Rebels (Vi x female reader)

Chapter 1 (Prologue): I've Had Enough

My father has lived a difficult, ragged life. As a boy and teenager, he had to warily eye his surroundings every time he left his home, took a walk, or went to the market. He was never allowed to go alone. That was the main rule he lived by. And that was because he resided in the undercity, a cruel and brutal city born out of a mixture between long-festering problems and the Piltover Counselors' incompetence.

In a broken city like that, most people had lost hope in the idea of a better life. They had lost hope in even owning a simple home in a safe neighborhood; a neighborhood filled with greenery, fresh air, and the bright shining sun overhead. Most had given up on the idea of being able to take a pleasant walk and carelessly strut down the street without worrying about being mugged.

Somehow, my father wasn't hardened by the desperation and suffering he lived around. In fact, he was inspired to find a way out of it, to escape to Piltover and make enough money to aid his family. Before the borders between the undercity and topside became tight, he would cross over to attend school. He surpassed most of his peers, later pursuing a degree with the aid of scholarships at a well-known university for medicine. He then met my mother, married, and later had me.

Perhaps it was the care and love shown to him by his parents, aunts, uncles, and cousins. Or perhaps, my father possessed a resolve most others didn't. But he found the desire and motivation to build a better life for himself and his family. And he succeeded.

Yet, although it's a story that I still deeply admire him for, my whole life he's planned out that I would be a doctor like him, and I have zero interest in the profession. I can't throw away my happiness and sacrifice my life working a six-figure job just for financial security. I understand where he's coming from, and the fear inside him of the possibility that I could be poor and suffer as he did as a child, but I can't.

That is one of my dilemmas currently.

Oh, the other!

Piltover. It's a society built on wealth and a strong government, and yet has produced a society blind to the problems and the struggles going on within the undercity. Many have an elitist ideology, that they're better than others simply for the money they possess, and have rampant prejudice they have towards people from the undercity.

Often as I hear people talk about them, I wish I could give them a piece of mind. My dad suffered there. Much of my family still lives there. My family still suffers from poverty and the city's problems, and that poverty prevents them from escaping their horrible conditions. 

But they can't have empathy for a people whose struggle they have no connection to. And I understand that there isn't much shouting in someone's face can do about their ignorance, but I hate feeling so powerless.

This city pressures me into a mold, and I feel suffocated, as if I have no room to breathe or move without someone judging or telling me what I should do with my life. Living within a circle of upper-class people, all with desperation to uphold self-image, with every family educated and producing greatness for Piltover at every turn; yeah, it sure as hell suffocates you. Not to mention with the pushing from my parents to become an excellent doctor and live up to my father's name, and to use my status and future wealth to aid my impoverished relatives; it's absolutely overwhelming. Sure, I could deny my father's wishes, but he would say I'm acting selfish and not using my advantage and privilege to help my family. Believe me! I feel guilty over it too, but I refuse to sacrifice my life for that sole reason.

Yet, instead of saying this, I've been conforming to everyone's idea of who I should be. I've long since buried my true feelings and desires away within my heart. It's gotten to the point where I can't really tell who I am or what I want anymore. Emotionally, I have no connection to it because I've been pretending to want to do and like other things. With each coming year, I grow more miserable, anxiety and desire bubbling up within me to look for change. To make a change. To change something, anything, in my life. I can't live like this any longer, it's been eating me alive.