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sissytobitch10seconds · 7 months

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Birdsong: Ribs

Fandom: Grishaverse: Six of Crows and Shadow and Bone (TV) Summary: Wylan is kicking himself in the ass for being as late as he was. He knew that his partners had to be worried, it was almost three hours after he sat that he would be home, after all. It seems as thought the world is determined to make him even later than ever when he hears something in the parking lot near his work. Warnings: Physical assault, mentions of canon-typical grooming/child abuse, and blood Word Count: 10,501 Ship(s): Nina Zenik/Wylan Van Eck/Jesper Fahey/Matthias Helvar/Inej Ghafa/Kaz Brekker

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A/N: At the time of writing this, I had not read the books so a lot of the plot was still pulled from the show. I've now finished the book but I don't want to rewrite the whole series so I'm editing some things as I go. If you notice inconsistencies from here on out that's why! Stay sissy and bitchy everyone <3

Wylan winced as the door to his lab shut harder than he had meant it to. He had gotten so wrapped up in the work that he had been doing, finally hitting the breakthrough that he had been searching for, that he hadn’t noticed how late it had gotten. He tried to make sure that he was home no later than six so that he could eat with his partners before Kaz had to go oversee the opening of the Crow Club. Inej often had a call time around seven as well, so it killed two birds with one stone to be home before they left. That way he knew that he had at least one in person interaction with them each day, since they were usually asleep when he woke.

He had broken the rule that he had made with himself by working over what his normal limit was. He didn’t break the rule often, maybe once or twice a year. A lot of the time when he was working in the lab, he was running the same experiment over and over again, which was so monotonous that he would often skip out on a test or two that he could have run that day in favor of doing it the next day instead. It was worse when he was writing his reports, since he had to speak slowly to his speech-to-text program so that he could get it written up faster than it would take him to try and type everything. Spellcheck was a godsend, but reading and writing were so much harder for him than they were for everyone else that he worked with.

Today he had been so wrapped up in the new breakthrough that they had made, that he had totally forgotten to keep track of the time. He had been mumbling down ideas into the notepad app on his phone the entire day so that none of the ideas would escape him. By the time that he had looked up again, ripped from his thoughts as he realized that he was famished, all of his coworkers were gone and the building had been darkened.

Wylan had finished cleaning up the lab and then locked the building as quickly as he felt he could while still being responsible so that he could go home. He hurried towards the parking lot that he had found a spot in that morning after running a little bit behind. That was the annoying thing about working so close to the university campus when school was in session, it resulted in him having to walk two blocks just to get to his car so that he could go home because all the other spots were taken. Still, it meant that they got a lot of student interns so they didn’t have to spend the extra money they were already strapped for, instead just giving them credit for their classes and real world experience.

He tugged his headphones out of his bag and then connected them to his phone as he picked the audiobook that he had been listening to that week. He and Jesper had a mini book club that they participated in, though it was turning into a playful argument about which audiobook producer was the best. Despite the fact that Jesper listened to more podcasts and music than he did audiobooks, he still had very strong opinions about it. Jesper was able to read physical copies even if it was only in short bursts, but Wylan preferred to keep reading as much as he could even with his learning disability, so he tended to plow through the books that they were allegedly reading together.

The soothing voice of the narrator washed over him as he stuck his hands into his pockets and walked down the street towards his car. He was trying to focus on what was being read to him instead of the plan that he was coming up with for the end of the study. He knew that if they made a big breakthrough and patented or sold something, then they’d be able to continue the work that they had been doing in the lab more than they ever expected to. Wylan didn’t look at science as a way of making money necessarily, he would still experiment by himself even if he wasn’t being paid to do it, but this way he could continue to work with the team that he had grown very attached to.

After about only three minutes and half a block, he decided that trying to pay attention to an audiobook just wasn’t going to happen because he was too invested in what he had been working on. Jesper and Matthias were both going to be very pouty when he got home and all he could talk about was work despite being late. At least Kaz would understand, but he’d be at work until midnight at the earliest.

Wylan let out a little put-upon sigh. It was hard to navigate adult relationships, even if the freedom of adulthood was more than worth it. Sometimes he longed for the simplicity that had come with being a teenager, but he was always quick to remind himself how much happier he was now. Even if he had his partners back then, the abuse that his father had put him through would have made him miserable despite the support of the five wonderful people he had met.

Instead, he hummed the song that had been pestering the back of his mind as he walked. Ever since they had actually started going steady with her, Jesper and Matthias had been playing the music from the band that their new girlfriend was in. The artists were very talented and Wylan had to admit that her voice was soothing, but it was still annoying that they were so good at becoming earworms when he was trying to have other thoughts.

He paused when he got to the edge of the parking lot to the bar that was on the other side of the block to his lab building. The area was mostly deserted now that students weren’t using it to get as close to campus as they could, but a few cars were still parked there. It was one of the least popular bars in town (and Wylan wasn’t biased because the Crow Club was becoming busier every day, he assured himself), so there were only about a half dozen vehicles.

What really caught his attention was the scene that was unfolding. There was a man wearing a red and white varsity-style jacket with the last name ‘Kaminsky’ stitched into the back and a pair of blue jeans with a thick brown belt. He was advancing on a woman while shouting at her, “You think that you’re tough shit because you stole Alina away from Aleksander but you’re nothing but a fucking whore!”

“Ivan, you’re drunk, you need to go home,” the woman replied.

Wylan took a step forward so that he could get a better look at her. She had coiled brown hair that was loose around her face and shoulders, which only served to bring out the pronounced jawline and cheekbones of her face. Her lips were soft and pouty, but that was mostly because of the peach colored lipgloss that she was wearing. She had accented eyeliner in pink under the black and rosy cheeks to match the eyeshadow. She was wearing a blue mini skirt that was tucking into a loose black bodice that had sheer puffy sleeves.

Objectively, she was very pretty. Wylan knew that women who were stereotypically attractive tended to get accosted by drunk men a lot, especially since he had begun his queerplatonic relationship with Inej. She had taught him a lot about women that he had never been able to pick up from his step-mother because of their distance. His own mother had disappeared when he was too young to learn about the kinds of things Inej had taught him and come back into his life after he had gotten together with the aforementioned acrobat.

Still, they seemed to know each other so Wylan hung back to let things play their course. He didn’t want to interrupt something and then get shouted at for it, especially when he was already feeling emotionally frayed from working too much that day. He desperately wanted to go home so that he could cuddle with his partners and eat dinner while watching bad TV, but this was important. It was possible that the situation would turn violent and she would need help, but he didn’t want to assume right away.

“You don’t get to talk to me like you know me!” the man screamed. He smashed the beer bottle that had been hanging loosely from his hand down onto the car behind her, which caused a few shards of glass to cut through her freckled skin. Beads of red blood blossomed on the skin and began to dribble down her cheek. She was pinned up against the car, the only other option for her was to move towards the wall which would result in her being trapped from all sides.

Wylan got out his phone and pointed it towards the fight. He had gotten used to doing that a lot when he was a teenager, but he was glad that something had come from that miserable time in his life. Hopefully if things escalated it could actually help the woman.

The woman had finally regained her voice after the sharp cry of panic that she had let out, “Ivan, you know that I don’t control what Alina does! I have nothing to do with the breakup, I just rejoined the band when she said she wanted to start playing again.”

That only provoked the man further instead of de-escalating it like she had no doubt hoped for. “You are the only person that was still allowed to be in contact with her from the old band. I know that you continued the music too. You really think that I’m stupid enough to believe that lie you made up for everyone else?”

