’s not sure who to focus on. Jinx is staring at him from behind Ekko’s–not him, the other him?

“What the fuck?” Ekko finally manages. 

“Why’d you throw that at her?” Ekko demands. He looks pissed. 

“That’s Jinx, dumbass!”

“Who’s Jinx?” Ekko’s face twists with confusion. “Are you talking about Powder?”

“Powder–”

“Hello, hi, I’m still here, by the way,” she pipes up from behind the other Ekko. 

He reaches for something blindly. Anything. 

“Ok, if you throw something else at her, I’m gonna knock you out until we get Heimerdinger,” Ekko threatens. He’s already pushing Jinx–Powder–further behind him. 

“Heimerdinger,” Ekko latches onto that, something that might make sense. 

Possibly. Yordles can be…confusing. But it’s the best he’s got right now. 

“Yeah, Heimerdinger. I thought he was joking when he said I–you? You. Let’s…go with that,” the other Ekko shakes his head. “This is weird.”

“Heimerdinger told us you might show up one day,” J–Powder says, peeking around the other Ekko. She looks kind of annoyed. “He didn’t mention you were a jackass.”

“Excuse me?”

“The first thing you did was throw something at me! I was just trying to see if you were ok!”

“I thought you were gonna shoot me!”

“Why would I–” Powder splutters. “You’re Ekko! Why would I hurt you?”

He has a whole list of answers he could give to that, but the door opens and they’re interrupted. 

“What in the blazes is going on in here?!”

Ekko freezes. 

It’s Benzo. Older, grayer, more wrinkles, but it’s him. 

His foster-father stops in his tracks and stares at the scene. He looks from one Ekko to the other, eyes growing comically large.

“Benzo,” the other Ekko says. “I think this is supposed to be Heimerdinger’s…me?”

“You gonna throw something at him, too?” Powder’s still frowning. 

He sort of does. 

Ekko can’t stop himself from rushing into Benzo’s arms and giving him the biggest, tightest hug of his entire life. 

“Whoa–easy, son,” Benzo wraps him up. Ekko feels the tension in his body drop and a noise that might be a sob escapes his throat. “Easy.”

He hears the other Ekko murmuring. Powder says something. The door quietly opens and closes. Ekko isn’t sure if someone’s come in or left. He doesn’t care. 

Large, careful hands squeeze him tight and he’s just a kid again. 

When he’s finally forced himself to pull away from Benzo’s embrace, he’s taken to The Last Drop. 

Everything is different. Familiar, yes, but Zaun is–it’s everything he’s dreamed it could be and more. 

The moment he stumbles out of Benzo’s office with his foster-father’s hand still on his shoulder, Ekko has to squint against light. He looks skyward. 

He can see the sun.

The scent of smog doesn’t pervade his nostrils. The noxious clouds that kept the Lanes in perpetual twilight are nonexistent. There is light, there is life. He can see plants growing from hanging pots outside a few buildings. 

There are people he knows as they go through the streets. Ekko throws his hood up–self-preservation instincts kicking in, don’t let anyone who might know your face track you back home–and sees Shimmer addicts walking around, healthy and happy. Beggars pulling coins from their purse to buy fruit–actual fruit!–from a vendor’s stand. 

It’s a paradise’s mirror to the hell he lives and breathes. 

The Last Drop at least is mostly familiar. The building’s exterior is cleaner than he remembers, like it was redone in recent years. There’s a glass ceiling and windows to let in sunlight. More plants to give the space some natural color. 

Vander is manning the bar. He’s older and grayer, like Benzo, but he’s alive. 

He looks up, smiling at first. Then he sees the…extra Ekko they’ve brought along and his eyes widen. 

His gaze trails to the…other Ekko. His Ekko? Or is Ekko the Alternate? 

Ugh. 

“I thought the Yordle was joking!”

“Yeah, so was I,” the other Ekko shrugs helplessly. “He just popped out of thin air and threw up in the middle of Benzo’s shop.”

Vander shakes his head in disbelief. “Where’s Powder?”

“She ran to grab Heimerdinger. Both of them, I think.”

“Both?” Ekko repeats. 

“There’s two of him and now there’s…two of us,” the other Ekko explains. “He’ll explain, I think. Like, we’ve known you might show up for a while, it was just a matter of when. That’s what Heimerdinger thought, anyway.”

“How did this even happen?” Benzo asks. 

“Piltover’s Golden Boy broke reality,” Ekko scowls. “I’m gonna kill him once my head stops pounding.”

His foster-father mutters something that sounds suspiciously like “Fuckin’ Yordles” and says nothing else. 

“Well, let’s get you a drink to start,” Vander sighs, gesturing for them to come to the bar. He looks at a waitress that’s been watching the scene with utter confusion. “Gert, go ahead and clock out. Just take the rest of the day off. Everyone’s done with breakfast, and we’ve got…family business, I suppose. I’ll pay you for the whole shift.”

Gert nods, bemused, and walks off. She’s out the door inside of a minute. 

