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Mondstadt was burning. The thick, acrid scent of smoke in the air stung Kaeya’s throat despite the damp cloth mask he’d tied over the lower half of his face to try and mitigate the damage. His head was killing him, his right eye aching behind the eyepatch he didn’t dare touch, not when Khaenri’ah’s army was here. It was hard enough trying to escape their notice without the blazing beacon that was his golden eye, the symbol of his heritage as their one-time prince; and he didn’t have the time or energy to field questions about it from the people around him either. Even with the eyepatch, people were giving him the occasional odd look, when they had enough attention to spare for his face between fighting fires and seeking safety.
“Kaeya!” His name was called by an unfamiliar voice, and he found a man he didn’t fully recognize at his side, his head swimming as he tried to pin down the vaguely familiar features. The man grabbed at his arm. “Kaeya, she's taken Albedo, and I don’t know if I can retrieve him alone.” Kaeya tried to parse the information, wondering who ‘she’ was and why this man had sought him in response to Albedo being taken. The realization came crashing down around him that Albedo would be fighting the same fight Kaeya himself was struggling with, the call of Khaenri’ah balanced against his love for Mondstadt.
“Who?” he asked thickly, the everpresent headache affecting even his speech as he struggled to stay upright with the splitting pain in his skull. The question was both directed at the man, wondering who he was, and at his statement, wondering who had taken Albedo. The answer to the second question slowly presented itself in his disordered thoughts even before the man answered.
“Rhinedottir. Gold. Whatever she calls herself these days. She’s activated the override she instilled in him to prevent him from doing what I did,” the man tells him, tugging instantly at his arm to pull him away from the stairs to the cathedral, where some of the knights were herding frightened, injured civilians in need of healing. Those who were able bodied were doing what they could to fight the fires spreading through the city, the wood and plaster buildings of Mondstadt catching all too easily as sparks jumped from one to the next.
“The city...” Kaeya began, but his thoughts were scattered. The knights were spread too thin, trying to fight fires and hold the walls, all the while trying to provide what aid they could to the people of the city. He needed to help, he needed to do something. Jean had given him orders when he’d seen her last, but he’d forgotten what they were. Albedo was supposed to be down in the lower city, but this man was saying he’d been taken. Taken where?
“The city will fall if we don’t retrieve Albedo,” the man at his side hissed. As if to punctuate his comment, there was an explosion of stone from below, a section of wall crumbling as it was ripped outward, and the man swore. “She’s already using him, if we don’t get down there now even more of the wall is going to come down and you won’t be able to hold them all off. Especially not against him too.”
Kaeya allowed himself to be led even though his instincts screamed at the danger of going any closer to where Khaenri’ah’s commanders waited, directing their troops. He saw the crystalline blooms of Albedo’s power blossoming in the stones on the wall before another section of the walls was ripped violently outward; and he recognized there was truth in at least some of what the man had said. Albedo was tearing down the walls, though Kaeya hoped it was against his own will.
“Wait,” Kaeya pulled his arm from the other man’s grip, head still pounding. This man didn’t know that Kaeya was a liability, and that the closer they grew to Khaenri’ah’s forces, the higher the danger of Kaeya falling under their control even as Albedo had. The posibility that the stranger was a Khaenri’ahn agent flickered breifly through his mind, even though there was some proof of his words in the form of Albedo’s power being used to destroy the city’s defenses. His eyes bore no stars, but that meant nothing. Would Khaenri’ah bait him with Albedo?
“We don’t have time for this,” the man hissed. “Unless you want me to kill him, you had better come help me drag him back to his senses. It’s you or Klee and I am not taking a child into the war zone.” There was little he could do to prevent Klee from being in the war zone, as the entire city was fast becoming one, but Kaeya did feel a faint flicker of relief that the stranger had rejected the notion of trying to use her to appeal to Albedo. “Attempting to kill him will likely get me killed as well and I am not ready to die again.”