“I expect you to be a rational fucking human, but apparently I set my standards too high!” she shouted back at him. “You really think that I single handedly tried to tear down The Fold?” she snarled.

Wylan could hear the fear in her voice as she did so. He took a step forward, preparing to help her if things got more serious, his phone still recording. He could feel her anxiety in his own veins, heart thrumming, lungs gasping for more air, mind racing.

“I think that you’re a traitorous bitch that would do anything to try and ruin the career of a man you hate,” the other man replied. He kept advancing on her, caging her in with his body more and more. He was svelte, thinner than she was, but he was also a couple of inches taller than her. It was made worse based on the fact that she was cowering back against the car that he had pinned her on.

Wylan envied the confidence that took over her features as she pushed up her chest and stood at her full height despite that mostly closing the space between them. She had a fierce look burning in her eyes, one that Wylan would have never been able to summon up if he had been standing in front of his father during one of their fights. Her mouth twisted into a truly feral smirk as she said, “I had nothing to do with the falling of The Fold. I think that you should talk to your precious Darkling about why he tried to sink all of his money into shit lawsuits to get back the girl that he groomed when she finally dumped his ass and took him for all he was worth. Maybe he should have thought before he decided that he didn’t need a prenup.”

That made Ivan snap.

He had swung his arm back and then brought it forward before Wylan even had the time to process what he was doing. The sickening crack that sounded as his fist collided with the woman’s jaw made him cringe. He shoved his phone in his pocket so that the camera was peaking out over the fabric and still recording their conversation as he rushed over. He may have been several inches shorter than the attacker, but two bodies were better than one so there was a good chance that he would actually be of some use when it came to helping her.

“Leave her alone!”

“Stay out of this,” Ivan replied.

The woman was bent over slightly, slumped against the car. She was supporting herself with one of her hands so that she wouldn’t fall over and holding her cheek with the other. One side was still dripping blood down her forehead so that it streaked the rest of her face and the other side was no doubt going to be blooming with a dark bruise based on the sound alone.

“You know, I don’t think that I will,” Wylan replied. He reached down into his bag for the pepper spray that he brought with him everywhere he went. He was a little less paranoid about people randomly attacking him when he was out on the street than Kaz, but the couple weeks that he had spent homeless had made it so that he never went anywhere without a way to protect himself. Just remembering the fights escalating to the point where he had decided the open streets were safer for him made him furious that the woman was being attacked out in the open like that.

Coming over to help had the effect that he wanted, which was both a good and a bad thing. Ivan had seemingly forgotten about the woman and had turned fully to Wylan, but there was more hate and rage burning in his drunken eyes than before. “This has nothing to do with you,” he snarled, spewing flecks of spit out towards Wylan.

“This has something to do with me because you’re attacking someone less than a block from the place where I work! I may not know who you are or why you’ve decided to be an absolute ass, but it’d be wrong of me to just walk away. That’s the right thing for you to do, though,” he said confidently. He uncapped the pepper spray in his bag and then wrapped his fingers around the small bottle. It would take him less than a second to bring it out, aim, and then incapacitate the man, as long as alcohol was the only thing in his system. He had seen pepper spray being used on another one of the homeless youth from his camp, and because the other had been on PCP it had been basically useless.

“He’s right, Ivan. What would Fedyor think about you doing this? I know that your husband still works for that scum but we were once friends. I don’t think that he’d be very happy about you wailing on me,” the woman said as she righted herself.

“Keep my husband’s name out of your mouth, wench,” he snarled as he turned back around. Apparently mentioning whoever she had was the wrong move, as he wrapped his hand into her dark locks and threw her down to the ground.

Wylan had moved in an instant, before he even knew what his legs were doing. He brought the pepper spray out of his bag as he moved, aiming and spraying just as he had been playing over and over again in his mind. The red liquid dusted through the air until it was covering the eyes and face of the attacker, burning into his skin.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he screamed as he fell down to his knees and began to claw at his eyes. It would do nothing to remove the irritant from where it was sticking, but it was the only thing he could think of in his addled state to get rid of the feeling.

Wylan quickly stepped around him and then offered his hand out to the woman. She had bounced hard against the asphalt of the parking lot but was already beginning to right herself, one hand once again cupping the side of her face. “Do you think that you can stand?” he asked as he offered his hand out to her.

She nodded weakly as she took it and used it to haul herself to her feet. She whimpered as she took a step, her ankle doubling because of the break in her heel. She bent down and removed both of her shoes, looping her fingers around the back so that she could carry them. Wylan took her hand in his again and then began to pull her down the street so that Ivan couldn’t get up and follow them if he somehow overcame the burning that of the pepper spray. It was unlikely that would ever happen because of the potentness of the irritant, but Wylan had learned that sticking around to make sure the monster had been taken down resulted in getting hurt.

They ran over the street, crossing against the red light because there were no other cars on the road. She held onto him like if she let go then she’d drift back to the place of pain and fear that she had been in before, something that he was intimately familiar with.

Wylan was by no means unfit, but he didn’t work out as much as his partners did. He and Kaz tried to do at least a little bit of physical activity, Wylan so that his body didn’t go stiff with how long he spent over a desk and Kaz to help self-regulate his chronic pain issues. Matthias worked out because he enjoyed it, Inej did it because it was part of her job, and Jesper somehow managed to stay fit because of the singing and acting that he threw himself at every chance he got.

Running down two blocks and into the parking lot where his car was left him gasping for air, along with the woman next to him. Her chest was heaving to bring in air even though she was nowhere as winded as he was. He wondered what she did for a living that let her have that much breath control, but now wasn’t exactly the time to ask.

He winced as he realized what he had done, eyeing her shoes where they were still clenched in the hand that wasn’t holding onto his. He dropped her hand then when he remembered that he hadn’t yet let go and said, “I’m sorry for bringing you all the way here, I should have brought you to your car.”

She waved him off dismissively, “I didn’t drive here and this is far enough that I can’t imagine Ivan being able to follow us.” She paused for a moment as her hand drifted up to where she had hit her head through the thick chocolate curls and Wylan remembered another thing that he technically should have done.

“Would you mind if I checked you out? I may not be a medical doctor but I’m still trained in first aid so I should be able to see if you have a concussion or not,” he explained nervously. He reached into his bag and dug out the keys to his car, unlocking it with a fluid motion. He opened up the hatch to the back and then pulled the emergency wool blanket over the dirt and grim covered edge so that she had somewhere to sit that was relatively clean.

It was a bit of odd paranoia that had followed him well into adulthood, even after he had become the legal owner of a home. He knew that it was unlikely that he would ever break up with his partners and even more unlikely that it would be all of them, or that him no longer being in a relationship with them would result in him being back on the streets, but it was a worry that always hung heavy in the back of his mind. He made sure that any vehicles that he owned had enough space for him to sleep in the back comfortably so that he wasn’t quite as exposed as he had been when he was a teenager.

“Right, you probably should,” she nodded. “I think if I said no my friend Tamar would find out and actually come to kill me.”

She let out another one of her pleasant laughs. It made Wylan feel comfortable and happy, settled back into his body instead of pushed out of his skin by adrenaline and bad memories. This woman reminded him a lot of Inej, though she was soft where Inej was sharp and quick where Inej was slow. While Wylan’s queerplatonic partner was a lot more partial to fixing people that bothered her with a silent yet deadly stare that promised untold pain, the woman next to him was the type to face her problems head-on with all the ferocity that she could muster. She didn’t seem jagged and broken afterwards the same way that Inej did, her confidence letting her head stay high instead of crumbling to dust after.