Ekko hears another door open from the basement and his eyes flicker towards the noise. 

“Hey Vander, where’s Gert?” Mylo’s anxious face makes his jaw drop. Claggor comes up behind him.  

“She just clocked out.”

“What?! But I thought her shift just started!”

“Well, something’s come up. Don’t worry, lad. You’ll get another chance.”

“Dammit, I don’t even know if the Chem Sisters are playing soon! I was gonna ask…”

Mylo trails off as he registers two Ekkos at the bar. Claggor has been staring for longer. 

“Uh. What?”

“I’m blaming Heimerdinger,” Benzo replies. 

“Whoa,” Mylo ambles closer. Ekko is still staring. His friend is older and…well, not more mature. That becomes clear a second later. “He’s like, if Ekko grew up into a gangster or something. He’s almost cool.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Scowls the other Ekko. “I’m cool!”

“Not with the bun, little man,” Mylo snickers, poking at the paint on Ekko’s face. His shock upon seeing his old friend is quickly being replaced by the familiar annoyance. “Though you do look cleaner than thuggy, here.”

“You’ve got no room to talk with that mustache.”

Mylo’s jaw drops and Claggor snorts. 

Vander purses his lips as he passes Ekko a glass of water–clear, untainted, safe–and tries not to laugh. “Right for the throat with you, eh?”

“My mustache is my best feature!” Mylo protests. “You have no idea the care I take to make it look this good!”

“Take a razor to it. All of it,” Ekko returns.

Mylo scowls as Claggor starts to snigger. He looks around to the other Ekko. “Ok, so I do like you more.”

“You’re not getting out of the money you owe me.”

“We were just joking! None of us thought Heimerdinger was being serious!”

“You gave me shit about my hair. Ten bucks. I haven’t forgotten.”

It’s so surreal and weird that Ekko almost doesn’t hear the door upstairs opening. Footsteps come down and his eyes trail to the side. 

It’s Silco. 

Ekko almost throws the glass at his head, but the alternate Ekko must be keeping a permanent eye on every reaction he has to new people, because he scrambles to grab Ekko’s hand and keep it down. “No.”

“Are you fucking kidding me–”

Silco blinks at the scene. His perpetually black eye is…still damaged, but it’s faded dramatically. Ekko can’t tell if it works or not. He doesn’t particularly care. 

Benzo takes his shoulder. “Son, what’s–”

“He did this with Powder, too,” the other Ekko says. “Dude, cool it!”

Silco has stopped about two steps away from the floor. Ekko glares at him. Vander’s hand slowly finds a place on his arm. The grip is gentle, but firm. 

“Easy. There’s no danger here.”

“What is wrong with you? He killed you!”

Vander’s brow twitches, but he doesn’t move. “I don’t understand Heimerdinger’s theories most of the time, but I think you’re talking about someone else, boy. He’s not the same man you might know.”

The door opens and Ekko hears the only voice that might make some semblance of sense.

“There he is! Ha ha!” 

He twists and finds a pair of Heimerdingers walking into the building with J–Powder behind them. 

One wears a Councilor’s uniform. The other is dressed more casually, with a banjo at his back. 

“Goodness, it’s true!” The Councilor exclaims. “So similar, yet so different! Not parallel, but a variation!”

“Ekko, my dear boy! Better late than never!” The musician beams as he approaches them. 

Ekko decides he hates traveling through space and time. 

They wind up bringing a bunch of tables together so they can all sit. Vander locks the door so they aren’t interrupted. 

Ekko is massaging his forehead to clear away the lingering headache. It’s a persistent thing and doing no favors for his temper. 

Vander, saint that he is, brings him some painkillers. 

Silco takes a seat on the far end of the table, away from Ekko, but he stays. He’s not said much, but he smiles when Powder takes a seat next to him. The alternate Ekko takes a seat next to her and she quickly links their fingers together on the table. 

He can’t help but stare. 

“You good, dude?” Mylo snaps his fingers. A smirk makes its way onto his face. “Trouble in paradise where you’re from?”

Powder rolls her eyes and his alternate self seems annoyed. But Ekko flashes Mylo a glare. “Piss off. She almost killed me the last time I–”

Benzo’s hand is a steady thing on his shoulder. An anchor. “Breathe.”

“Ekko and I come from a very different world,” the musician– his Heimerdinger, Ekko’s come to learn–says. “I’ve told you all as much as I can about it, haven’t I?”

“Yeah, but you never mentioned Ekko was…” Powder trails off. 

“What?” Ekko challenges.

“I was going to be nicer this time and say ‘feral’,” she replies, eyes narrowing. “But you’re still a jackass.”

“Yeah, well the last time I saw you, you tried to blow me up. Twice. Before and after you shot at me.”

Mylo attempts to fix the mood he’s created. “...Kinky?”

Everyone stares at him. In a rare moment of wisdom, he shuts up.

“...Anyway,” Ekko grumbles, turning his eyes to his Heimerdinger. “Tell me what happened? Please? The last thing I remember is Jayce poking the anomaly like an idiot, and then…we like, got split into a million pieces.”

