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"Well, well, Mr. Zhongli. Didn't think I'd ever see you on my ship. Welcome aboard the Alcor."
Captain Beidou calls to him over the roar of morning waves. She stands at the quarterdeck of the Alcor, casting a striking figure against sunrise. Wind whips her hair wild and Zhongli is reminded of allies long gone. There are few he would entrust with his safety on the seas. Most of them are dead. In that, she would have fit in well among adventurers of old.
"Thank you for accommodating me,” Zhongli says. He bows his head just so.
“It’s no trouble.” She descends the steps to the main deck and joins Zhongli and his company.
“We picked up the mail you wanted us to get from the Qixing,” the Traveler, Lumine, says. She pats her dress, suggesting that the mail is somewhere in the ruffles of her skirt.
Is there adequate room for mail in the fabric of a skirt? By what mechanism would Lumine keep this mail in place? Perhaps she has a mechanism from beyond the stars.
Captain Beidou claps once. “Great. They would’ve had my ass if I didn’t deliver it to the Kanjou Commission this time. Wish they’d ask someone else to do this run now that the Shogun isn’t messing with the weather.”
Zhongli understands this sentiment. Captain Beidou is a busy woman. Her influence in the waters south and east of Liyue Harbor is hard-fought.
“This route must be more pleasant now,” he says.
“It’s like night and day,” Captain Beidou agrees.
Lumine continues batting at her skirt.
“With the waters clear, I would imagine that sending smaller vessels has become a viable option,” Zhongli thinks aloud. He taps his chin.
Captain Beidou nods. “Yep. This is my punishment for being buddy-buddy with the Tianquan.”
Zhongli smiles, for he too was young, once. “You have a fortuitous relationship. Watching it evolve as you’ve grown up has been a true joy.”
“Getting soft in your old age?”
He considers denying it, but before he can, a small comet crashes between them. The comet is Paimon, soaking wet and half-trapped within the confines of a woven satchel. Lumine freezes with her hand buried in her skirt—a hole in her skirt, no less. Zhongli never would have noticed if she hadn’t gone rummaging in it.
What craftsmanship has allowed her this? Zhongli must know.
Paimon shakes seawater off herself ungracefully. “Eugh. Sorry. Paimon was being followed by a big freaky fish that wouldn’t leave Paimon alone."
“I was supposed to keep it in my pocket,” Lumine says.
A dress with pockets. How novel, Zhongli thinks.
“Paimon was worried,” Paimon cries. She holds the satchel close to her little body. “Ningguang said it was super important and you said things have been disappearing from your pockets lately!”
“I was joking.” Lumine sighs and plucks Paimon up from the deck where she’s left a puddle. The little floating one shakes herself dry and soaks Lumine and Zhongli in the process.
Captain Beidou, entirely unfazed, holds out her hand. “Alright. Pass it over, tiny thief.”
Paimon wails. “Paimon is not a thief!”
“You stole the delivery for Beidou.” Lumine pulls a kerchief from one of her hidden pockets and blots her face dry.
“For safety!”
Captain Beidou’s waiting fingers curl and uncurl impatiently. When the satchel is finally set to her palm, she immediately lifts it to her nose. It twitches with suspicious inhales and exhales. The fabric wobbles with her breaths.
Lumine steps closer. Curiosity, perhaps. “Is something wrong?”
“You didn’t notice the smell?” Captain Beidou asks.
“I didn’t sniff your mail, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Does something smell fishy?” Paimon scratches her head.
Zhongli stares at the unsuspecting package. Faint Geo energy follows it, but other than that it—
A breeze passes. A wretched odor passes with it. The roof of Zhongli’s mouth tingles. He catches himself grinding his teeth and massages his jaw to loosen the bite.
Captain Beidou raises an eyebrow at him and snorts. “That good, huh?”
“That is not the word I would use, but if you find it pleasant I will not criticize your individual preferences,” he says. He sounds more petulant than he wants to. The stench is horrific, though, and he should not be blamed for his reaction to it.
“Hey. Catch,” she calls to a passing crew member.
Multiple people turn their attention to the captain but only one catches the now-very-suspecting bag she tosses.
“It’s from the office of the Tianquan. You know what to do,” she says.