Wylan wanted to get to know her more, but he could do that after he made sure that she was okay. “I’m going to check your pupils with the flashlight on my phone,” he warned her. She had sat down on top of the blanket in front of him so that he could reach her easily, which he was grateful for. Despite the fact that she had already removed her heels, which had made her a few inches taller, she was nearly a head taller than Wylan when he was standing at his full height.

She just hummed in acknowledgement, choosing not to nod her head, which was probably for the best. Wylan grabbed his phone from his pocket and stopped the recording that he had completely forgotten about. He then placed his hand on the edge of her eyelid. He shook the device in his other hand twice to activate the flashlight before he brought it up and shone it directly into her eye. The pupil shrank and revealed more of the beautiful green color in her irises.

He repeated the process on the same eye once and got the same response before he did it to the other. When he was sure that her pupils were dilating and constricting as they should have been, he pressed the light button on the back of his trunk so that they could properly see each other. The overhead streetlights had given them enough that he wasn’t worried about hurting her while he checked her out, but it would be easier for them both to maneuver around.

Wylan fidgeted with his first aide kit as he tried to figure out what he was going to do next. Before he even got the chance to start forming a sentence, she asked, “What’s your name?”

“Huh?”

He winced. He wasn’t very good at meeting new people.

She didn’t seem to mind very much, just laughing again. She slid further back into his car so that her knees were hugging the lip of the trunk. “I think it’s only fair that I get to know your name after everything that I put you through,” she explained easily. She was so warm, like freshly baked bread or pancakes directly off of the griddle. She had just been through something so deeply traumatizing and yet the kindness and compassion that she seemed to carry with her came off of her in waves.

“You didn’t put me through anything,” Wylan shook his head. “I could have just kept walking or gone into the bar to get one of the bouncers to help you if I didn’t want to deal with it. I wanted to help. I know what it’s like to be on the receiving end of some guy’s anger.”

Worry took over her pretty features for a moment before she winced and placed her hand up on her face where she had been struck. “So does that mean that I get to know your name or are you going to be the handsome stranger that saved me for the rest of my life.”

For some reason, he didn’t feel panicky or strange when she called him handsome the way that he had when other woman had done the same thing. It made him feel bashful and excited the same way that he did when Inej called him that, like she was complimenting him objectively instead of seeing someone that she could possibly romance. It was a different feeling than when his boys complimented him, which made fire run through his veins and excitement flip his stomach. “Wylan,” he supplied after he realized that he hadn’t answered her again.

Her face fell and her eyes widened. For a moment he was worried that she was going to puke or that he had missed a pivotal sign of concussion despite her not acting like she was dizzy or nauseous before. Then she asked, “Hendriks?”

He nodded, “How did you know?”

She sighed and slumped against the side of his car, her head resting against the rubber insulation on the side that wasn’t already swelling with injury. “My name is Nina Zenik. You and I were supposed to meet tomorrow so that Jesper and Matthias could introduce me to you.”

“Oh!” he gasped. Relief washed over him as he realized just how much of a good thing it was that he had interrupted the fight instead of minding his own business. Sticking his nose where it didn’t belong had actually resulted in him getting a lot of good things in life, which is why he had made such a massive habit out of it despite the way it had treated him in childhood. “I thought that you looked a little bit familiar.”

She righted herself, squaring her shoulders dramatically before she stuck her hand out in front of her. Wylan took it and gave her a shake like she had been asking for as she said, “It’s good to meet you.”

“You as well,” he laughed. “Now, do you want me to take you back to your apartment?”

Nina deflated again. Her eyes glanced back towards the parking lot that they had come from. She took a moment before she finally, cautiously answered, “I don’t think that I can go home. Ivan and Fedyor both know where I live and where I keep my spare key. I’ve been trying to find a new place to move it but I haven’t quite figured it out yet so there’s a chance…”

“Do you have a friend that you want to stay with?” he asked instead, not judging her in the slightest for not wanting to go home. Wylan himself had struggled with panic attacks for the first week that he had been living in his family estate after he had inherited it. Matthias and Jesper had spent every waking moment that they weren’t working or spending time with their other partners helping him remodel the house so it felt more like his home and less like his prison. If she felt at all unsafe in her apartment then there was no way that he was going to pressure her to go back, especially since he understood that feeling.

A small blush joined the makeup on her cheeks, which only served to highlight the freckles brushed across her nose and ears. “I would suggest that you bring me to Matthias and Jesper if you hadn’t already told me that you were their partner.”

“I can bring you back to the house,” Wylan immediately replied. Just the idea of doing so already soothed a lot of the anxiety that had been brewing in his gut. He was worried that the second she was out of his sight something horrible was going to happen to her, like it had been before he arrived. It was a lot less creepy to suggest that he take her back to his home when he knew that she was already very familiar and comfortable around two of his partners, so he was grateful that they had learned that fact about each other that early into their interaction.

“Are you sure? I wouldn’t want to intrude or anything, I know that the five of you live together,” she touched the edge of her mascara where it was still smearing with blood.

He offered her a shy smile as he reached into the first aid kit that he kept in the back of his car. “Well I actually own the house, so I’m technically the one that gets to decide who does and does not get to go inside of it. Step mother? Proably not. The woman that two of my boyfriends have been going out with that just got hurt? Absolutely.”

She laughed, more of the tension beginning to melt from her. It was clear that she was beginning to come down from the adrenaline rush that the fight had brought her, the exhaustion hanging off of her. Wylan wanted to get some of her wounds cleaned up in the car before they had the actual first aide expert look her over.

Finally finding what he had been searching for, he handed her a wet wipe and asked, “Do you need to go to the ER or do you feel comfortable coming back to my place?”

“It’s going to sound so silly,” she mumbled as she picked at the edge of the wipe’s packaging.

“I don’t think anything you say when you’re going through shock is going to sound silly,” he assured her. It was a bold move from a very unbold person, but he touched her arm to try and emphasize what he had said with actions.

She leaned easily into the touch as she collected her thoughts. She then said, “All I can think about is seeing Matthias and Jesper. I know we haven’t been together for nearly as long as you have, but they’re the best thing that has happened to me in a long while.”

“Not your band getting back together?” Wylan asked.

She shook her head and then winced. She unwrapped the wet wipe and then tenderly brought it up to her face. Nina was only able to get some of the blood off of her skin, a decent amount of it already congealing and making it monumentally harder to do what she needed to.

Carefully, he pried the item from her hand and then began to patiently rub it over her skin to clear away the blood. She scrunched her nose and took in a sharp inhale when he got closer to the cuts. He couldn’t see any shards of glass so far, but he wasn’t trying to clean out the wounds, but rather make her more comfortable until he could actually tend to them properly.

While he was cleaning she explained, “My band getting back together has been messy, as you saw with my fight with Ivan. I was partially signed to the label owned by a really famous artist and when I started refusing to produce music under the contract I got in a lot of trouble. They stole a shit ton of money from me but I made it work. They didn’t really like that and so now I’m on the shit list for the rest of my life.”

“If that was anything to go by then I can see that,” Wylan murmured. He got the gauze out of the first aid kit and then wound it around his hand until it made a thick pad. He slipped it off of his nimble fingers and pressed it to the cuts on her face before they had the chance to continue bleeding. “Do you want to do the rest of the cleaning and tending back at the house?”

“Yes,” she nodded immediately. “As comfortable as the back of your car is, I would much rather have somewhere that has soap and running water.”

He held his hand out to help her steady herself as she stood back up properly. She was holding the gauze to her face with one hand and moving around the edge of the car with the other. Now that the adrenaline had worn off, the asphalt making up the parking lot had to be painful on her stockinged feet.