“The Arcane anomaly is quite the conundrum,” the musician hums. “But I’ve come to understand a great deal of what happened! The Hextech overuse accumulated in the base of the Hexgate tower, creating a singular point of potential that split space and time! It’s quite fascinating, actually!”

“I didn’t understand any of that,” Benzo deadpans. 

Ekko holds a hand with his palm up over the table. “Think of…like, a ball of yarn. Try pulling it apart in every direction. That’s…sort of what happened, just with space and time and reality.”

“So you made a mess,” Vander says bluntly.

“Hey no, this is on Jayce, not me,” Ekko scowls. “My hands are clean of this.”

“Jayce never invented Hextech in this universe. His progress ended after the explosion at his apartment,” Councilor Heimerdinger says.

There’s a dreadful quiet around the table. Ekko doesn’t know why. “So there’s no anomaly. That’s a good thing.”

“Yes,” Heimerdinger says slowly. “In a way. The change in this timeline still came at a cost. Jayce was killed by the blast. Along with Violet.”

Ekko freezes. He works his jaw, then gets a grip and it goes tight. His eyes flicker down. 

“Well…I thought she was dead for a long time. That’s…not so different.”

“But she’s alive where you come from?” Powder’s gaze is fixed on him. There’s something in her voice that might be hope.

“I think so.”

“What does that mean?”

Ekko presses his lips. “The last time I saw Vi, she was dragging an Enforcer back to Piltover. I was fighting Jinx– you –so you wouldn’t kill them.”

Powder stares. 

Benzo runs a hand down his face. “Maybe you should tell us everything from the start, son. This isn’t going to get less confusing if we keep jumping around.”

Heimerdinger–his Heimerdinger–looks at him and nods. Ekko resigns himself to reliving the worst memories of his whole damn life. 

“This is going to suck,” he says, mostly to himself. 

He goes through it from the divergent point–that being the apartment explosion. 

Ekko details everything he remembers, the missing bits and pieces Vi gave him during their short reunion at the Firelight base. He gets up to Benzo, Mylo, Claggor, and Vander’s deaths, to Vi being arrested and abandoning Powder. 

To Powder’s ending and Jinx’s beginning. 

They’re all affected by the story. Ekko’s Heimerdinger too, who never learned the full extent of what his pupil had been through. The Yordle–both of them, actually–looks terribly sad. 

“Did…” The other Ekko swallows hard. “Did you ever try to get Powder away?”

“Of course I–” Ekko cuts off his snarl and squeezes his knuckles until they go pale. “I tried getting to her. Silco’s goons kicked my ass. I was a stupid kid in over my head. Never had a chance.”

His shoulders sag. “I hit the streets. Did what I had to do to survive. Couldn’t keep Benzo’s place running, so I took what I could use and…just kept moving. I made a home.”

“Alone?” Powder chokes.

“There wasn’t anyone else.”

She swallows. Squeezes the other Ekko’s (Alter-Ekko, he decides to call him) hand. Every time she does that it stabs at something in his chest. “You–but you did see the other me again.”

“Not for a while,” he admits. “I had to avoid Silco’s territory a lot for a couple of years. Grow up and find a way to fight back. By the time I ran into Jinx she’d…she’d made her choice, I guess. She was Silco’s attack dog. Then…”

He pauses and something hits him all of a sudden. 

“Is…is Isha here?”

“Isha? You mean Felicia?” Vander and Silco are suddenly focused on him with sharp eyes. 

“Mom’s alive?” Powder’s mouth has fallen open. 

Ekko stares. 

Isha wasn’t born here, he realizes. Powder isn’t a mother with her happy little accident trailing behind her.

His gaze lowers. “No, not her. I meant someone else. I guess she’s not here.”

“How do you know?”

“You would know.”

Powder frowns. “That doesn’t make any sense.”

“It doesn’t matter,” he shakes his head. “Point is, something happened a few years after Silco took over and it only made Jinx more loyal to him. I could never convince her.”

He stares at his finger tapping the table. Takes a breath. Keeps going.

“My Firelights and I did our best to hit Silco and the Chem-Barons. I can’t tell you how many times Jinx and I fought. She’d kill my people. I’d kill as many of Silco’s goons as I could, if I had the time. Most of the time we hit them and ran as fast as possible.”

Ekko feels that old, lingering guilt that comes back up every time another Firelight falls. 

“I couldn’t kill her,” he admits. “Even when I should have.”

“Sounds like she couldn’t kill you, either,” Vander remarks.

He shoots him a glare. “Everything I’ve told you and you still think–”

“That she’s not a damn good shot?” Vander interrupts. “Powder breaks her record at the arcade every time she visits, I swear. Either Jinx is a bad shot, or she’s never wanted you dead.”

Ekko scowls. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. She’s hit me before. It’s not for lack of trying.”

But Vander’s words become an annoying itch in the back of his head. Jinx was a damn good shot. The minigun wasn’t as accurate, but that pistol? She was the quickest draw he knew and had deadly-accurate aim. 