“Yes, Captain.” They tug the collar of their shirt over their nose and scurry off.
She watches her subordinate disappear below-deck and waits until they’re gone to explain. “Ningguang’s assistants leave their pheromones on anything they send out. They say it ensures people know where their whatever-it-is comes from, as long as it arrives in a timely fashion.”
Zhongli’s eye twinges. He cannot stop himself from saying, “That is a terrible idea.”
She laughs. “One of many damn good reasons my crew is mostly betas.”
She is a smart captain, indeed.
***
The Alcor drops anchor at Ritou to the west of Narukami Island.
It’s been too long since Zhongli set foot on steady ground. It occurred to him beforehand that he could reach Inazuma any number of ways, many of which are better than taking a boat and resisting the urge to vomit at all hours. But it has been some time since he has stepped outside of Liyue’s bounds, and to face another element alone stirs something in him. He is acutely aware of how Electro skitters across even the sand in Inazuma. Having trustworthy companions on the voyage eased his mind.
Zhongli is pressed against the ship’s railing. There, on the docks, Ajax is waiting for him. Hands behind his back, left foot tapping. A passerby takes visible note of Ajax's backside before disappearing. The nerve.
His pheromones may bother Inazuma as much as they bother Liyue. He toys with Hydro to cool his head, capturing sakura petals in bubbles. That nervous energy, so very visible and so very endearing, captivates Zhongli.
Ajax looks up from below. When their eyes meet, even Celestia stills.
Zhongli loves him.
When the wooden plank for disembarking is set out by the captain’s men, Childe approaches the Alcor. His face is aglow. He is breathtaking.
"Captain Beidou of the Crux Fleet," Childe yells out, "may I have your permission to board the Alcor?"
Captain Beidou barks a laugh. She adjusts the treasure chest she’s carrying in her arms to peer over its lid at him. "Funny," she calls it.
Childe throws himself at Zhongli. Zhongli considers it a privilege to catch him. Holding his mate—his bonded partner that he will someday default to the modern terminology for—for the first time in weeks is refreshing. For all Inazuma suffocates him, Zhongli can breathe again.
He holds Childe closer than he believes possible. He yearns for an unfamiliar oneness, craves to absorb Childe into himself so they may never be apart. They share the most cherished partnership between humans, yet it is not enough. Even as Childe nuzzles into his neck, spreading sweat over them both, he is not wearing enough of Childe’s scent. Childe rubs his forehead against Zhongli’s jaw, cheek, anything that is accessible to mark.
The hug around Zhongli’s waist is all-encompassing, like everything else he adores about Childe.
“Happy birthday,” he says. And he presses a kiss into Childe’s hair.
***
Childe escorts Zhongli on the long walk to Inazuma City. It’s fortunate, Zhongli thinks, that they do this frequently together. In spite of multiple interruptions made by local monsters, they arrive at the outskirts of Inazuma City before sunset. And as the sun does dip below the horizon, they dine at a street-seated restaurant much like those in Liyue they’re both terribly fond of.
The meal is good. The conversation is better. It takes a grating familiar voice to pull him out of the stasis he falls into whenever they’re together.
A stasis. Yes. Time is frozen with Ajax, yet it moves so quickly. Too quickly.
“My, my, Tartaglia. You’ve brought quite different company than you typically keep, this evening.”
Yae Miko, Baal’s familiar, hovers behind Tartaglia too close for Zhongli’s liking. Admittedly, any time she comes within spitting distance of another person it’s too close for their own good.
Childe swallows his shrimp puff. He swivels on his stool to face her. Zhongli does not, as an average citizen of Liyue would not know Yae Miko and therefore have no reason to be candid with her. He is nothing if not a completely average citizen of Liyue. Childe toys with his cup of sake and rests his elbow on the bar’s surface.
“You’re right about that,” he says. “He’s better.”
Zhongli coughs on—what was he chewing again? It’s not seafood but the texture is unpleasantly similar.
"And who is this upright gentleman?" Yae Miko asks. Out of the corner of his eye, Zhongli would swear he can see her menacing aura.
Childe is surely aware of the fact that she knows him, already. They've known each other for a long, long while. To this end, Zhongli shifts on his stool to face her properly.