While she was moving, he packed up the first aid kit again and then shoved everything properly into his trunk. He clicked the light off and shut the hatch before he went to the driver’s side and got in. He turned the car on so that the heater was running and hopefully helping to warm her up since the night was a little bitter and she didn’t have a coat.

“I’m going to text the others to tell them what happened before we get going, is that okay?” Wylan asked as he motioned to his phone with his other hand.

She nodded her consent and he got to work. He opened up the group chat that he had with his partners and then held the phone up to his mouth. He spoke clearly and deliberately so that the speech-to-text program could actually write down what he wanted to say. “I’m sorry for being home so late from work, but I found Nina in a fight with someone. She’s doing mostly okay but I’m going to bring her back to the house so that we can help her. Be home soon, love you.”

He glanced at her, a bit sheepish as he sent the message off to his partners. He connected his phone to the car’s computer and opened Spotify so that he could pick some music as a social lubricant. He felt comfortable with silences, even relished in them at times, but he had been dating Jesper for long enough to know that other people felt pressured to talk when everything else was quiet. Music usually stamped that down at least a little, made silences between acquaintances more comfortable and soothed anxieties.

He had four pinned playlists other than his liked songs up at the top, each with a combination of his name with one of his partner’s. It was something cute that they had done with each other, making a playlist where they could send messages to the other, give music suggestions, or just generally be sappy. It worked best with Kaz, who loved them very, very, very much but had trouble being able to express that physically on some days.

Wylan had been thinking about Inej a lot since he had gotten Nina back to his car, a lot of the feelings he had for her recurring in his chest. Of course the emotions were nowhere near as strong as they were for Inej since he had known her longer, but they were still there. He had only ever felt the warm giddiness pooling in his chest for one other woman before, and it was the one that he was queerplatonically dating. He was going to have to take a moment to process that when he was no longer feeling quite so sleepy and frazzled.

He finally settled on the one that he and Matthias had made for each other, setting it to shuffle before he deposited it down onto the center console. His phone lit up with a couple of texts from his partners but he was unable to read what they said or who had sent them. The only way that he had been able to parse through his playlists was because the covers had been very unique, for the express purpose of helping him when he was struggling with reading. The combination of him overworking himself earlier that day and the adrenaline made the words swim in front of him whenever he tried.

Once his bag was deposited into the back and Nina was buckled in, he pulled out of the parking lot and began the drive back to his home. He lived on the very outskirts of the city so it was going to take them a while to get there despite the ten o’clock traffic being so light that outside of the center of town, there was no one.

He had been right to start music for the drive. Nina didn’t seem to be up to doing much talking, simply holding the gauze to her forehead and switching hands when one got tired. Wylan made sure to check on her every so often by glancing in her direction, admiring how cinematic she looked when the streetlights were bathing her in soft yellow and red light.

The ride had been going smooth until they got about ten minutes away from the estate. A new song that Matthias had added came onto the radio, and it just so happened to be one of the ones that her band had produced. Wylan had been informed that it was Nina singing since those songs all happened to be Matthias’ and Jesper’s favorites, not that they were biased, but it was also deeply personal to him. He couldn’t relate to every line that was said, but it was so reminiscent of the way that he had grown up and how he would raise children if he and his partners ever decided to have them.

The sultry voice murmured out of the radio as he reached down to change the song. Before he got the chance, Nina’s hand landed on top of his and stopped him from doing so. She gave him a kind smile as she began to sing along, matching the notes perfectly since it was her.

“Marrow made a wife of Eve, but no one gave up a rib for me and mine. My hearts did expose to the elements, calloused and untouched by a man's design. Oh, my ugly organs, how lucky we are. Brick and mortar between my bones, built a kingdom fierce and fortified. My name fading from the yellow page, stones are laid upon the mountainside Oh, my savage empire, ow lucky we are, never to be moved by the words of a liar. The dark doesn't frighten me, I chose to close my eyes. It is mine, it is mine. The night doesn't frighten me, I chose to let it thrive. It is mine, it is mine. Time has changed the metaphor. Now, dust is not the origin of bone Little girl, don't let them sell you any armor, all your ribs are still your own. Oh, my precious child, how lucky you are, handed down a shield for your tender parts.”

By the time that they had reached the end repetition of the chorus, Wylan had joined her in singing the song. It felt cathartic to be able to sing it out loud when usually he was too shy to do so. The song was raw in a way that many things rarely were any more, which was only part of the reason that he adored it so much.

Nina hadn’t removed her hand from where she had stopped him from changing the song. Instead, their hands lay on the center console. Their palms were pressed flush and their fingers slotted together without interweaving. It felt right and gentle, not forward despite them having only known each other for half an hour.

When the song finished, she took a deep breath. “I wrote that song immediately after I left The Fold. So many of my emotions went into it and it was so personal, I wanted to produce it under my other name. It fit better with Shadow and Bone than it did with Heartrender, though, and the band agreed that they’d be okay with producing it.”

“Is it about everything that happened under that label?” Wylan asked, his eyes darting towards her for just a moment. He was worried that he was asking something that was too personal or prying into a wound that hadn’t healed yet.

She didn’t seem to mind as she gave him another affirmative hum. “It was also based off of some of the things that happened when I was young. I knew Alina, one of my bandmates, when we were both fifteen. We went to that huge Catholic school, the one that everyone else calls the Little Palace because the chapel attached to it makes it look kind of like a castle. We were both so sheltered and we had all that religious drivel drilled into us so hard. It made me feel so guilty for being able to love women as well, but it also opened us up to some pretty nasty older men. I was able to avoid it from the romantic side, but when Kirigan approached us and promised us the fame and fortune that we had been dreaming of, there was no way that we could reject it. We signed with him and things got worse for her but they eventually got better for me. We’re both okay now, but that song…”

“I relate to it too,” Wylan gripped the steering wheel a little tighter. “My dad was shit and my mom was always telling me that I had to find armor wherever I could find it. She left when I was eight and then she couldn’t be my armor anymore, so I had to find it in other things. There was no one there to protect me,” he shook his head as the memories all came pouring back.

Nina took in a deep breath and cleared her throat. “That’s enough hard stuff for tonight! We should talk about something else.”

“Yes,” Wylan nodded in agreement. His face then brightened as he turned onto the street that would lead him to his home, “Have you had the chance to meet Trassel yet?”

“I haven’t! Matthias was going to bring him to a date that we were supposed to have in a park but then we got that horrible thunderstorm and had to change to a cafe, which meant no dog,” she pouted.

“Well you’re about to meet him. I want to warn you that in pictures he looks a lot smaller than he actually is because Matthias is massive. He’s absolutely sweet but can be kind of scary if you were expecting a dog closer to the size of a lab,” Wylan informed her. He had a bad reaction when he first met Trassel because of the sheer massive size of the dog, despite Trassel being the sweetest animal that he had ever had the fortune of living with.

They pulled into the driveway and then the garage. He noticed that Kaz’s car was gone, but the one that Matthias and Jesper shared was parked dutifully in the spot on the other side of the garage. “I knew that it had to be a big place for you to all live together but I wasn’t expecting it to be this huge,” Nina commented as she carefully got out of the car.

“We’re not secretly rich or something, this was the only thing that I inherited from my dad when he died,” Wylan explained as he grabbed his bag and phone. He got out and locked the vehicle.

A smile pulled at his lips as he could already hear the deep barking from inside the house where his pet had heard the garage door opening. Trassel was smart enough to know that meant someone was coming home and he adored them all so much that it didn’t matter which one of them it was.

