Chapter Text
Childe discovered it out of his own volition. One more parting gift— or perhaps a curse— from the Abyss. Besides his new penchant for violence and a monstrous new form that distorted his body completely, Childe came to the harrowing discovery that he could not die.
Childe found the gift hidden in his bones, the night that his mother gathered him gently from sleep, nestled in her arms. Though Ajax had arose from sleep at her touch, he had kept his eyes closed and breathing even, not wishing to break the spell. It had been so long since his mother had last wrapped him in her embrace, at least, ever since the fateful day he had fallen into the Abyss. And so, Ajax basked in it now, letting his head fall ever so softly into the crook of her shoulder.
His mother had held him with such a feather light touch, gentle, as she led them outside the warmth of their home into the cold of the twilight winter air. It had been quiet, no one awake at this hour. No one except his father, waiting out at the lake, hole already neatly carved into the ice. It was almost like a disfigured illusion, the dark shadow of a possibility, of what could almost be the beginning of a relaxing time out ice fishing. Had Ajax let his eyes open the moment the chill of the winter air hit his cheeks, he would have seen that his father’s expression lacked any of its usual enthusiasm. Instead, his father’s face was drawn, grey, and his body swayed anxiously, eyes flickering nervously about their surroundings.
“Hurry now,” he heard his father warm.
And yet, Ajax did not break his ruse, his cover of sleep, though he had started to become aware of what was to happen, what was already happening. Despite the inner beast within him shrieking, writhing, wanting to wrap its claws around his parents because how dare they, how dare they, to their own son— the part of him that still ached for the love of his parents quelled the beast. Quelled it, even as Ajax’s mother whispered apologies into the crown of his head, her tears catching in the strands of his hair. Quelled it, as his body, still warm, was passed into his father’s arms. Quelled it— but not enough to stop the cry of alarm from slipping past his lips as he was dropped into freezing water. Ajax only caught a glimpse of his parents’ twin expressions of horror tinged with regret, before the water dragged him down, down, down.
Perhaps it would have been better if the Abyss had swallowed him whole again, dragged him below the bed of the lake. It would have saved him the effort of desperately thrashing in the water, trying to swim up to the surface, but not being able to endure the cold which had settled heavily into his limbs, exhausting him. It would have saved him the burning in his lungs and the feeling of life gradually slipping past his fingertips, leaving his body limp, lifeless. It would have saved him the feeling of coming back, consciousness struck back into him like lighting, feeling lake water burn back into his lungs as life thrust him back into drawing breath.
Ajax would die two more times in the water, the surface of the ice feeling further from him with each resurrection. The drowning was a never-ending torture and every new chance at life felt more like a misfortune each time. The pain did not ease, instead seemed to amplify along with Ajax’s growing emotions of both terror and the agony of wishing that please, please, could he finally just rest. However, the next time he opened his eyes to freezing lake water yet again, Ajax allowed himself to desperately conjure his Abyssal form. He let the transformation wrap itself around him, breaking him out of the ice. As soon as he broke the surface, the Foul Legacy was already shuddering off of his body, still unused to wielding such power.
For a while, Ajax had simply laid on the surface of the ice, a numbness seeping into him that was separate from the freezing cold. The burning in his throat had nothing to do with the drowning, his lungs completely healed of any damage done by the suffocating water. The stinging in his eyes had nothing to do with the water dripping from his frame, which was slowly forming ice crystals on the tips of his hair. Before any tears could fall or before the weight of his parents’ actions could settle into him, Ajax allowed his body to move completely on instinct as he clumsily adjusted himself into an upright position. Ajax had limped his way back home, soaked to the bone, had made it to the doorway just in time for family breakfast. He felt like a creature pulled from a nightmare.
His mother had screamed when she saw him, sending a plate of food shattering against the wooden floorboards and her breakfast smattering on the ground like a grotesque painting. Her face was white as if she had seen a ghost and Ajax wondered if he could be considered one, a creature that death could not quite keep in its grasp.
Ajax had ignored her, then stepped around his father who seemed frozen in place. His elder siblings, though confused by their parents’ reactions, but blissfully unaware of the events that had taken a few hours before their meal— innocently probed at why Ajax was all wet, why his lips were so blue, and what the hell was he doing out there in the freezing winter? Ajax ignored it all, until he slid into his seat, his empty chair not yet removed from its usual place at the table.
“Mama, I’m hungry.” Ajax had said, smiling innocently, as if nothing had ever happened.
-
Ajax didn’t enjoy dying, nor the feeling of it. It was just that, well, he had to be sure. And to be sure, he felt that he needed to try dying again, to get rid of any doubts or lingering suspicions about how he had survived the disastrous incident at the lake.