Kaeya didn’t have time to work through that comment before the man was dragging him down the stairs again, heading straight for the chaos of the breached wall. He tried not to think too hard about the wounded knights buried in the rubble, stumbling over the broken stones and lashing out nearly blindly with cryo when an abyss mage floated too close to the pair of them. The stranger held his own surprisingly well for someone without a vision, blade flashing as he darted in at Kaeya’s side.
Albedo wasn’t far from the wall, and while he’d already done sizable damage to the structure of this section, it was clear he was fighting against the compunction to continue destroying the wall. His gestures were jerky and disjointed even as the vision at his throat glowed again, geo energy blooming on the wall once more. His eyes were glowing too, surprising Kaeya, but he suspected that it had something to do with whatever Rhinedottir had done to him. Trying to ignore the pain in his head and the fact that he was about to do something very stupid, Kaeya sprinted full speed at Albedo and knocked him to the ground. The geo blossoms faltered and while the next section of wall was severely weakened, it did not come down.
As expected, Kaeya found himself pinned down, Albedo’s blade at his throat, the eerily glowing eyes narrowing as Albedo looked down at him. Kaeya put his hands up in surrender, taking a moment to tug the cloth away from his face so Albedo would see him better.
“Albedo, it’s me. Please tell me you can still hear me. I know you’re still in there.” The alchemist’s face remained blank, no recognition dawning on his features, only a cold, impersonal glare; but he didn’t move to take Kaeya’s life. The blade shifted slightly, Kaeya’s throat in marginally less danger, but Albedo’s hand was moving toward his eyepatch. “Bedo, no. I can’t. Don’t,” Kaeya pleaded, trying and failing to catch Albedo’s wrist before the other man’s fingers brushed the fabric of the patch.
“You would betray your own people?” The voice that came from Albedo’s throat was not his own and Kaeya started as the other man’s eyes glowed brighter. Albedo ripped away the eyepatch and Kaeya cried out as the pain in his eye doubled, his vision blurring. There was a notable shift in the air around them and Kaeya felt Khaenri’ah’s generals become keenly aware of his existance. “I’m disappointed in you,” Not-Albedo said coldly. “You’ve grown soft.”
“You don’t know me,” Kaeya managed through gritted teeth, grinding the palm of his hand into his eye in an attempt to somehow alleviate the pain with the pressure. “You never did.” There was a sound he couldn’t immediately place and Albedo slumped forward onto him. He realized the other man, who Albedo had either not noticed or had been ignoring, had snuck up on the pair of them while Albedo was distracted by Kaeya. The sound had been him knocking Albedo out with the butt of his sword.
“Get up, this won’t stop him long,” the stranger ordered, already dragging Albedo off of Kaeya. “If you have any ideas how to knock some sense into him, I’d love to hear them, but I suspect you’re on the verge of joining him instead of calling him back.” He was looking right at Kaeya’s golden eye, now glowing in a manner similar to how Albedo’s had been glowing.
Kaeya could feel and hear the Khaenri’ahns dying as some of the city’s allogenes carved into their ranks. His loyalty wavered, the faith and mission instilled in him as a young child being dredged from the depths of his memories and pulled to the surface. These were his people dying, and he was letting it happen. His fists clenched, the temperature of the air around them dropping as his vision reacted to his pain and frustration. The other man swore and dropped the still unconscious Albedo in favor of grabbing at Kaeya’s shoulders.
“Snap out of it! Fight it, prove to me you’re worth the time this idiot put into you! Don’t let her destroy another city, another nation!” Kaeya dimly processed the words as the stranger shook his shoulders and it finally clicked who this person was. Albedo had called him ‘Subject Two,’ and had stated he was ‘taken care of’ when Kaeya had asked what happened between the two of them, so Kaeya hadn’t pressed the issue. It seemed that Albedo had at least taken care of the problem of Subject Two wearing his face.