He’d lost that old game with her more times than he could count. She always got him. He’d won their fight on the bridge by baiting her into the same pattern he’d memorized from their childhood. 

…Was it possible she’d never tried to kill him? He had grazes from bullets and scars from Chomper shrapnel, but nothing ever fatal. To his Firelights, yes. 

But not to him.

“That doesn’t matter,” Ekko dismisses. She’d used the Chomper in the end to…

But there’d been that look in her eyes and her daughter’s name on her lips. It hadn’t helped his (already failing) resolve to finish her. 

She’d survived the blast. Had she expected him to survive too? He doesn’t know. 

“Son?” Benzo nudges him. 

“It doesn’t matter,” he repeats. “Things changed about…eight years after Silco’s takeover. My Firelights and I were upping our hits on the Shimmer shipments. The Enforcer’s were hunting us. Jinx hit Piltover to steal Hextech data. To make a weapon, I think.”

Ekko takes a drink. “That was when Vi came back.”

There’s not much to tell after that. He goes into detail about how he tracked Vi and Caitlyn. How they retrieved the Gemstone from Jinx, the fight on the bridge, and how Ekko had been separated from the others. 

“I was a little fucked up after that,” he admits. “Needed some time to get back on my feet. Heimerdinger found me and tagged along to the Firelight base.”

“And I believe I’ve told you all that happened afterwards,” the Yordle tells them. 

“Yeah, but as weird as your story is, at least it’s not like– that,” Mylo throws a hand in Ekko’s direction. “You are like the most depressed, fucked-up guy I’ve ever known!”

“I’m going to peel your crappy mustache off with my bare hands,” Ekko retorts. “Heimerdinger, how do we get home?”

“You want to go back.” 

It’s the first time Silco has spoken. He has an odd expression Ekko doesn’t like. As if he understands.  

He doesnt sound surprised. It’s not even a question.

“What? Are you nuts?!” Mylo gapes. “Dude, just stay here! Like, this universe is way better than where you came from! We’d help you out, y’know? You can be like, the real Ekko’s long-lost twin.”

“I have people who need me. And the anomaly…we can’t leave the anomaly there to get worse. We’re the only ones who can do something about it.”

Heimerdinger nods. “I have a few theories. We can create an anomaly with a Hex Crystal I’ve acquired. But it will take time, and the calculations are not yet complete. I’ve run into something of a wall on that front.”

“We can help,” Powder offers. Alter-Ekko inclines his head. 

Benzo claps Ekko’s shoulder. “That can wait, I think. Zaun’s different from what the lad remembers, no doubt. If he’s going to be staying for a while, he’ll need to know where everything is! And you two–you still need to be ready for the Innovators Competition later this week.”

He points to Alter-Ekko and Claggor. 

“But first, you look like you could use a shower, son,” Benzo offers him a smile, slightly teasing. Ekko flushes. He must look like a mess compared to them. 

“Yeah,” he admits. “Yeah, that’d be good.”

Zaun and Piltover are connected. Truly one, with citizens going back and forth across the bustling bridge. There’s none of the prejudices or downward sneers of the Topsiders, like they’ve just smelled something disgusting when they look at him.

He doesn’t know what to make of it. The Enforcers give their little group (Both Ekkos, Powder, and his musician Heimerdinger) a wink and a nod, then they’re on their way. Most of them are just talking to civilians, seemingly doing no real work. 

Ekko doesn’t relax around them. Not even a little. He’s wearing some clothes his alternate self has lended to him, seeing as his own outfit is a mess that Benzo insisted be washed. 

He pulls his eyes away from a food stand run by Jericho, who is serving both Zaunites and Topsiders, and blinks as they reach the halfway point on the bridge. 

For a moment, all he can see is Jinx lying there, bloody and motionless. Isha’s name on her lips. Something twists in his heart. 

“Hey.”

He flinches back to awareness. Powder has tapped his shoulder, though she backs off a moment later. Alter-Ekko is watching him closely, like he’s not sure if he’ll have to protect Powder from…

Ekko feels sick. She’s watching him with worry in her eyes. 

He beat her half to death right here. 

“I’m fine,” he rasps. He keeps walking. 

Ekko doesn’t venture far from Zaun after that. He learns where everything is, but he largely throws himself into the calculations Heimerdinger is working on to get them home. 

Most of that work is done in Powder’s hideout. He’s never gotten to Jinx’s variation of this place; only tried to find it once, nearly fell into three separate traps.

Mylo and Claggor visit from time to time to bring them food. It’s something they’re clearly used to. 

“Silco does that for us too,” Alter-Ekko tells him. “Helps us remember to eat. But we figured it might be better for him to…keep his distance while you’re around.”

“Probably a good idea,” Ekko replies. He’s staring at the numbers on their chalkboard, trying to figure out where to go with it next.

“He’s not the same man he was in your universe. You know that, right?”