Because perhaps his parents had come to immediately regret their actions, the moment his father dropped him into the lake. Maybe they saw him thrashing in the water and realized that he was still just a child, still their son. Maybe his parents had been the ones to drag his body to the surface, not the Abyssal monster that had become a part of him. Maybe they had left him behind on the surface of the ice while he was unconscious, because they simply hadn’t known what to do with him. Maybe he hadn’t actually died at all, it just felt like it, because the feeling had been so, so horrible.
They were the desperate musings of a boy, a child, a son.
Because though Ajax wanted to believe that his parents did not wish him dead, Ajax could not deny the memories that he still held— the moments when consciousness ripped through him again, the moment he had used his Abyssal form to tear out of the lake. The ache of it still lingered in his limbs.
The ache persisted, as a muscle in his arm twinged as he tightened a knot in the noose that he had fashioned from the rope he had snuck from the shed in their backyard.
Once the only sound in his house was the quiet of sleep, did Ajax attempt to put his newfound ability to use. Sure, it was a grotesque way of experimenting upon his own theoretical non-death and there was the possibility that he might not come back this time, but Ajax found that he did not particular mind the prospect of a permanent death either. It was not that Ajax particularly wished to die or that he put much thought into dying, it was just that he didn’t think too much about living either. Though, Ajax did wonder if a death caused with his own intent would finally put a stop to this horrid cycle for good.
In the end, Ajax only held a hazy recollection of the after, though the harsh line of pain across his neck was still something that came back to him every once in a while. A phantom pain. Ajax remembers the deep Nothing, different from sleep, different from the void of the Abyss. Ajax also remembers blinking blearily back into life, the blurred view of his ceiling sharpening into focus. Ajax found himself tucked back into his bed, blanket under his chin. Evidence of what he had done to himself had been cleared out, his parents’ pale faces hovering over him like two wan moons. The dismay on their expressions was enough of an answer for Ajax, that death had not kept him this time either, that by some miracle or disaster, he truly could not stay dead. The revelation only brought an apology to his lips.
I’m sorry, Mama. I’m sorry, Papa. He wanted to say, though his mouth refused to open, to let the words escape him. Somehow the regret, the apology, seemed too human, too unlike the thing he had become.
Ajax realized that he could never be his parents’ son again, that he was only a twisted image of the fourteen-year-old boy that they had lost, got stuck in the Abyss, and never came back. A monster had crawled out in his place, a beastly imitation. Something seemed to fracture within himself, shattering Ajax into tiny little pieces. And so, Ajax turned his grief into violence, wreaking chaos across what used to be a peaceful fishing village. It was as if he was showing his parents that he too was accepting the monster that he had become, that he would no longer try to be their son, that he has finally realized that he could no longer be one of their own.
Ajax’s violence eventually drove him into the path of a Harbinger— Pulcinella. However, instead of horror, Pulcinella had gazed upon him appraisingly and had gathered Ajax into his arms, blood and all. Once in the ranks of the Fatui, the Tsaritsa rewarded his viciousness by consecration into the position of a Harbinger. Ajax was the youngest one yet.
His recruitment into the Harbingers marked an end to Ajax and gave him a new name instead. It also brought an end to any more of his resurrections. Ajax, now Tartaglia, Childe, had honed his innate battle abilities to a level that prevented death’s shadow to ever fall over him again. In a strange paradox, it almost made him crave it more, seeking death’s long shadow in the silhouette of more dangerous foes. It’s different, he argued to himself, that this hunger for battle is not at all a reflection of the time he took his own life. However, it was the same emptiness that dug into him, the same indifference. It was constantly there— a small hole in his heart, his soul, the mouth of a goldfish that constantly opened and closed, gasping for breath.
Childe keeps learning to forget instead, getting lost in learning the rules behind how to wield different weapons, the strategy to a fight, the art in battle.
Childe could almost forget that he is an anomaly, some damned creature destined to live a life that can never be fully wrought, a death that can never be fulfilled.
-
Childe thinks that it’s too bad that despite everything, he has always cared a little too much. A bleeding heart, Pulcinella had called him, though it had been a reprimand. An unsuitable heart for a Harbinger. Despite these words, Pulcinella also treated Childe with a bit of a softer edge than he did with the other Harbingers, a fact that Childe did not hesitate to point out.
“It just seems a bit hypocritical,” Childe said playfully, dodging Pulcinella’s swipe at the back of his head. “You always nag about how soft I am and yet, here you are.”