Wylan walked over to Nina and brought her to the steps that led to the backdoor of the house instead of the ones that led to the dog run in the sideyard. It had been a massive undertaking for the rest of his partners to get used to the size of the estate when they had finally moved in. The only reason that Wylan had been an exception to that was because he had grown accustomed to every nook and cranny of the place while hiding from his father and private tutor.

They stepped over the threshold and into the kitchen just as Trassel finished barreling down the stairs that led up to the bedrooms. The space that they were in was massive, but felt more snug than it had in Wylan’s childhood because of the details that his partners had helped him add to the space to make it his own. The tile was white and black diamonds that went halfway up the walls. They had recently painted the kitchen to be a butter yellow color, with red curtains hanging and drawn over the windows. All of the appliances had been updated within the last couple of the years but were also the ugliest stainless steal. The fridge was the best part, now covered in little magnets and sticky note reminders for each of them. Art hung around the cupboards, which were a rainbow set of colors in the most obnoxiously bright yet not neon colors that they could find. Every surface other than the counters was also cluttered with aloe vera and spider plants, which Inej had brought from her apartment when she had moved in.

“Hi puppy!” Wylan beamed as he patted his lap to call the dog over to him. He knew that Nina would likely need a second or two so that she could become accustomed to the new space that she was in.

Trassel barked excitedly as he immediately ran over to Wylan. He was massive even for a utonagan, coming up to the Wylan’s waist with all four paws down on the ground. He was also about a hundred and ten pounds, most of which appeared to be fur as they got closer to the winter months. He was beautiful shade of brown-black with the white clinging to his chest and the underside of his muzzle. It would likely spread as he continued to get older, but at only five years old he had retained all of the luscious color he had been born with.

“Have you been good today?” Wylan asked as he began to run his fingers through the side of the dog’s face. The fur around the top of Trassel’s head was his favorite, soft and already brushed back so it didn’t hang in front of his eyes or nose.

He received another bark as the dog’s excitement rose. When Trassel got so overwhelmed that he placed his hands onto Wylan’s chest to get closer to his face, Wylan reached down and took his hands. It stressed his hips enough that he calmed down, so Wylan let him go as soon as he had calmed.

When he saw Nina he barked again and rushed over to her. She knelt down in front of him as she dug her hands into his fur and began to baby talk him. “Hello there, hello! I bet I smell like all kind of interesting and same things, don’t I? You’re so handsome, so handsome,” she murmured.

The meeting was cut short as they were reminded why they were there in the first place. Matthias walked down the hall with Inej and Jesper hot on his heels. “Nina?” he called out, his voice more accented than it was normally, which just illustrated how stressed out he was.

“Hey,” she breathed as she rose to her feet. Matthias was by her side in an instant, peeling back the gauze that was just barely soaked with enough blood that it was sticking to the wounds on its own.

Trassel was wuffling and barking to be played with, so Jesper grabbed him under the collar and led him to the back door. “Go run,” he instructed with a firm point to the space that they had for him. He listened and rushed outside so that he could complete his course and get a prize. As soon as the dog had been taken care of, Jesper rushed back to his girlfriend to check on her. “What happened?”

“I was attacked by an old friend of mine’s husband. He was drunk,” Nina explained. She winced as Matthias reached up and peeled the gauze away. It broke some of the scabs that had begun to form there and restarted some of the bleeding.

“Here, why don’t we move to the bathroom to get you cleaned up,” Inej said. She swatted Matthias hand so that he would leave the wounds alone until she could take care of them herself. Matthias did know a decent amount of first aid and wouldn’t make anything horrendously worse, but he wasn’t as knowledgeable as her.

The group moved through the house until they were upstairs in the master bath. While they were walking, the shorter of the two women said, “My name is Inej. You probably guessed that since I’m the only feminine presenting person here that could be called girlfriend,” she chuckled.

“Nina Zenik,” the other replied. “You’re about to go on some sort of tour, aren’t you?”

“I have a couple of shows in Vegas that I’m doing this week,” she nodded. “I was cuddling with the boys while waiting for Wylan to get home when we got his message. I’m the one that knows first aid the best so I got up to help you. It’s wonderful to meet you, Nina, even if I wish it was under better circumstances.”

“At least we got to bring it forward?” she offered with a light laugh.

The master bathroom was huge, so it was no trouble for the five of them to get inside. Matthias took up the spot on the edge of the tub where he could see all of his partners. Wylan and Jesper stood near the shower part of the room, leaning heavily against the gray colored glass with their fingers interwoven between them. Nina was sat down on the counter space between the two sinks while Inej spread out the things that she would need to check and clean the wounds around them. “How did you get these?” she asked as she turned Nina’s face to the side to get a better look at them.

“Ivan broke a beer bottle above my head and some of the glass got on me,” she said. “I think that they’re mostly just weeping so much because they’re on my face, they don’t feel all that deep.”

“They’re not,” the other woman answered. She got a wet cloth with some antibiotic soap and then carefully began to drag it across the wounds. Nina winced and let out a little whimper, holding her hand out towards Matthias. He was there in a second, threading their fingers together so that she could focus on something other than the pain of having her wounds checked.

Once they were cleaned, Inej put some cream on them that would help fight any leftover bacteria and numb the area to dull the pain. “Do you have any allergies?” she asked as she fished through the pile of band aides. Kaz had topical allergies, bursting into hives whenever he had an adhesive that less than medical grade on his skin.

“No,” Nina replied. “Nothing that you’d have in that kit, anyway.”

Inej plucked one of the larger plasters from the pile and then opened it up. She set it over the biggest of the cuts and then used two smaller bandaids for the others until everything was covered. “I don’t think that there’s anything I can do for that bruise, other than this,” she supplied a small jar containing a balm. “It will sting really bad and it smells quite strong, but it helps aide the healing process.”

Nina glanced towards Wylan and he gave her a confident, reassuring nod. The balm that Inej had was a godsend for sore muscles, which he and Kaz often got. “Alright,” Nina agreed with a little nod. Matthias brought his hand to the side of her head that wasn’t being tended to, running his long fingers through her thick hair as he pressed a kiss to her temple.

Inej’s skilled, calloused fingers dipped into the balm and then began to carefully and evenly spread it across the darkened area on Nina’s face. When she finished, she wiped her hands off on a baby wipe and offered Nina a makeup remover wipe. “If you’re going to be staying here tonight then I think you’d like to be comfortable.”

“Yes, thank you,” she replied as she took the offered object. Inej cleaned up the rest of the scraps before she ushered the other two boys out of the room. Wylan and Jesper hung in the background long enough to hear them making plans about clothing and where she might sleep.

Eventually, Wylan tugged his boyfriend down to the kitchen so that he could cook something. Eating always settled their nerves and made them feel better, especially since they had both been rather food insecure at one point in their lives. Jesper jumped up onto the island counter in the center of the room, folding his legs underneath him to make balancing easier while watching Wylan working. “So what happened?”

“Well, I got lost in my work, which is why I was late coming home,” he winced. He had forgotten to properly apologize for that and bringing it up had reminded both of them that it had happened in the first place. He set down the tortillas and cheese that he had gotten out of the fridge as he walked over to Jesper. He wrapped his arms around the other man’s waist to bring them closer together, knocking their foreheads together softly. “I’m sorry for not texting you as soon as I realized what time it was and for losing track of time. I know you worry about us when we go silent.”

“Inej had to talk me down like four times. I was a second away from texting Nina to get reassurance that you were alright and she doesn’t know anything about that particular issue yet,” Jesper mumbled. He was pouting slightly but there was real hurt behind his words.