“I…know. It’s just hard to separate him from the guy I’ve spent so much of my life hating.”

Mylo looks up from where he’s eating with the others. “Dude, is there anything happy about your life?”

He thinks about that. 

His family is dead. The girl he’d adored for so long has been twisted into one of his worst enemies. Her adopted father has seen fit to cut down the people he’s sworn to protect, one after another. His city has been ravaged by Enforcers and Shimmer. His tree is poisoned. He’s been shipped off to an alternate universe that has everything he’s ever wanted, and none of it can ever truly be his. 

“I’ve got some friends. Heimerdinger started teaching me recently.”

“A hobby?”

“I make stuff to help people.”

“For yourself, dude.”

“I guess I draw sometimes. It’s been a while. No time.”

“Favorite food?”

“Depends on what we scrounge up.”

“Girlfriend? Boyfriend? Partner? Friend with benefits?”

Ekko hasn’t looked away from the chalkboard. He ponders answering that last question a moment before he finally shrugs. He won’t be staying here, anyway. 

“I had a fling once. Scar’s idea. To get over…someone.”

“...And?”

“And what, you want details?” Ekko huffs. “I hooked up with this girl in the Red Light district when I was seventeen. Didn’t do it for me. Don’t ask for more.”

He’s not about to get into why he even gave Scar’s suggestion a shot. It wasn’t long after he’d found out Isha was born. Ekko had thought he’d been over Jinx, but learning out of nowhere that she’d had a child had just stabbed and twisted a knife through his heart.  

Scar had tried to get him back on his feet by whatever means necessary. Frankly, Ekko doesn’t even remember who he’d slept with. She’d been a few years older than him, that was about the extent of it. 

It sounds like Mylo deflates. “I’m just fishing for anything that’ll make you happy, bro. You’re not our Ekko, but we give a shit about you, y’know?”

That makes him pause. Ekko hasn’t been… happy for a long time. He has drive. He has purpose. But it’s always for someone else. 

Finding Vi was a brief moment of joy. Then she was gone again. And truth be told, he doesn’t even know whose side she’s on. 

“It’s not enough to give yourself what you need to survive, lad,” Heimerdinger turns his words against him. “You need to live.”

Ekko takes a deep breath. “Thanks, just…I have to do this.”

He knows it’s not the answer they want, but it’s all he has right now. He focuses. This equation won’t math itself out. 

They research for weeks. Progress is made, slowly but surely. 

The Innovator’s Competition comes and goes, along with that dance. Ekko has his…talk with Silco. They watch Powder dance with his alternate self. 

They’re happy. They have a future. He’s…glad they have that. 

This world is so right. It’s hard to believe how wrong it went where he comes from. 

And Ekko knows he’s been down. He’s at the lowest point of his life, but he’s also aware that he’s not making it easier for the people around him. 

They all try to help in their own way. Mylo with his bad jokes. Claggor’s quiet support. Powder’s optimism and energy. Alter-Ekko who understands the way he thinks, even if he can’t fully relate to everything. Benzo’s warm hugs. Vander’s cooking and an open seat always waiting for him. Even Silco’s reached out, and if that doesn’t say something, Ekko doesn’t know what will. 

This place is wonderful, something out of his dreams, and it forces Ekko to see exactly how broken he’s become. He’s jaded, angry, spiraling down a path of self-destruction for the sake of the people who need him. 

But here, there’s no one who needs his help. 

It’s him. He’s the one who has to heal, with his bitter, jagged pieces and the tattered remnants of his heart. And Ekko just does not know how to do that. He doesn’t know what to do with peace.

So he goes looking for the tree in an attempt to ground himself. 

It’s there. Growing strong, untainted by the Arcane runoff. The house is missing, the mural, everything the Firelights built. 

But the tree is still here. 

The concrete wall where the mural should be is a blank canvas. 

Ekko doesn’t know how to heal, and no one here really needs his help. But maybe he can put a little bandage on an old wound. 

It’s what he knows. 

He takes everyone to the tree the next day. Ekko hasn’t slept, but he feels…a little better. Like he’s gotten some of his balance back. 

“Whoa,” Claggor steps past Vander, who has stopped in his tracks. 

“Oh, son,” Benzo puts a hand on his shoulder for a moment. His voice is a little shaky. 

Powder slowly approaches the mural. “You…painted this?”

Ekko looks up. He’s got a good memory, and Vi…her face is one he can’t forget, changes and all. He’s captured her likeness as best he can. 

“She looks so…badass,” Powder laughs, a little wetly. Alter-Ekko takes her hand and squeezes. 

“She has her moments,” Ekko admits. His mouth curls up a bit. “Still blocks with her face, though.”

Vander lets out a startled laugh. “‘Course she does.”

“Surprise, she’s just like you,” Silco comments dryly. Vander half-heartedly elbows him. But both of them are memorizing Vi’s face. 

“This is an apology,” Ekko admits quietly. “I’m…not an easy person to be with. I’m starting to figure that out.”

