Chapter Text
The air beneath Zaun had always been heavy—thick with smoke, rust, and chemicals that clung to your lungs like ghosts. But tonight, the tunnels held something quieter. Almost gentle. Almost bearable.
Powder sat on the edge of a broken supply crate, hands wrapped around a chipped mug of cold broth she wasn’t drinking. Her blue hair was tied back in a loose braid, too thin from the months of malnutrition. She still looked a little ghostly, like her body hadn’t caught up with the fact that she’d escaped.
But she had. She’d gotten out.
Silco was dead.
She was free.
And still, some nights, she didn’t feel real.
“Powder,” a voice called softly behind her.
Her spine straightened before she turned. No longer twitching at every sound like she used to. Not as much, anyway.
Ekko stood in the hallway, backlit by dim firefly tech. His dreads were tied back, jaw tight, a bit of grease on his cheek from fixing a broken exhaust vent. He looked tired—but calm. Grounded. Alpha.
Her omega instincts didn’t flare around him like they used to around Silco. She didn’t freeze or shrink away. But she did feel it—the quiet pull toward him. Something old. Something deeper than instinct. It scared her more than anything else.
“You didn’t come to training,” he said.
She looked away. “Didn’t sleep.”
“Bad night?”
She didn’t answer, just shrugged and brought the mug to her lips. The broth was cold and bitter, like everything in Zaun. Her scent-blocker patch clung to the inside of her shirt, itching her skin. She wore it religiously. She had to. Her scent—vanilla, oak, and a trace of gunpowder—was too honest, too revealing.
Ekko stepped closer, boots soft on the metal floor. His scent reached her even before he did. Clean, sharp, steady.
Mint and rain.
It used to make her flinch. Now… it just made her breathe deeper.
“You missed breakfast too,” he said. “You’re not eating enough.”
“You sound like Vi.”
“I’m not Vi,” he said, more gently. “I’m not here to push you.”
That was the thing. He never was. Even when she’d first come to the Firelights—shaking, half-starved, hollowed out by Silco’s suppressants—he hadn’t forced trust. Not when she’d confessed through clenched teeth that she’d killed some of his people. Not when others had looked at her with open disgust.
He’d just listened. And stayed.
It had taken her three weeks to speak more than a sentence to anyone. A month to stop waking up screaming. Two months to stop expecting Ekko to change his mind and throw her out. And still, four months in, the guilt hadn’t let her go.
He didn’t say anything more—just sat beside her, keeping enough space that she didn’t feel trapped, but close enough that his warmth cut through the chill in her bones.
“You fixed the vent?” she asked quietly.
“Mostly. I’ll need help with the relay node tomorrow.” He paused. “If you’re up for it.”
“I can help.” Her voice was soft, automatic.
She wanted to be useful. Needed to be.
He nodded once. “Thanks.”
A silence settled between them. Not uncomfortable. Just… weighty. Powder rubbed her thumb over a crack in the mug, thinking about nothing and everything.
“You know,” he said suddenly, voice low, “the others don’t hate you anymore.”
Her fingers froze.
“They were scared,” he continued, “and they had every right to be. But they’ve seen how hard you’re trying. They know the truth now.”
“They should still hate me,” she said, flatly.
He didn’t argue. He never gave her false comfort. She appreciated that more than she could say.
“Maybe,” he said after a long pause, “but I don’t.”
She looked at him then. Really looked. His eyes were dark and tired, but steady. He wasn’t lying.
The burn in her chest started up again. That sick, unnamable thing she felt every time he was too kind. Too close.
“You should,” she whispered. “I could’ve killed you.”
“You didn’t.”
“But I could’ve.”
“You didn’t,” he said again, more firmly.
Her throat tightened. “Only because you were faster.”
“And you’re not her anymore.”
His words dropped like a weight into the silence.
Jinx.
That name still scraped at her like rusted wire. She hadn’t said it in months. Refused to let anyone call her it. That name had belonged to someone twisted by chemicals, by grief, by the hands of a man who pretended to love her.
She was Powder now. Even if she didn’t always feel like she deserved it.
“You still trust me?” she asked.
Ekko turned his head, looking at her like she was the only person in the world.
“I never stopped.”
That did it. Her cheeks went hot, color rising under the pale of her skin. She looked down fast, trying to pretend the reaction was nothing, but she knew he noticed. He always noticed.
The sound of his quiet chuckle made it worse.
“Stop that,” she muttered, flustered.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You were thinking something.”
“Guilty.”
He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, fingers loosely linked. He looked casual, but she could feel it. The way his focus never really drifted from her. The way his scent shifted just slightly whenever she was close.
She wondered if he noticed how hers changed too. She bet he did.
“It’s getting stronger,” she admitted after a minute.
“What is?”
“My scent,” she said, barely above a whisper. “I think… the blockers aren’t working as well. Or maybe my body’s just—catching up.”
Ekko didn’t flinch or shift away. If anything, he leaned in slightly, letting the soft rush of mint and rain roll toward her like a tide.
“I noticed,” he said gently.
Her stomach dropped.
“Sorry.”
“Don’t be.” His voice was calm. Measured. “It’s you. You don’t have to apologize for that.”
“But—”
“I don’t care if your heats are irregular, or if you don’t want anyone near you, or if your scent leaks through a little. I’m not here because of your biology.”
She swallowed hard. “Then why are you here?”
Ekko looked at her like it was obvious. Like it had always been obvious.
“Because I missed you.”
Something deep in her chest cracked open at that. A wound she’d been taping shut for years, hoping no one would notice it was still bleeding.
“I don’t know how to do this,” she admitted, voice raw. “Be normal. Be… safe.”
“You don’t have to know,” he said softly. “You just have to try.”
And she was trying. Every single day. To eat more. To sleep. To trust her hands not to build bombs. To believe the girl she used to be wasn’t gone forever.
To let herself feel something again.
Her gaze dropped to his hands—rough, strong, scarred. She remembered those hands pulling her from the wreckage of her old life. Holding her still when she shook too hard to stand.
They’d never asked anything of her.
“You always smell like rain,” she said, quietly. “Like something clean. Safe.”
His smile was slow. “You smell like something I’d chase through a storm.”
The words hit her too fast, too true.
Her cheeks went red again.
“Stop it,” she whispered, face burning.
“You like it.”
“Do not.”
“Liar.”
She couldn’t stop the tiny laugh that escaped her, even though she immediately tried to smother it. Her fingers pressed over her lips like that might undo it somehow.
But he just smiled wider.
It was the first real smile she’d given anyone in months.
And he’d earned it.