Work Text:
Oil. Heat. Oil. Chicken. Oil. Orders. Diluc’s day seems to repeat in a loop of continuous work. Forehead now laced with beads of sweat from the humidity of the fryers, he keeps taking orders, filling buckets, and handing them away to groups of troublesome customers. As he begins packing what he hopes to be his final order of the night, a loud crash comes from the back near the takeout area.
“NOELLE! This is the third time today you’ve miswrote a customers request. If this continues, I’m going to have you resign from this company and work somewhere else. We can’t have you wreaking havoc upon everyone in this store again. You’re lucky I even hired you, with such little work experience you barely made it. Now get up and LEAVE before I force you out of here forever.”
Some harsh words, Diluc had to admit. The boss of the place, Scaramouche, wasn’t the nicest to new workers, and especially not to Noelle. The young girl shrivelled up on her chair under the ear-splitting shouts of their boss and hung her head down low. All Diluc could hear next was Noelles frantic apologies and the sound of the bosses flip-flops slap the floor back to the main office.
Diluc had no other choice than to see if the girl was okay. Yes, it may be more work than he wanted to commit to (especially at ten at night), but he wasn’t going to let some pissy boss upset a more-or-less innocent worker.
“Noelle, what happened?” He questioned as he held his hand out for her to stand up. She accepted the gesture and replied,“I was never taught how to man this machine! I couldn’t change their orders at all! I feel like such a fool, maybe I should just leave here like the boss said...”
Well, he wasn’t going to lie. Noelle was an extremely dedicated accomplice, but she was lacking overall in experience as well as confidence.
“Whether you want to leave or not, I’ll leave that to you to decide. However, you should ask to be moved to the kitchen instead of taking orders. If you want, I can ask the boss for you,” Diluc offered with a sigh. Upon hearing that, Noelle cheered up a bit and smiled, “Really? Wow, I’m glad! I actually can’t join you as I must be heading back home, but I appreciate it. I’ll be sure to repay you!” Diluc simply nodded to that and began cleaning up the tables before changing out of his uniform and resetting the tills.
As the last register had reset, Diluc began unfastening his bun and retying his red locks into a ponytail. In the midst of this, he heard a loud smack on the glass panes of the KFC doors.
What the hell?
The redhead rushed towards the sound and looked down to see a blue haired bloke lying on his side, hand planted on his head and wincing in pain. Diluc was sure this was someone he had met before, but couldn’t confirm the fact until the bluenette turned to face him and he was hit with the powerful smell of odorous wine and cat piss.
Of course, the man was Kaeya Alberich.
Diluc’s night could only go downhill from here.
“Hey big bro!” Kaeya’s words seemed to slur and his face was redder than usual. This man was most definitely drunk.
“Don’t call me bro. Why did you just run into the window? No, let me rephrase that— why are you here at all?” Diluc furrowed his brows and stared at the drunkard before him with a face of both disgust and irritation. Kaeya latched onto his brother’s leg, simply to be launched back onto the concrete causing him to whine in displeasure.
“I’ll be taking my leave. Should you regain some sense and get off of the fucking concrete, I expect not to see you here again,” Diluc said sternly, giving Kaeya an extra punt in the ribs just for kicks and leaving the restaurant.
...
The following morning, it was around 12:00pm that Diluc began his daily trek to KFC. Passing by the heart of Mondstadt, he read an announcement pinned on the news board that read,
“Wednesday, May 17. Today we expect a new visitor from Sneznhaya, by the name Childe. As a man of high status, we expect him to be treated with paramount kindness on his tour of Mond this afternoon.”
That was the part that particularly stood out to Diluc. Childe? Snezhnaya? He was sure to be an interesting fellow.
Brushing off the news he had just read, he continued to make his way to work. Praying Noelle wouldn’t be here to see that he never got the chance to talk to Scaramouche, he gently opened the door and scanned the vicinity for her. However, instead of being greeted by his usual coworker, he saw the one person he despised most.
It was Kaeya Alberich.
In an attempt to avert Kaeya’s attention from him, Diluc lowered his gaze and body, and speedran to the back kitchen. Sadly, his plan didn’t work as expected and Kaeya began pounding him with hello’s and questions about his new workplace.
By 2:30, Diluc had lost his patience. Not only was Kaeya a horrible worker, but Scaramouche seemed to love him. Of all the questions he had asked Diluc, the worst one had to have been, “Wait, so what do you guys even cook here? I thought this was an ice-cream place”.
To put it simply; working with Kaeya was a living hell. So much so that Diluc’s built up rage seemed to burst and he slapped Kaeya’s stupid face in the middle of their shift.
“Now what was that for? Are you being edgy because your dad is dead?” Kaeya was clearly pissed and trying to make his brother as aggravated as possible. So, he returned the favour and punched Diluc right in the gut.
Diluc flinched at the sudden BOING(whatthefuck???) They were both full grown men but couldn’t get enough of the pain they inflicted on each other. So, Diluc’s little slapping-fest turned into a full fledged battle behind the counter. Upon hearing that Diluc was in a fight, various coworkers raced to stop the two. Of these, Noelle was trying especially hard to avert Diluc from the fighting, but over Kaeya’s stupid little girly shrieks and the banging of various cooking utensils, her voice was utterly silenced.
“STOP!” Someone finally yelled. Kaeya and Diluc’s battle finally came to a halt as they stared in silence at the owner of this blaring voice. It didn’t seem to be anyone familiar to Diluc. But realization slowly set in as he recalled the only possibility of who this person could be.
Surrounded by Mondstadt knights, with Jean by his side, it was Childe, the rich Sneznhayan. Head held high and mora in hand, Childe marched up to the two with uppermost swag. He flicked the coin in his finger in an attempt to come off as cool but the gold piece just fell to the floor. Childe cleared his throat, picked up the money and threw it in Kaeya’s face.
Deserved, Diluc thought.
“Sir Kaeya. I must ask what you are doing here in a KFC during your knightly work hours? Surely you didn’t intend on leaving poor miss Jean to do all of your work alone, did you?” Childe snickered and continued, “Now, I expect to have a meal of astonishing quality served for me in the next five minutes, or I don’t think I will be staying in Mondstadt any longer.”
Kaeya processed his words and began to nervously laugh, “Ah, about that, Dear Childe. It seems I haven’t exactly mastered the arts of cooking in this delightful little diner. So, uh, would an ice-cream suffice?” Kaeya asked as innocently as possible. Childe just laughed at his statement and pushed him to the Acting Grandmaster Jean.
Childe then proceeded to take Diluc by the hand and exit the KFC, yelling, “I expect to be met with some privacy this time around, please, nobody follow us.” Diluc was confused by the gingers actions, but obliged and was brought to the outside of the shop.
Childe took Diluc and spun him around so he was staring directly at his face. Then he wrapped his arms around Diluc’s neck and came closer and closer to his face. He whispered into Diluc’s ear, “Pretty Boy, about that brother of yours. He seems to be quite irritating, no? Don’t you think it would be better if we got rid of him forever? Because I can help you with that.”
To be fair, Diluc thought erasing Kaeya from existence sounded like quite the difficult task to succeed in. But given his position and Childe’s dumb smile it was hard to say no.
“I mean, I can’t really say no to that, can I,” Diluc mumbled. After that Childe started making out with him and Diluc left work early to scheme his new plan.
Blah blah blah they become ninjas and kill off Kaeya and get married