“It’s not that,” Vander shakes his head. He reaches up and brushes the edge of Vi’s image. “Boy, you’re just like us old-timers. That’s exactly what we never wanted for you. What we did, what we put each other through…those wounds never fully heal. They just get smaller.”

Ekko can believe that. He already knows there are things he’ll never completely recover from. He’s a tattered, ragged mess of a person. Like everyone else he knows back home.  

He thought about putting Isha up there, too. But ultimately, he’s chosen not to. Powder has lived a different life here, doesn’t have the child slipping through the fissures at her heels. She’s a what-if Ekko suspects would hurt more than help. 

Ekko leans against the concrete. “I don’t know what I’m going home to. If I’ve got a home to go back to at all. I can’t make it whole again. But this place–it’s only missing a few pieces. This doesn’t replace Vi, but…”

“It makes the hole smaller,” Powder sniffs. “Do you–do you think once we get the Hextech figured out we can…Could we visit you guys?”

Ekko snorts. “It’s not safe over there, Powder. I don’t want you guys going anywhere near the place. Besides, playing with Arcane anomalies is…”

“A hazard?” Silco suggests. 

“Yeah.”

Powder doesn’t agree, but she doesn’t say anything else about it, either. She just stares at Vi’s mural. 

Ekko’s not sure, but he’s got a feeling she’s…going to try coming after them. Call it a hunch.

“Maybe give it a few years if I can’t convince you otherwise,” he suggests instead. She glances at him. “Make sure you’ve got a safe way there and back so you’re not stranded. And…maybe things will be slightly better if you wait?”

“Wow. That’s the most optimistic you’ve ever been,” Alter-Ekko tells him. 

“Fuck off, I’m doing my best.”

Benzo reaches over to clasp his shoulder. Ekko might feel a little better. 

It’s a start.

They finally get to the testing phase of the Hextech. An attempt to recreate the Arcane anomaly.

It’s wrong. 

The anomaly forms, but it dissipates instantly. They play with the math a few times, test a couple of different theories, but the anomaly doesn’t stick the way it’s supposed to. 

Ekko stares at the runes, considers what they’ve tried. The math is there, so what’s missing? 

He draws his mind back to the anomaly that sucked them in. The tendrils of reality he could pluck with his astral form. 

The Star Forger creating light with the raw ingredients of the universe. 

Arcane. Space. Time. The physical as Ekko knows it. He closes his eyes and tries to picture it. That moment when the cosmic entity had bent the rules of the universe to its will. 

He sets his hand on the dial controlling the runes. 

“Ekko? Hey, wait a sec–”

He twists. In his mind, he can see the way the energy fluxed and coiled. How something that was potential became a point of firm reality. 

It’s all looped together, all connected. The Arcane, space, and time interweave like differently colored strings wrapped together. The physical…that’s what’s missing. Reality.

Something tangible that links it to the other universal building blocks.  

He inverts the acceleration rune. Flips a trait of reality on its head with the Arcane.

And the anomaly is born.

It’s suspended in the center of the particle container they’ve tentatively named the “Z-Drive”. Coiled tight, a loop of controlled Arcane energy bound firmly in their plane of reality. It does not fade. It does not grow. It is simply present.

“You did it,” Heimerdinger gasps. He’s not sure which one. Ekko’s still staring at the anomaly. 

“How did you…?” Powder trails off. 

“I inverted the acceleration rune,” he says, a little stunned. “That’s what ties it all together. It keeps the Arcane looped with space and time. Keeps it anchored. Keeps it here.”

Alter-Ekko leans around him. “So…what does it do, exactly? It’s your way home, but not unless we figure out how to make it work.”

“One way to find out,” Powder bounces over. She’s got a delighted grin on her face. “Let’s play!”

It’s a time loop. 

They’ve broken four seconds from the mosaic of time itself and taken them for whatever they deem fit. 

As it is, it doesn’t have nearly enough strength to send them back home. But both Heimerdingers have that manic inventor’s look in their eyes now that the math is fully in front of them. They’ve got something cooking, but suggest the students take a well-earned break. 

Ekko’s brain is beat, so he agrees without a fuss. It’s back to The Last Drop, to toast to their success. 

Vander serves him, Benzo, and Alter-Ekko light drinks at the bar. None of them are big on drinking, he learns. Neither is Ekko, for that matter. Alcoholism is a trap he’s managed to avoid, despite how difficult his life is back home. 

Powder doesn’t have any alcohol at all. She takes a glass of water instead along with a medicinal pill that she downs in one go. 

Ekko raises an eyebrow. “What’s that?”

“It’s for, um,” she twirls a finger towards her head. “My BPD. The Scribbles?”

He stares. “There’s…there’s medicine for that?”

“Yeah. It helps. I do like, therapy too,” she admits with a shrug. “Does Jinx not have the Scribbles?”

“She does, just…”

Ekko hasn’t actually been around for one of her attacks in a long time. They’ve certainly never talked about it. But he’s seen enough over the years to know that it’s gotten a lot worse. 