“I’m sorry,” Wylan apologized again. He brushed their lips together in a sweet yet chaste kiss to accent the words with something positive.

It worked and the anger immediately drained from Jesper. “I know. I just worry that something bad has happened to you guys when you don’t respond like that. Like with my mom…”

“I love you,” Wylan whispered as he brought their lips together for another sweet kiss. Jesper’s mom was a sensitive topic that would result in a lot of feelings about his own mother, feelings that Wylan wasn’t quite emotionally prepared to look into that night.

“I love you, too, baby,” he mumbled as he held the side of Wylan’s face.

Neither of them had been able to clock the sound of the garage opening and shutting over Trassel’s barking from the backyard. They lived far enough away from the city that sometimes he found deer and foxes out past the fence that he wanted to talk big game about but could never dream of ever getting to, so they tuned out the sound of his barking at that tempo. They both realized what he had been barking at when the door to the garage shut and Kaz said, “I thought that we had agreed no food was to be left out on the counter.”

Wylan broke away from his boyfriend and then flushed when he realized that he had been caught. They were supposed to make sure that anything that wasn’t actively being eaten or used was put away to make sure that their mischievous puppy didn’t devour it and make himself sick. “I’m sorry, I was supposed to be cooking something for myself since I missed dinner but then Jesper and I got talking and that led to…” he trailed off and felt his face flush harder. “Sorry.”

Clearing his throat loudly to get the attention on himself, Jesper jumped off of the counter and stuffed the food back into the fridge. “That is enough apologizing from Wylan! We don’t want our sweet boy thinking that he has done all the wrong in the world, after all,” he grinned as he wrapped his arms around the aforementioned man’s waist.

“Jesper,” he complained as he was bombarded with kisses. He knew that part of it was actual adoration for him and the other part was the actor trying to make sure that his anxiety didn’t overwhelm him. When it was clear that Jesper wasn’t going to stop anytime soon, Wylan turned to face their boyfriend, “You’re home early. Is everything okay?”

“It was a slow night and I thought that you would all be able to use me here more,” he replied. “Also, I got you all something to eat.”

He placed the bags of food down on the table and Wylan felt his heart sing. It was hard for Kaz to show love in the same way that Jesper did, but his actions meant so much in their relationship. “Thank you,” he breathed as he tried not to cry from how overwhelmed he felt.

“You’re alright,” Kaz reminded him gently as he brought their lips together in a very chaste kiss. That was all that Wylan was going to be able to get from his partner after work. Even if the Crow Club had only a dozen patrons, the amount of strangers that he had to be around when he was working often overwhelmed Kaz to the point where he didn’t feel safe being touched unless he instigated it. He had updated the group chat when he had been in the office for half an hour, which Wylan had seen just before he realized what time it was.

They moved to the living room with the food and an extra set of paper towels. The living room was their biggest work in progress yet since it had been a formal parlor before they had moved in. They were slowly replacing all of the hyper modern furniture with the more vintage pieces that they preferred, which meant that seating was a little bit sparse at the moment. The most modern piece that they had left in the room was the sectional that could transform into a big enough space for all five of them to cuddle together when they wanted to. The TV stand was pulled straight out of the sixties, reshaped by Matthias and Jesper so that it could actually fit their flat screen in the middle of display case. The rug and coffee table had been picked out by Inej, both of them reminiscent of how her house had been decorated before her parents’ accident.

The trio settled in to eat what Kaz had picked up for them, Wylan and Jesper both sitting on the ground with their backs pressed to the couch while Kaz sat in the armchair that he had gotten to help with his pain before they had even moved in. Other than his clothes, it was the only thing from his old apartment above the Crow Club that he had brought with him.

About fifteen minutes later they heard some of their partners coming down the stairs and turned the TV off. Nina was walking hand-in-hand with Matthias, wearing a pair of Jesper’s sweatpants and one of Matthias’ shirts since everyone else had a vastly different body shape compared to her.

“Hey baby,” Jesper said as he moved onto the couch. She smiled, trying to hold back tears as she trekked over to him. She collapsed down onto the couch, her legs pulled up near his chest and her head immediately on his shoulder. He moved his arm around her back and pressed a kiss over the top of the band aids on her forehead. “How are you doing?”

“I’m tired and scared,” she mumbled. “Glad that it was Wylan that helped me, though.”

“Yeah, he is pretty great like that,” Matthias replied. He stooped down and kissed Wylan within an inch of his life. “Thank you for being such an amazing, kindhearted person, min brandstifter.”

“That was one time,” he muttered, his cheeks turning a dark red color with embarrassment.

Inej sat herself down in his lap and stole a couple of his fries. He didn’t mind, since she indulged in processed foods so rarely that she deserved a treat. “It’s fun to tease you.”

He buried his face into her shoulder, which he knew was why she had sat down on him like she had. “Fun for you, maybe.”

Nina laughed, which was a great sound to hear with how clearly worn out she was. The energy in the room got a lot more somber when Jesper asked her once again what had happened. She recounted some elements from her past like she had for Wylan in the car, still refusing to let herself cry. She cuddled in between her boyfriends like they were going to be able to save her from her own bad feelings, something that Wylan remembered doing vividly after he got the news that his father had died.

She finished telling her story and they all agreed to watch something calm to wind down before bed. Wylan finished his food and then gave Inej a sweet kiss on the cheek before he dumped her down onto the couch next to Kaz. He made sure that there was enough space between them that they wouldn’t accidentally crash together. “I’m going to go shower, I know you’ll all probably be in bed by the time I get back,” he sighed. He was both glad and upset that he had gotten off work so late.

“We’ll see you in the morning,” Matthias promised as he tenderly kissed his boyfriend. Jesper mimicked the movement as well before settling in next to Nina.

“I can give you a kiss if you want, but what I really want to do is say thank you,” she replied, witty and sharp-tongued even in her exhaustion.

“I would have done it even if you weren’t dating two of my partners,” he replied as he fought back another blush. The only thing that Kaz was able to do was give his hand a squeeze through the thick leather of his gloves, which Wylan was okay with.

He disappeared up the stairs as exhaustion sunk low into his veins. A lot had happened in one night, but the net effect seemed to be good overall. Nina fit right into their flock like she had been there from the beginning.

18 notes · View notes

sakkiichi · 9 months

Text

COVER ME IN SUNSHINE.

Ways in which your kid calls his dad. Will he get to hear a ‘papa’?

ft. Scaramouche/Wanderer, Albedo, Xiao, Childe, Kaeya, Neuvillette x gn! reader.

cw/genre: pure fluff. Reader is referred to as ‘mama’, you and the character have a child. They’re all girl dads.

a birthday present for my dearest @bunny-rambles 🩵 i’m wishing you the best day today and always, hun ! ilysm, thank you for always being by my side. I hope we can celebrate many many more birthdays together, mwah <3

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ note: about this fic… i struggled quite a little with it, and i’m sorry it’s not my best piece… this was a totally new concept to write for me, but i still hope you can enjoy, bunbun, dear ♡

if you enjoy this, reblogs and comments help more than likes !

✧ SCARAMOUCHE

Wide indigo orbs meet his furrowed gaze.

Scaramouche is not amused.

Or at least that’s what he wants whoever sees him right now to believe. Namely, you.

Tiny hands cup the Wanderer’s cheeks, big eyes, so similar to his, staring up at him in wonder. The little girl in his arms squeezes his face, a pout forming on her father’s lips. Giggles erupt from her smiling lips, the corners of Scaramouche’s mouth unconsciously tilting upwards.

“You’re amused, huh?” Your husband asks, rocking the baby in his hold. She stares at him, her little arms flailing upward, giggling happily.

