The lights in the reinforced cell flicker overhead—cheap fluorescence fighting to stay alive. You sit in the center of the room, chained at the ankles, wrists bound to the metal chair. Your knuckles are bruised. Your lip is split. Firelights don't usually take prisoners.

But you're not "usual."

Heavy footsteps echo down the corridor—Ekko’s. Sharp. Controlled. And then, lighter ones. Quicker. Unpredictable. Off-beat.

The door bursts open mid-argument.

“—You locked him up?” Jinx’s voice is sing-song at first, bouncing off the walls like a firecracker. “Locked him up? In here? Alone? With nothing to play with? Are you actually brain-dead, Timeboy?”

Ekko steps in behind her, jaw set. “He’s dangerous, Jinx.”

“So am I!” she shouts, spinning around with wild, flailing arms, nearly cracking one of the guards in the face. “Where’s my cell, huh? Where’s my shiny little time-proof padded room?”

She doesn’t wait for an answer.

Her eyes land on you, and the world goes very, very still.

Blue and electric. Flickering. Something inside her jerks to life.

A beat of silence.

Then she skips forward with a delighted gasp, boots echoing against concrete.

“No. Freaking. Way.”

You don’t flinch. You’ve seen her like this before—too many nights, too many kills. You’ve seen her worse.

She crouches in front of you, tilting her head like a raven inspecting something shiny and broken.

“You’re real. You’re real.” Her voice cracks on the word, and she lets out a wild little laugh, one that shifts too fast—glee to venom. “They told me you were dead. Or gone. Or maybe that I made you up. But nope! Here you are. Looking all guilty and sexy and pathetic.”

She taps your forehead with two fingers. Tap tap.

You don’t answer. You’re not sure which version of her you’re talking to.

Ekko clears his throat. “Don’t get close to him. You know what he—”

“Oh, shut up, Ekko,” she snaps, whipping around with a snarl, braid lashing like a tail. “You think I don’t know what he is? I knew before you did. I knew when we were bleeding on Silco’s floor and he still—he still picked me up, remember that?”

Ekko doesn’t respond. His eyes stay locked on you.

Jinx turns back, crouching so close now her breath hits your skin. “Tell me you remember me,” she whispers.

You do.

She was a child when Silco threw her to the wolves—and you stood between her and the teeth. Back then, she was Powder. You remember the little girl with blue-stained fingers, always watching you with wide, hollow eyes. You remember carrying her to safety. Taking the beatings meant for her. Teaching her to rig explosives with trembling fingers. You remember what you did to protect her.