“Ask Heimerdinger,” she tells him quietly when he doesn’t expand on the topic. “He knows how to get it. How to make it, even. He can help.”

“I have no idea how I’ll ever get Jinx to take those,” he says. She’ll probably think it’s poison. At best, she’ll chuck it into a dumpster. 

But he…can try. He still isn’t sure what to do about her. 

Powder reminds him of all that he loved about Jinx. What Silco’s told him makes him want to hope.  

He just doesn’t know how to reach her. 

“Gods, is that the time?” Vander suddenly remarks. “Powder, you two had best get home. Meds are gonna knock you out soon.”

Alter-Ekko is on his feet, reaching for her hand as she yawns halfway through a protest. The meds aren’t kicking in that fast, he’s pretty sure, but she’s just as worn out from the day they’ve had as he is. 

“Uh-huuuh,” she works her jaw until the yawn is done. “Ugh. Alright yeah, we’re outta here.”

“See you guys tomorrow,” Ekko waves them off. 

“See ya,” Alter-Ekko nods as he leads Powder out of the bar. 

Ekko looks down at his drink, shifts the glass a bit so the liquid moves in a gentle whirl. 

Vander cleans the abandoned glasses and tells him and Benzo he’s turning in. Then the man retreats to the back room to find his bed. Ekko considers doing the same; he’s crashing in the basement of The Last Drop right now. 

“Silco told us you talked,” Benzo says casually beside him. 

Ekko stirs and glances over. He thinks about that for a moment. 

“A bit. He told me the best thing he’d done in his life was find a way to forgive Vander. I just…don’t know how to do that with Jinx. I’m not sure if I can even listen to any advice from him. I get that he’s different here, just…”

“You hold a grudge as badly as us old men,” Benzo shakes his head. “Though I can’t say I blame you.”

“I’ve had days where that’s all that’s kept me going.”

“I can tell,” he lets out a long sigh. “You say you know Silco’s different here. But do you understand what that means?”

Ekko shakes his head. He’s too tired to guess.

“Vander is the enemy they remember, lad. All that happened to you at his hands–it didn’t happen here. The last man with blood on his hands was Vander.”

“Yeah, but he’s…”

Benzo raises an eyebrow. Ekko falters. He looks down. “That’s not the same thing.”

“Our revolution–when we stormed the bridge, when we got all of those people killed, all Vander wanted was blood. He was ready to burn Piltover down if it meant everyone we’d lost hadn’t died in vain. Then…then Felicia was shot. Silco was with her at the time and Vander blamed him. He turned his hands on his own brother.”

Benzo shakes his head slowly. “He hurt him badly, but Silco got away. Made Vander so angry he went straight back to the fight. You know what stopped him in the end.”

“Vi and Powder.”

“They lost everything because of us. Those kids–they had nothing left. That was…it took all that for us to realize how badly we’d fucked up.”

Ekko’s heard this story before, though not Silco’s part in it. He only knew that he and Vander had history before Silco ultimately killed him. “How’d Silco forgive him? I don’t know how to do it.”

“Truth is, once Vander had Vi and Powder safe at the bar, he went looking for him. I told him not to, but he wouldn’t listen. All the old haunts, our hideouts. But he couldn’t find him. He left a letter at their old home in the mines, told Silco he was sorry.”

Benzo sighs. “Time went on. And then Violet…she passed. I don’t know how he heard about it, but Silco loved Felicia as Vander did. Her little girl dying so suddenly broke something in both of them. In all of us.”

“He never even knew her,” Ekko murmurs. Though Silco’s said himself how much he regrets not knowing Vi.

“Oh, he did. Used to watch her with Vander when Felicia and Connel were off in the mines. Less and less as our revolution grew, but he knew her when she was just a tyke.

“So he reached out. He’d found the letter in the mines. I suppose he was wandering through old memories like we were, mourning in his own way. Couple of days after Violet died, he turned up at the bar. He and Vander talked. It was…it was hard. But they were done being angry at each other.”

“Just like that?”

“You’ve lost a lot, lad. I know how that hurts you, I wouldn’t wish that on anyone. But losing your children–that’s…it’s a different kind of pain. That shatters your life in a way that I hope you never have to experience. 

“You give everything you have trying to make a future for them. Trying to make them happy and be sure they never go through the shit you did. You give all your love. And when that gets ripped away, it’s a wound that bleeds worse than any other.”

Ekko isn’t sure what to say to that. He’s not a father; he’s mostly sure he never will be. Life expectancy isn’t high in the trenches at the best of times, and it’s only a matter of time before a stray bullet finds him for all the fights he gets into. 

“It wasn’t simple, with Silco. I’ll admit that. Not just with him and Vander, but me, too. We took years to reconcile, and there’s always going to be sore spots between us.”

Benzo looks at him. “Ultimately what really brought us back together was when Vander asked Silco to Paint him.”

“He–”

“He had to know Vander meant it. Powder was crushed when Vi died. Felicia’s only surviving child. Vander was ready to give Silco anything if it meant she’d have him there to look out for her.”