“Ah, the failure,” Kaeya murmured, and Subject Two froze, fingers digging into Kaeya’s shoulders harder for a moment before he released him with a dark expression. The other man stepped back, warily drawing his sword and dropping into a defensive stance as Kaeya stood. Ice crystals glittered in the air around them, condensing from what little moisture Kaeya could draw from the immediate atmosphere. There was no wind, something that struck him as odd in the back of his mind, though he couldn’t quite pin down why. At his feet, Albedo stirred.
In the distance, flame blossomed in the shape of a bird, sweeping through the ranks of the Abyss soldiers. Kaeya watched it go and his chest ached, the headache returning. The ice crystals faltered as he struggled with the warring memories inside his head. Diluc, smiling and laughing under the warm sun, a gentle breeze stirring his hair. His father, eyes hard and cold as they bored into Kaeya in the frigid rain he’d been abandoned in. Klee, laughing and showing him her latest picture, which featured the pair of them together. His mother, bleeding on the ground in Khaenri’ah’s harsh shadows.
Kaeya gripped his head, hunching over as the pain threatened to split his skull. His people were dying no matter which side he chose, because he was Khaenri’ahn by blood but everyone and everything he loved was in Mondstadt. He loved the city, the gentle breezes that teased softly at his hair whenever he was on patrol. He loved the people here, those who had opened their arms and hearts to him. Mondstadt had taught him love and warmth, but Khaenri’ah demanded his loyalty. Khaenri’ahn memories continued to be tugged to the surface by the magic around him, threatening to drown him even as he grasped desperately at the shards of his time in Mondstadt.
Something smacked him in the face, hard, and he tumbled over backward. “Pull yourself together!” Subject Two snarled at him. Kaeya realized the man had thrown several ley line branches at him. He grasped at one, concentrating on the memories of Mondstadt, drawing from the power of the branch. Ley Lines, as well as the trees that sprouted from them, carried memories of their own. Such branches could be used to draw out memories or strengthen the recollection of a memory, but they were not truly understood by anyone on the surface. Even Khaenri’ah, and now the abyss, did not fully understand their power.
Still, the headache eased some as Kaeya concentrated on his loyalty to Mondstadt and the strength of his love for the city and the people within. He slipped a fragment of the branch into his glove, and another into his shirt, next to his heart. Some of the branches had also landed on Albedo, but as the alchemist got back to his feet they fell away. His eyes still glowed golden, an eerily cold expression on his face. Kaeya wondered if Albedo had not been taught what a ley line could do, unlike Subject Two; or if the one in control of him was deliberately ensuring that Albedo could not utilize them to recover his sense of self as Kaeya had.
“What under the stars did you even expect me to be able to do?” Kaeya hissed at Subject Two as Albedo summoned his sword, geo blossoms blooming around him. “I don’t think he even truly registers we are here, and the one in control certainly sees us as a threat!” He crystalized a shield of cryo around himself as Albedo sent shards of geo energy in his direction. Subject Two had no answer for him, and no time to offer one anyway as he was forced to defend himself. Kaeya was at least buying some time, preventing Albedo from tearing down more of the wall, but he didn’t know what to do from here.
A stupid idea presented itself, the sort of thing that he might find in one of the storybooks Klee loved to listen to him reading to her. Kaeya deflected Albedo’s sword and wondered if fighting off Khaenri’ah’s influence had done something to his brain that he was even considering the notion. He was probably just going to get himself killed if he tried it, but he grimly thought that it would be better to be dead than be used by Khaenri’ah to destroy his own city. Parrying another blow, he waited for an opening, watching Albedo’s movement’s closely and hoping Subject Two would provide enough of a distraction that Kaeya could slip through Albedo’s defenses.
There was a split second window, but it was enough. Kaeya lunged forward, dismissing his sword and catching Albedo in his arms. He pressed a desperate and furious kiss to Albedo’s lips, dipping the alchemist slightly as his entire body followed through on the motion. Albedo faltered in his arms, and Kaeya didn’t feel the blade he’d expected to pierce him in retaliation. Instead, the glow in Albedo’s eyes flickered and faded, gold fading to bewildered and distraught teal. Tears welled in his eyes, his sword clattering to the ground as he desperately clung to Kaeya, kissing him back as if his life depended on it.
