Chapter 1 - Vi
When Caitlyn had heard the gunshot, she hadn't been too worried. Honestly, Vi had been shot before and been fine. Her armour had absorbed some powerful bullets in the past and Vi had always come out on top.
But it was what followed after the gunshot that had made Caitlyn start walking that little bit faster.
The silence.
Before the shot, she had heard Vi shout her position, she had heard vehicles in the distance, she had heard the thunder in the sky. Then, immediately after the gunshot, all the sound in the world just died. Only the sound of gentle raindrops could be heard and even then, the sound felt muted.
Caitlyn's quick steps quickly turned into a full sprint when the silence lasted more than 4 seconds. She knew Vi was fine, Vi was always fine. They'd been friends for over 3 years now, Vi had always been fine no matter what.
She ran down an alleyway looking for a sign of her friend, half expecting the pinket to be hidden away somewhere to give her a jump scare. She mentally recalled the last place she had heard Vi call from and continued down the alley. At the end, where it turned into another, she saw it.
Vi.
She was sitting against a wall, her mechanical gloves torn apart, destroyed and barely recognisable. The wall behind her, a watered down colour of red. The red. That was the colour that stood out to Caitlyn the most. It was pooled around Vi. The source of which was a perfectly clear and round bullet hole in her chest.
Caitlyn didn't feel her rifle slip from her fingers, and she would later be surprised that she ran so fast that her hat fell from her head. But right there and then, these were trivial things, she had something much more important on her mind. She only had one thing on her mind.
"Vi!" She shouted, almost diving to the ground, embracing her friend. At what point she began crying she did not truly know or care, but tears streamed down her face, competing with the raindrops.
She pulled away and grabbed Vi's face between her hands, wiping the wet locks of pink hair out of her face. Trying in vain to wake her friend. She ignored the hole in Vi's chest, hoping it was just a figment of her imagination and that Vi was fine.
"Vi, please talk to me!" Caitlyn begged. "Say something!" She ordered. "PLEASE!" She shouted.
But Vi said nothing. Her mouth only the slightest bit open and her eyes half lidded, staring straight ahead but seeing nothing.
Caitlyn's face scrunched up in pain and began to sob. She pulled her friend as close as she could, wishing for the life of her that some warmth would return to Vi's cold skin, or that Vi would raise a hand and pat her back, or tease her, that she would breathe again. That she would do anything.
But Vi did nothing, she simply remained quiet and unmoving.
Caitlyn buried her head into the crook of Vi's neck, crying, begging silently for a response.
After almost a minute, it had completely sunk in. With her eye's filled with tears, she turned away slightly, face turning to pure rage.
"WHEN I FIND YOU I WILL KILL YOU!" She shouted to the sky, her throat burning with the force of the shout, hoping that the murderer could hear her. "THERE IS NOWHERE IN RUNETERRA YOU CAN HIDE FROM ME!"
She turned back to her friend, grasping her face almost reverently. "I promise Vi, they won't get away from me." She said through her grit teeth.
Without another word, Caitlyn jumped up, retrieved her rifle and with an indescribable rage she began her search.