“Moochie!” She babbles, trying to stand on the wanderer’s knees, her hands reaching for his hat.

“Hey, hey, now!” Kunikuzushi pouts, securing his hat. “That is not a toy and I’m not Moochie…”

“Moochie!” His daughter repeats, poking his cheek.

He sighs.

“Not Moochie…” Scaramouche’s ears take on a rather rosy tone, especially when your giggles are not exactly inconspicuous, your attempt at keeping hidden just outside the living room, obviously half-assed.

“Pa-pa. Not Moochie.” He repeats, bopping his little one’s nose. “And here, play with this.” He offers, handing his baby a doll curiously identical to himself.

Your eyes soften from your spot when you observe the fond smile on your lover’s face. He might feign annoyance, but when it came to your baby, all the facade was scattered to the winds. Storm clouds and lightning seemed so far away when he was surrounded by the blue skies and birdsong that dawned with your daughter’s hand grabbing his finger.

“Pa..” The little one begins, lifting the doll, as if indicating that it indeed represents her father.

“Pa…” Your wanderer prompts, as he points to the cloth mini version of himself.

Then, the girl’s eyes focus somewhere beyond her dad, tiny hands wiggling and waving, the plush doll still in her grasp.

“Mama!” She exclaims, making to reach for you, trying to climb over the sofa’s backrest, where it not for your partner’s protective hold.

Finally stepping out from your hideout, you walk towards them.

Familiar warm arms wrap around the no longer broken puppet, as your precious baby rests between your two heartbeats. Yours, steady, undeniably human. His, bloomed anew, thanks to you; with a newfound tune, sweeter, gentler, thanks to his little one.

Scaramouche closes his eyes, lashes of now starlit midnights resting on his perfect cheekbones. His head leans on your shoulder, your lips feather-light on his dusky hair, as your hands gently lift his hat a bit.

Your girl grabs one of her father’s fingers once more, the handmade mini wanderer kept close to her chest.

Yes, storms were definitely over for days to come.

✧ ALBEDO

A tug on the leg of his pants and familiar unintelligible noises pull the alchemist out of his task.

Albedo’s features soften when he spots the cause of his distraction.

Putting the notebook he was currently scribbling on aside, he crouches down.

“And who do we have here?” The chalk prince asks, smoothing the golden locks on his baby’s small head.

“Mama?” She replies, her tiny hand pulling on her dad’s clothes.

The gesture is followed by one of Albedo’s gentle chuckles, eyes like northern stars on clear nights bright at the sight of his daughter.

“Mama’s not here now, little princess.” He explains, as he picks the baby up. “They will get home soon, though.” Your child stares at him as if unsatisfied with the answer, head slightly tilted to the side. “How about we have some fun in the meantime?”

Giggles that always reminded Albedo of sunshine days at dragonspine are the answer that follows.

Taking his little one’s two hands in his, the chief alchemist helps his daughter take a few trembling steps, the baby happily padding on the wooden floor.

“There we go, princess!” Your lover chuckles, sitting the girl securely on the beige couch. Teal eyes flecked in emerald follow your partner’s movements, as he rummages through your living room’s drawers.

A few seconds later, more incomprehensible joyful babbles follow, when he sits by your daughter’s side, his hands expertely setting the supplies he retrieved on the low table. She stares at him intently, her gaze drawn to the vibrant crayons cluttering the tabletop’s surface.

“What should we draw today, my princess?” Are Albedo’s words, as he hands his child a light blue pencil, its tip dulled so she can’t hurt herself.

“Snow!” She exclaims, her tiny feet kicking back and forth in excitement, eliciting chuckles from her dad.

“You want to paint snow, my little cecilia?” He asks, combing through her blonde strands. “Alright, how about we paint you, mama and papa building a snowman?”

“Yay!” Your baby reaches for the blank paper, wonder and excitement written all over her rounded features, her tongue sticking out the corner of her small mouth. She always loved to draw and paint, especially when it was with Albedo. And even if her pictures often ended up turning out as just criss-crossing lines or messy splotches, you and your husband always kept every single one of them, displayed as priceless masterpieces on the fridge’s door, the living room walls or your study.

After a few minutes of focused work, three figures start taking form over a background of messily drawn blue snowflakes.

“Look, dearie.” Albedo calls. “Who are these?”

His girl looks up at him, a huge smile on her face as she bites the pencil.

“Mama! Me! And Papa!” She answers proudly, pointing at each of the figures.

Albedo’s eyes widen, gilded sparks reflected in the cloudless skies of his irises at his daughter’s words.

Those last two syllables.

His own pencil falls out of his grasp, clattering to the carpeted floor. In this moment, nothing else exists, save for the jingling echo of his daughter’s angelic tone.

“Papa?” She asks, tugging on his sleeve.

Albedo picks the little girl up, rising her as she laughs, unaware.

“Can you say it again, little princess? ‘Papa’.”

“Papa! Papa!” Giggles leave her throat.

Softly, Albedo places a kiss on her kid’s forehead, hugging her as the both of them lay down on the sofa.

When you got home, silence greets you, broken only by even breaths. Smiling to yourself, you brush a kiss against your husband’s and your daughter’s hair, a new painting adorning the walls after you gently throw a blanket over the sleeping figures of your two treasures.

✧ XIAO

“Do you want to hold her, Xiao? She’s been looking at you for a while.” You chuckle, your gaze softened when it sets upon your yaksha.

Golden eyes, not unlike the child’s currently on your arms, shadow in fear and shame for a moment.

What if he hurts the baby? What if his karma taints her somehow? What if-

“Xiao.” Your hand finds his gloved one, centuries of bloodshed written in the concealed scars. “She’ll be okay.” You reassure, a gentle squeeze, as your fingers slot between his.

The adeptus glances in his daughter’s direction, her round amber eyes curiously observing him.

Your husband’s jaw sets, his lips drawn in a taut line. If someone were to look at him now, they may think he’s sulking, the furrow of his brow apparently an indication to steer clear.

You, however, know better.

“Here, I’m with you, love.” You softly utter, placing your daughter in her father’s arms.

The baby stares up at her dad in awe, her little hands fiddling with the necklace he always wears.

She’s so small… such a pure and precious being… will she be safe with him?

Just as these thoughts plague his mind, the girl curls up in his embrace, nuzzling against his toned torso.

“See? She adores you, Xiao…” You tell him, knuckles brushing against your baby’s soft full cheek. “Isn’t that right, sweetie?” She turns around, a smile drawing on her lips, as she buries herself further into Xiao, whose cheeks have gone as red as the carmine lining his eyes.

“H-hello, little qingxin…” Xiao greets her, awkwardly rubbing her back.

In response, his baby tilts her head slightly backwards, the molten suns in her stare illuminating her father’s rusted gold gaze.

“Papa!” She goes, a little clumsy, it sounding more like ‘dada’.

The vigilant yaksha’s eyes widen, his heart feeling like a million bright lanterns floating towards a starry sky.

“Xiao! She said ‘papa’! See? She loves you!” You excitedly chant, hugging your husband’s waist, as you pepper kisses all over his face. “You are her first word, dear, our baby adores her dad so much. I knew she would!” A smile tugs at your lips, lids fluttering closed as you rest your cheek on Xiao’s shoulder.

His hands hover around his daughter, his hold on her delicate, as if she was a newly bloomed flower whose petals could vanish if the wind blew too strongly.

“Papa…” The girl repeats, her chubby cheek squished against’s Xiao’s form. Her eyes are droopy, a little yawn escaping her as she settles more comfortably in her father’s embrace.