Kaeya had honestly not expected that to work, but as he pulled back and found Albedo crying in his arms rather than trying to dismember him, he couldn’t help but wonder if there was a grain of truth in some of those storybook tales after all. Albedo dug his fingers into the front of Kaeya’s jacket as he tried to pull back further.
“Don’t! Don’t. She’s going to...ngh...” he winced, eyes squeezed tightly shut as he ducked his head, clearly in pain. “Stay with me!” He pleaded desperately. “I need you to stay with me.”
“I’m here, schatz,” Kaeya assured him, pressing a kiss to Albedo’s temple and pulling him back into a tight hug. This was not an ideal place for this, he could see a number of abyss mages and at least one abyss herald moving toward them. He would not be able to defend them both, especially if Albedo insisted on clinging to him like this. “I’m here, but we can't stay here.” Albedo made another pained sound, clearly fighting to resist being controlled again. Kaeya wondered if taking him back into the city would be safe. If Rhinedottir took control again, the consequences could be catastrophic.
Subject Two offered Kaeya another Ley Line branch behind Albedo’s back, warily watching the approaching abyss forces. Kaeya wondered what would happen if a person swallowed a fragment of the branch. Having them directly against his skin seemed to be helping, but he wasn’t sure if that would work for Albedo. Accepting the branch, Kaeya gently disengaged one of Albedo’s hands from his jacket and peeled the glove off. Albedo opened his eyes, looking at him with confusion but not pulling his hand away.
“I want you to hold on to this and think about Klee. Think about Mona, Sucrose, Timaeus. Think about Mondstadt.” Kaeya pressed the branch into Albedo’s unresisting fingers.
“This is a Ley Line branch,” Albedo said, his voice watery and pained as he stared uncomprehendingly down at the branch. Kaeya closed his fingers around the branch, wrapping his own hand over Albedo’s.
“Ley Line branches are a catalyst for memories, if you open yourself to them. Concentrate on our city. Stay here, with me. Don’t let her in, use this to block her out.” Albedo took a deep breath and closed his eyes, leaning back into Kaeya to rest his forehead against Kaeya’s chest. Watching the abyss forces drawing ever nearer, Kaeya hoped Albedo would be able to to maintain his sense of self and fight at his side. If not, he was definitely going to die here today, but he would go down fighting. Even with Albedo at his side, their chances of survival were dicey.
“Any day now,” Subject Two said irritably, and Kaeya shot him an annoyed look. While he did appreciate the warning the man had brought and the fact that he had led Kaeya to Albedo, he was not at all impressed with the man’s personality. Albedo took another deep breath and straightened back up, resolve in his eyes.
“I’m ready,” he said, summoning his sword and turning to face the first of the mages, who was now in range. Kaeya called his own sword back to his hand. The mage did not attack immediately, speaking Kaeya in the language of his birth nation. His memory of the language was fragmented and rusty, but he understood enough to know that his loyalty was being called into question.
“I choose Mondstadt,” he answered, not bothering to attempt to speak Khaenri’ahn in return. He was still a traitor, but he chose to betray those he had been sent to wait for. They had never wanted him for who he was, only what he was. Mondstadt was his home, and his heart. He had chosen Mondstadt many years ago, when he’d come clean to Diluc on that terrible, rainy night. Even still, he had questioned his choice every day, wondering if he truly had a choice or if he would be forced to fight to destroy those he loved. Today he had his answer.
“I choose Mondstadt,” Albedo echoed at his side, his voice no longer wavering. Subject Two also stood beside them, sword at the ready, but he didn’t speak. His loyalty had already been made clear when he had not rejoined his creator on her arrival. Kaeya dropped into a fighting stance, ready for the inevitable attack, ready to defend his city. Around them, the breeze had returned, carrying with it encouragement as it gently caressed their faces. As he and Albedo leapt forward to attack, the motto Jean was always repeating played in his mind, resonating with him now more than ever.
For Mondstadt, as always.