Pulcinella had only shook his head at him in reply, though there was a fondness to it.
“Trust me, my boy, when I say you are more alike to a lifelong affliction.” Pulcinella let out a deep sigh.
Childe has learned by now how to read between the lines, that Pulcinella had also come to care far too much about the boy he had acquisitioned into the Fatui. Childe knew it in the way Pulcinella stood staunchly by him as the other Harbingers doubted his post. The way Pulcinella spent extra hours in the dead of night, running him through Fatui history, some of the backgrounds of the other Harbingers, a few points of interest about their Tsaritsa. Though Pulcinella constantly reminded Childe that the only reason he was investing so much time into Childe’s growth was because any improvement Childe showed would be a benefit in proving Pulcinella’s sound judgement in Childe’s recruitment, Childe could always see the hint of pride and affection whenever Childe did make strides in his rank, earning the honor of his fellow Harbingers.
And perhaps it was this reason, that Childe decided that he had wanted Pulcinella to be the person he entrust his secret to. Someone he could share the burden of his curse with. Childe had always wanted someone that he could tell his secret to, after all he himself still had questions that he wanted answers to about the full breadth of how the curse worked.
Childe had carefully chosen a day where he knew most of the other Harbingers would be out on their own individual missions, before he pulled Pulcinella aside one day, locking the door to his own quarters within the palace behind him.
“Tartaglia, what on earth is this all about?” Pulcinella had asked with a furrow in his brow, taking note of Childe’s erratic behavior and anxiety.
“Listen. Promise me you won’t freak out and please, for the love of the Tsaritsa, don’t call for anyone. This is just a secret between you and me, okay? Just—” Childe slips a pocket watch into Pulcinella’s gloved hand. “Let me know how long it takes for me to get back, would you?”
“Get back? From where— Tartaglia, what is going on?”
Childe had not replied, unable to find the words to explain the wretched nature of his life and death. Childe had pondered over it in his head many times— conjured up different speeches on how he could explain this phenomenon to Pulcinella— but Childe had always been more a man of action, than he ever would be with words.
“Just. Don’t freak out.” Childe replied instead. Then, without a moment’s hesitation, he conjured up a Hydro blade and struck himself right through the chest.
Childe briefly caught a glimpse of Pulcinella’s eyes widening in alarm, before he was toppling backward onto the hard surface of the ground. Childe found himself feeling momentarily apologetic to his body count, because by the Tsaritsa, the blade burned. Childe was no stranger to pain, but he had to stifle his cry of agony as the blade bit into him.
The last thing Childe saw before his vision fizzled out completely, was Pulcinella’s expression, drawn with horror, worry a slash across his features. It was a morbid sort of comfort, witnessing the depth of Pulcinella’s regard of him.
When Childe came back to the world of the living, hazily, like waking up from a long nap, he found that one of his hands were tightly clasped within Pulcinella’s own.
“You stupid, stupid, boy.” Pulcinella said, once he saw Childe’s eyes flutter open.
“Hey,” Childe chided, pretending to take offense to the insult. Childe knew that he had probably shortened Pulcinella’s somewhat ambiguous lifespan by about half.
“Did you keep track of the time, though? How long did it take me to come back? I’ve always wanted to know.” Childe asked thoughtfully, shifting into an upright position with some difficulty. Despite the wound being completely healed, there was still a dull ache where the injury had been.
“30 minutes.” Pulcinella replied, while patting Childe down gently, as if reassuring himself that Childe was truly back, in solid form.
“Wow, only 30 minutes?” Childe wondered aloud. Death had always seemed much longer. “That’s pretty quick.”
Pulcinella shoots him a look.
“It was not quick.” Pulcinella says, gravely. Then, Pulcinella grabs Childe’s shoulders, turning him— still gently— to face him. Pulcinella’s eyes bore into his own.
“You must not tell another soul about this… ability. Do you understand? No one else. Not even…” Pulcinella gives a short sigh. “Not even the Tsaritsa.”
Childe can only nod his affirmation in shock, realizing the gravity of such a secret.
“Good,” Pulcinella says.
After that moment, the relationship between Pulcinella had irrevocably changed— the ghost of a family, two accomplices to a secret withheld to their own Tsaritsa. Though neither of them brought up the topic of Childe’s inability to die, Pulcinella discreetly kept an extra eye on him. The only time Pulcinella mentioned it again was when the Tsaritsa had assigned Childe to a long-term post in Liyue, where Pulcinella came to see him off on the departing ship.
“Remember,” Pulcinella said, while giving Childe a short embrace. “Not another soul.”
Pulcinella releases him.