Ekko can’t even imagine that. He knew Vander and Silco had history, that they’d been best friends and bitter enemies. But to Paint each other…

“What are you getting at?” Ekko sighs. “It's not the same thing, what’s happened with Jinx and I.”

“No feud is ever the same,” he shrugs. “And it’s always worse when it’s with people you love. But you haven’t given up on her.”

“You don’t know that.”

“You can’t bring yourself to kill her, son. You said it yourself.”

Ekko’s eyes drop to the counter. “But I should. She’s taken so much from me. From us.”

“But you still have hope. What’re you holding on to?”

Ekko opens his mouth, but he isn’t sure if he should say it. Benzo waits a few moments. 

“Is it Isha?”

His eyes fly upwards. Benzo is searching his face. “You weren’t talking about Powder’s mother when you said that name.”

Ekko says nothing at first. He folds his arms on the bar and lays his head down on them. “If there’s any chance of making things better, it’s because of her. Every time I’ve tried to save Jinx, I screw up. So I’ll just…I’ll do everything I can to keep Isha safe, instead. Maybe that’ll be enough.”

“And what then?”

“What do you mean?”

Benzo reaches over, wraps his arm around Ekko’s shoulder. “Son, you keep throwing yourself on a pyre for everyone else. Sooner or later, you won’t have anything left to burn.”

“There are too many people who need help. I can’t stop. It’s all I can do for my home.”

“And that makes you a better man than I’ve ever been,” Benzo murmurs. “But Ekko…you’re worth more than what you can give to other people. You deserve happiness, too.”

And he’s…slowly been putting that together, while he’s been here. It’s not something that comes naturally to him; being selfish. He hasn’t had that luxury for years. 

“I don’t know what I’ll do,” he confesses. “If I fail again. I’ve been holding onto this hope that things will get better. That our luck’s gonna change. Not just with Jinx, but…everything. Anything.”

Ekko has a few moments where he just breathes. He doesn’t feel good.

“Sometimes I wish I could just…walk away. Sneak onto one of those fancy airships and fly off. Jinx used to say she’d do that. Maybe I’d go to Ionia. Find some little town and disappear. Try to start over.”

Even as he says it, like every time he’s ever thought it, he knows he never could. He’s chained himself to Zaun to his dying breath. Something old and heavy wells up in his chest and he squeezes his eyes shut. 

“I’m so tired, dad.”

“I know son,” Benzo leans over and squeezes him tight. “I know.”

He’s too drained to move. Benzo doesn’t let him go. The comfort is something he’s needed for a long, long time. 

“It’s a hard thing. An impossible thing, sometimes,” Benzo tells him. “You have responsibilities you can’t shy away from. People who need you. A fight to be fought. But you’ll destroy yourself if you give too much.”

“I’ve never been able to math it all out. To make it work,” he admits. “I just…cut myself out of the equation.”

“You’re poisoning yourself every single day you do. You already know that.”

Ekko sighs. A little weight leaves the mountain crushing his chest. Crushing his soul. 

“I can’t stop,” he murmurs. “I have to see this through. No matter how it ends.”

He’s resigned himself to that. For quite a while, actually. He’ll go down swinging, but Ekko knows he can’t keep it up forever.  

Time has never been on his side. 

They’re ready to leave. The Heimerdingers have built a device that will empower the anomaly and send them home.

Ekko does one last loop around Zaun, early in the morning. He walks through the streets and watches the sun rise. It might be the last time he’s ever allowed this view from the fissures. 

Saying goodbye is harder. But it’s…not as bad, in some ways. He knows they’ll be ok when he leaves. That they have a future ahead of them all. 

Mylo and Claggor give him firm hugs, with back-slapping, muttered goodbyes, and one last bad joke for the road. Vander gives him a similar farewell. 

He exchanges a hesitant handshake with Silco. It’s the best he can do. 

Benzo squeezes him tight. “You can do this, son. I’m proud of you, you hear?”

“Yeah,” he swallows past a lump in his throat. 

Alter-Ekko and Powder are the last. 

He embraces his alternate self for a moment. “Don’t let her get into too much trouble.”

“Full-time job.”

“I’m still here, y’know,” Powder says dryly. But she’s got a wobbly smile as Ekko pulls back and then she jumps to hug him tight. 

“It’s been real, Pow-pow.”

“I couldn’t ever forget you. Not in any universe,” she murmurs. Ekko squeezes back. “You’ve always been there to keep me steady. Don’t let me go. Ok?”

“I’ll try.”

“Stay safe.”

He can’t promise that. He nods anyway. Stepping away from that last goodbye is hard, but he’s ready. He takes the Z-Drive in his hands.

Ekko and Heimerdinger step into the apparatus. Everyone backs up as Counselor Heimerdinger flips a series of switches and powers the device. Energy surges, fixates on the Z-Drive. 

He can’t look away from Powder. She’s got a watery little smirk that vaguely reminds him of their childhood. 

Ekko blinks away tears, then they are gone.