Your adeptus heaves out a sigh of relief, the warmth of a familiar fireplace swarming all around him, as if candid candle flames were running through his veins when the soft snores of his daughter reach his ears.

The conqueror of demons’ mask would be shed for tonight.

✧ CHILDE

Small hands are glued to the window’s glass panes, a pair of bright blue eyes staring awestruck at the image currently taking place in your garden.

Flashes of crystalline cyan flit across the air as Childe wields his double blades, merging them into a spear, his muscles taut at the effort.

The little girl’s tiny hands curl into fists, as she leans forward in anticipation, marine gaze following her father’s movements.

He reminds her of the illustrations she’s seen in the picture books Teucer has shown her before.

She must get closer.

Looking over her shoulder, your daughter makes sure you’re busy with something in the kitchen.

Her plan can be put into action now.

Crawling towards the door on all fours, she realizes she’s nowhere near tall enough to reach the handle.

Oh, but she takes after you, and will not be deterred by something like this.

Silently, the baby makes her way towards the dog you took in. He’s big and fluffy and very peaceful, often keeping company to the little girl. With a gentle pat to his side, she looks up at him with those big blue eyes and, despite his instinct to keep her safe, the puppy obliges to her demand.

Folding his paws, the animal lowers himself to the ground, allowing your daugher to climb. A vivid spark flashes through her ocean eyes, tiny hands securing on her companion’s fur.

And just as she was about to reach the door opening to the garden, a familiar voice that’s lulled her to sleep many a night stops her in her tracks.

“And just what do you think you’re doing, little lady.” You stand a couple feet away from her, hands on your hips, your concern masked with masterfully feigned anger.

Your baby stares up at you, that oceanic gaze puppy-like, much like her father did when you were mad at him.

“Mama…” She mumbles, her little hands signaling to where Childe is training outside, sounds you can’t understand leaving her pouty lips.

You sigh, kneeling to pick her up, rubbing your dog’s chin gently.

“So you want to see papa training, don’t you, little troublemaker?” You prompt, smiling as you tickle her belly. She giggles, wiggling her legs in your hold. “Alright, just this once, and because he’s almost finished with his routine.” You warn, softly pinching her cheek.

Once outside, you both stare at the harbinger, you, with heating cheeks; your daughter, in admiration and wonder.

Then:

“Papa!” She calls, energetically waving to her father, as you have to struggle so she doesn’t fall out of your grasp.

Suddenly, Ajax’s hydro blades vanish, a rare glow present in the eyes that are so like his daughter’s. A wide grin spreads across his sun-kissed features, arms opening as he runs towards you and his baby.

“Papa! Papa!” His daughter repeats, as your husband hugs the both of you.

No matter how cold Snezhnaya’s blizzards blew, Ajax would always have his personal patch of sunshine in you two.

✧ KAEYA

Calla lilies surround the scene, their russet-hued petals aglow in the blue shimmer of the statue of the seven standing amidst the lake.

Dusk approaches, the sky still dyed in shades of tangerine and cherry blossom, the sun, a glimmering halo right above the horizon.

Over frondous grass spotted in sun and shadow, a blanket lies, its baby blue pattern fading into the multiple colors of the snacks scattered above it: portions of cake you baked the afternoon prior; sandwitches carefully cut in triangle shapes; handpicked apples and sunsettias, cut and placed into plates by your lover.

But perhaps the most vivid color of them all was that of the couple sitting atop it.

A couple and their daughter.

“You really liked this pie, didn’t you, little lily?” Kaeya coos at his baby, her chubby cheeks littered with crumbs of the soft cake she’s been devouring all afternoon. Two pairs of ice blue eyes meet each other beneath the setting sun, the girl’s giggles eliciting a chuckle from her father’s lips as he carefully wipes her face. “Mama will be mad if you stain your dress, little princess.” The cavalry captain points out, in mock scolding.

His reprimand is met with a bashful smile and his kid cuddling into him, her tiny hands clutching his clothes.

“Kaeya, don’t tease her!” You swat at his arm playfully, soft laughter leaving the both of you as your husband smooths over your girl’s hair, placing a soft kiss on her head.

“Don’t pay any mind to papa, now.” You reassure her, tenderly brushing over her chubby hands. “He’s a little silly sometimes.”

The girl looks up at you, those iceberg toned eyes wide in wonder at the world that she still has to discover around her.

You ruffle her hair, as she turns around in Kaeya’s embrace, settling on top of his legs, staring up at him.

“Papa!” She announces, taking ahold of Kaeya’s long braid, playing with it. “Papa… prince!” She points out, as she grabs one of the dolls she brought: a boy wearing a crown.

With a knowing grin, you shift closer to your lover, leaning against his side.

“Yes, little sweetheart, you’re right, papa is a prince.” Kaeya’s hand locks with yours over his shoulder, fingers laced together, the warmth of his touch so paradoxical, given the freeze he commands.

“And that is why you’re our little princess.” The knight tells your baby, as he places a stray calla lily on her hair.

“Princess!” She happily babbles, rising her arms.

Instances like this… they truly stoked gentle flames around the captain’s heart, oftentimes concealed behind apparently crystalline walls of frost. As long as he had the two of you, at least during brief moments like this, there would be no need for practiced facades.

Across the distant horizon, even dusk seemed to delay, allowing a few more seconds of luminous skies for the family sitting below it, a flickering smile crossing the anemo archon’s face of stone.

✧ NEUVILLETTE

Slate skies expand above him, his opal eyes restless oceans in the tears they contain, painted lashes dripping in midnight droplets.

Rainbow roses seem to weep too, their petals downcast, the sunrise shades of their blossoms muted in the downpour.

Neuvillette stands alone, the garden of your shared home melancholy; the trees too bare, the grass ashen, the flowers wilting.

Save for the pitter-patter of rusted silver droplets, silence reigns the scene.

The hydro dragon’s mood had a tendency to be mirrored in the heavens over Fontaine, after all.

Sighing, the Chief Justice takes a sit by a bush of lumidouce bells. Fitting, for someone whose shoulders slump not unlike the petals of the periwinkle hued blooms.

“Neuvi, love.” A familiar voice calls him, gently. “What are you doing out there in this weather, dear?”

Long argent locks of hair shift, like seafoam by moonlight, when he turns around, water, from the rain, or his tears, or both, running down his cheeks.

“Someone has come to see you, my love.” You softly utter, beckoning your husband towards the porch, the impending cacophony of his racing mind and falling downpour partially silencing.

Neuvillette’s features warm up a bit the moment he realizes who you’re talking about.

A little girl placidly rests between your arms, eyes of crystalline dusk looking up at her father. Unlike his, hers are rounded, lacking the dark circles frequently etched under your lover’s.

“Look who’s here, little rainbow.” You coo at your daughter, who tries chasing after your wiggling fingers, right as you playfully poke her belly. “Papa is here, do you perhaps want to play with him?”

The baby looks at you, one of her tiny fists on her mouth, as her eyes crinkle up in crescents. Then, she turns towards her dad, arms reaching out.

“Papa! Papa!” She laughs, inclining her flexible small torso towards him.

Neuvillette’s gaze widens, placing his hands around his little girl, protectively cradling her in his embrace.

“Papa is here, sunshine.” Your lover assures her, as he leans down to kiss her nose.

In the distance, a familiar arch shoots across the heavens, the violet of goodbyes and separations shifting into rosy affection.

Golden replaces dull steel, flecks of it dotting the grass, remnants of rain clinging like emeralds to the verdant stems.

The sun is out. The hydro dragon cries no more.

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