“Be careful out there, Tartaglia.”
-
Unfortunately, nothing in all of Teyvat— nor the Abyss— could have prepared Childe for the enigma that was one Mr. Zhongli, funeral consultant.
After a number of meetings together, Childe realized that Zhongli was no ordinary human— there were certain characteristics about the mysterious consultant that revealed Zhongli’s lack of human sensibilities about the earth, about life. Like recognized like after all, Childe supposed. And though Childe wasn’t quite sure what sort of non-human Zhongli could be, (most likely an adeptus, was his current hypothesis) there was some comfort in the fact that Zhongli was not an ordinary mortal. Childe found himself easing into Zhongli’s presence more and more, with every moment spent together with the man. It was enough so that he found himself perhaps a little too attached. Childe knew that he shouldn’t get too close, especially with someone that he would have to part ways with after his mission in Liyue had concluded, but he couldn’t help how his heart seemed to gravitate towards Zhongli’s.
It also didn’t help that almost every quality of Zhongli fascinated Childe. Unlike Childe’s more brusque treatment of life, Zhongli treated life with a careful reverence. And it was not just his own, but Zhongli extended this same courtesy to others, treating those who sought his expertise out with consideration.
Of course, to the people with less admirable qualities, Zhongli would exact a swift punishment by confounding the other with a truly impressive number of intelligent verbal rebuttals and arguments. Though, it couldn’t be considered much of an argument, what with how Zhongli could leave someone utterly speechless by barraging them with facts that brokered no room for a response. Childe had been able to witness what he liked to call, a verbal smackdown, in-person and it had been one of the best things he had been given the pleasure to witness.
In fact, Zhongli’s seemingly never-ending well of knowledge was a constant temptation onto Childe, a constant push and pull within himself, wondering if he should ask about living creatures who couldn’t stay dead and would constantly come back to life like a stubborn parasite upon the earth. The only problem resided in Zhongli’s naturally sharp perception. Childe feared that his question was too transparent and Zhongli would be able to see right through him. The fact that Zhongli might find out about his inability to stay dead bothered him more than he would like to admit— in fact, Childe found himself fearing Zhongli’s derision more than he could’ve ever realized. To Childe’s dismay, he realized that he had started to deeply care and even hold something alike to affection for Zhongli.
He was in a truly terrible predicament.
Thankfully, or unfortunately— depending on the way you looked at it— the decision to ask Zhongli his question was made for him on the day of the Rite of Descension. It was usually a joyous occasion, the anticipation had been sparking the air of Liyue weeks before the day, but the ceremony only ended in horror, when Rex Lapis’ draconic form fell into the square, lifeless. There had been a moment of pause, only a few seconds, as every Liyuen citizen witnessed the untimely death of their own god. Unexpected and incomprehensible. Childe had been similarly in shock, but for an entirely different reason. Mostly because he had just witnessed the death of a god and that it had been so quick. Easy. No sign of struggle was marked upon the iridescent scales of Rex Lapis, no evidence of a fight, anything. Childe almost expected Rex Lapis to shudder back to life any second, because how was it allowed to be so easy? Why was it fair that even gods could be given such a death and yet Childe was somehow the one who had to suffer through an endless cycle of life and death— a miserable resurrection?
As Childe realized that he was jealous of Rex Lapis’ death, he recoiled at the thought. Even to someone like himself, it felt reprehensible to feel envious of such a tragic moment. In the end, it left him unable to ask anything, simply deciding to enjoy Zhongli’s company for as long as his mission in Liyue would allow it. After all, there was no use in honesty or getting too close than was strictly necessary.
And yet.
“Mr. Zhongli, are you free tomorrow afternoon for some lunch together?”
Childe consoled himself by saying that there was no helping it really, the more he imagined having to leave Zhongli behind after his departure from Liyue, the more he grasped for time with the other. Childe knew that continued meals together with Zhongli wouldn’t exactly help their already ensured farewell, but the though of ignoring Zhongli when he was right there in the city with him felt worse. And how could he resist, when Zhongli smiled at him so warmly with every request to spend time together?
And just like clockwork, Zhongli responds to his question with his gentle earnestness, his features softening into a pleased expression.
“Of course, Childe. I am always glad to spend more time with you.”
It would never cease to surprise Childe how openly affectionate the man could be, without any difficulty or embarrassment. Zhongli’s easy endearment always sends a blush fluttering across his cheeks, much to his dismay.
Childe clears his throat.
“Then it’s a date!”
Something more wistful casts itself over Zhongli’s features.
“Yes, a date. A date sounds very nice indeed.”