Work Text:
This is going well, Lumine thinks, as her party engages with one of the Chasm’s resident Cryo Abyss Mages.
It’s actually going better than Lumine dared to hope it would.
Whenever she switches up her companions and goes adventuring with new combinations of them, there’s always the risk of things not working out. Either elemental powers not working together quite like she anticipated or personalities clashing, sometimes horribly.
Yelan, however, is fitting in quite well. Lumine was a little worried since, at first glance, she came across as a bit prickly, and Kaeya has a tendency to wind people up at the best of times. It was also a bit risky considering how alike they are – both the type to keep their cards close to their chests, while setting up elaborate, inescapable traps for their enemies, like spiders spinning beautiful but deadly webs. The two of them have been getting along splendidly, however – being polite, but not polite to the point where it means they loath each other. Working in tandem to immobilize and completely demolish their enemies – and cryo and hydro do go together so well. The two of them even look well matched as they fight together. Lumine actually stops and takes a step back once the Cryo Abyss Mage’s shield shatters, and their foe falls to the ground.
Or rather, it starts to fall to the ground.
Glowing blue threads slice through the air out of nowhere, wrapping around the Abyss Mage, holding it up. Giving Kaeya time to land a devastating combination of sword strikes, his blade still infused with pyro from the buff Bennett gave them all.
This time when the Cryo Abyss Mage falls, it’s like a puppet with its strings cut. It goes down hard, and it doesn’t get back up.
“Haha! Teamwork really does make the dream work,” Bennett says, pumping his fist beside Lumine, though he does sound a bit winded – the Abyss Mage managed to nail him in the solar plexus with an icicle, right after he used his burst. Unlucky for him, but everyone else covered for him and cleaned up without a hitch.
“Nice bladework, Mr. Alberich,” Yelan compliments Kaeya, looking at him from beneath heavy-lidded eyes.
“Nice tactical use of hydro, Madam Yelan,” Kaeya returns, his voice smooth as honey.
“Hey, hey,” Paimon hisses, flitting between Bennett and Lumine. “You two have noticed those two, right? Right? It’s not just Paimon’s imagination?”
“Er – what’s not?” Bennett asks.
“That those two are into each other!” Paimon stage whispers, conspiratorially.
“I don’t know about that, Paimon,” Lumine says . . . even though she knows it’s a possibility . . . and that even if it’s true, there’s really not much to be said about it. Kayea and Yelan are both adults. They can have a relationship if they want, and it’s no one’s business but their own –
“Well, Paimon ships them, so there,” Paimon says stubbornly.
“They . . . do sort of match really well,” Bennett speaks up after a beat.
“Yes! See! See!”
“Not you too, Bennett,” Lumine groans. Belatedly, she wonders if she’s made a mistake with this party after all. Then she hears a sharp shout and looks up to see Kaeya holding onto the white fur that once belonged to the recently fallen Cryo Abyss Mage – and Yelan trying to yank it out of his hands.
“It’s mine!”
“What? No, I got the final strike. That makes it mine!”
“It might if you didn’t spend half the fight being useless against its cryo shield.”
“Useless? I battered it until Bennett’s powers let us melt it, the same as everyone else! And my cryo was no more useless than your arrows against it!”
“Well my hydro –”
“So, what were you saying again, Paimon?” Lumine asks her travelling companion, who is staring wide eyed at the two adults, as her shipping dreams come crashing down around her.
“Well . . . they could . . . they could still –”
“Let go!”
“No! Give it to me!”
“It’s mine!”
“No, it’s mine!”
“They could still be a friends to enemies to lovers kind of thing,” Bennett comments, and Lumine nearly face palms.
“Yes! Friends to enemies to loves!” Paimon seizes on this.
“No!” says an unexpected voice right behind them, and they all spin around to find Childe staring daggers at them. “And I have a bone to pick with you, Lumine!”
“Childe – what are you doing here? You know that the Fatui are persona non grata in this part of Liyue right now –”
“Oh, I know, I just don’t care,” Childe says. “Especially since, once again, you’ve invited my closest comrade Kaeya along on an adventure with yet another weird hydro allogene. First it was that annoying Inazuman dandy, now this Liyuen noir bad girl?”
“Again – Fatui are banned from the Chasm, Childe,” Lumine tells him. “I couldn’t exactly invite you. Besides, Yelan knows this place –”
“I could know this place too!”
“ . . . Do you?”
“No, but I would have learned about it! I have enough connections here that I could have! Kaeya is my special comrade! We work so well together! You can’t just keep giving him to other hydros!”
“Mine!”
“No, mine!”
“Give it back!”
“No!”
“You tell her, Comrade!”
“Archons above,” Lumine groans, and this time she does give in to the urge to face palm. “What is this, a daycare? And why is it my job to teach them how to share?”