"My name is Zhongli. I am a consultant at Wangsheng Funeral Parlor in Liyue."
Yae Miko steeples her fingers close to her chest. "So this is the man Tartaglia talks about at every given opportunity. Zhongli this, xiansheng that. He painted the picture he's been worshiping some sort of god."
Childe laughs, then places his own hand near Zhongli's. So cavalier, he says, "No one stands higher than Her Majesty. But I think it's appropriate that no one stands closer than my bonded partner."
Zhongli nods in the affirmative. That is how it works, to the best of his understanding. And, assuming that he and Ajax are fated partners as they speculate, having a mutual bond is the most significant declaration of their intentions possible. Their shared fate is a contract governed by Celestia. Their mating bond—pair bond, and how many terms do humans need for such?—is their acknowledgment of that shared fate.
Yae Miko's lips form a circle and her brows raise above her bangs. "Mister Zhongli is your bonded partner?"
Childe dusts his fingers over Zhongli's. "For obvious reasons we try not to advertise it."
"Obvious they certainly are." Yae Miko swipes a thumb across her lip. She catches a spot of saliva from her drooling over this update. "Mister Zhongli, you must be the unluckiest man in Teyvat if you've found yourself in bed with this rascal."
"On the contrary, I consider myself most fortunate." Zhongli catches Childe's hand and kisses his knuckles. "To have received such a lovely gift from afar in my homeland, I can only believe I've been blessed by the late Rex Lapis himself."
Childe makes incoherent noises. Precious.
Yae Miko narrows her eyes. "What a strange story that would make, if the final blessings of an Archon were used to set one of his people up with a mate."
"Stranger things have happened."
"Do you imagine that he would pass with any regrets? There are better uses of an Archon's time than playing matchmaker."
Zhongli pretends to think on this while Childe consumes additional puffed shrimp. His breath will be unconscionably bad and he will have squidgy remains stuck at the edge of his canines. Zhongli will not want to kiss him until that is taken care of, but Zhongli would also wait Childe's entire life for his breath to be tolerable again.
"Historical records suggest that those closest to Celestia are often the most eager to escape her," Zhongli points out.
His old acquaintance smiles—genuinely, this time.
***
Zhongli is a skilled planner, if he may say so himself. The longer he has to contemplate, the better the results of his efforts, although he has been known to engage in a minor amount of tomfoolery. His plans for Ajax's birthday are a bit of both. He started months ago on a whim.
Because, see, millennia slipped through his claws. There's little of what one would call a "self" outside of his duties to Liyue and Celestia. Erosion creeps ever-closer, and time never ceases rolling him over as a misplaced corpse atop a hill.
Appropriate, seeing as he did "die" recently.
There is a lifetime of memories as Morax and Rex Lapis that have begun to escape him. As Zhongli he has Ajax to carry those stories with him, and he is not as alone as he's been. The inevitable is staved off. He does not yet fear it.
It's ironic, then, that for the first of Ajax's birthdays since their mating, Zhongli chose a fleeting experience: a display of fireworks like no other, with pyrotechnic elements from Liyue and Inazuma working in rare harmony. The young lady Yoimiya seemed lovely in their correspondence.
The artistry is magnificent. The display is otherworldly. She fires them from Akane Island so they have an ideal view from her cliffside village. It's masterful, and he'll have to extend his gratitude further at a later point. To pursue fleeting moments under the eternal shogun is a daring thing.
He can't focus on it in the slightest. Ajax is sitting on a tree branch in a nearby sakura tree whereas Zhongli is seated on the nearest rooftop. They're close, never close enough, and Zhongli can only stare at Ajax. Bright, beautiful Ajax who hums to himself to keep the sounds of explosions from bothering his sensitive ears.
There's a hint of Ajax's pheromones in the still night air. Jarring as they are, they bring Zhongli comfort and he tries to release his own to match. (He is not sure if it works. He does not yet know how his humanlike body is doing things.) Ajax's nose wiggles in response. They exchange a glance.
A firework bursts, cracking the sky open with color. There are endless twinkles reflected in Ajax's eyes.
Zhongli wonders if maybe, behind the "dead-fish" dullness, those little sparks are always there.
