Work Text:
Could the day get worse?
This is what Sara thinks about when the head of the company loudly clears her throat, pulling her out of inappropriate thoughts in this situation. The look Raiden casually gives her could easily melt steel while remaining colder than the north wind. The boss furrows her brows, does not hide her irritation when she rejects another call on the phone, briefly slapping her finger on the gadget. The white, perfectly clean table trembles slightly under this action, Sara clears her throat, not daring to loosen one of the buttons of her snow-white shirt, which seems to deliberately begin to put pressure on the skin.
The black tie loosens as she shakes her head slightly.
"I demand an explanation, Kujou Sara." Her voice is full of dry annoyance, Raiden does not intend to wait, and the girl forces her brain to work to the limit, hearing loud raindrops that are pounding outside the window.
"Raiden-sama, I don't understand how this could happen." Sara holds in her hand several documents proving that none other than her father, who ordered private information to be leaked to outsiders, is to blame for the crushing decline of the magnificent campaign. "I didn't know anything."
Sara skillfully keeps a tremble in her voice when she is forced to report like this to the most powerful woman in the whole country, who, moreover, openly expresses dissatisfaction.
"Do you admit that you failed in your duties? Your father, the person closest to you, do you understand that this is complete incompetence?"
"I understand, Ms. Raiden."
The woman sighs, and Sara hears the full range of her emotions, and then the dull creak of a chair. Ashamed. She is ashamed and turns away, clumsily hiding the redness of her cheeks. Raiden growls wearily, flicking his lighter, and Sara instantly takes the hint, immediately reaches into her jacket pocket to get her lighter.
Realization comes to her too late.
Raiden does not seem to notice her embarrassment, looks into her eyes for a moment before leaning towards the purple light that slowly and beautifully blinks in the dim room and lights a cigarette.
Sara hurries to apologize for her faux pas, but the woman gestures for her to be quiet.
"You're doing the right thing, Kujou Sara, you're now free to do whatever you want. Sign this and you can leave Tenshukaku territory."
Sara freezes with her blood in her veins, she is fired, dishonored and trampled. But she is silent, with all her strength she forces herself to remain with a stone expression on her face, and staunchly nods when Raiden slowly gives her a pen.
Sara does not even read the lines of the dismissal, because she knows the contents of every document that she has drawn up for almost all five years of work.
She has no right to be angry, offended, accusing the world of cruelty. This is her mistake, for which she alone should be responsible. She doesn't understand why Raiden is smiling like that when he picks up the piece of paper.
"You have three days to collect your things. Get on with it."
"Of course. Sorry." Sara feels stupid because she knows words are not enough. She thinks for a moment as she leaves her lighter on the table and bows before touching the expensive wood of the now former boss's office door for the last time.
Raiden chuckles but accepts such a small donation, tossing the old lighter in the trash can and taking another puff.
"Kujou Sara." she calls casually, and the girl stops at the exit, "What I smoke is only between us. Am I clear?"
"Yes, Ms. Raiden."
Sara had a very spacious office, there was an ideal environment where she could completely devote herself to work and not think about personal problems. She had everything she needed for comfort, it was comfortable furniture, heating, lighting, everything was highly developed and according to the latest models. She was so natural to this room that several times she fell asleep at the table.
Now she puts her few belongings in a shallow box, trying not to overexert herself and not give in to emotions in front of her former subordinates, who are also in absolute bewilderment.
Someone is sad that Sara is leaving, and someone is just pretending, intending to quickly grab onto a prestigious place with a good salary.
She leaves the tall, vast, and incredibly important building with a barely audible sniff, the guard checking her one last time before leaving. Sara felt the discomfort of a man who had previously let her pass without any examinations.
He says goodbye to her with a short nod, handing her a box of things, which he helpfully covered with a plastic bag so that papers and other things would not get wet in the rain.
Sara doesn't have an umbrella, unfortunately.
She pulls on the collar of her black coat, adjusts her hat of the same color, and sighs five times, and only then goes down the stairs, she is careful not to trip.
It's getting dark fast, and Sara tightens her grip on the edges of her belongings box as she turns the corner, intending to take a shortcut home. She does not have the slightest desire to call a taxi, a walk helps her calm down.
She thought too hard that she did not notice a tall man in front of her, waiting for her in the alley..
He yells when the girl bumps into him, almost falls, but manages to rest on the bat, and Sara would have apologized for the inattention, as he begins with a pleased smile.
"Kujou Sara, what a pleasant surprise."
"Not now, Arataki." she sighs and Itto notices the box in her hands, of course he laughs, loud enough to override the sound of the rain. His hair sticks to his face, Sara finds it unpleasant, mentally rejoicing that she still did not grow her own.
"Have our bird been kicked out of its warm nest, and you have accepted my invitation? Alas and ah, but I don't need you anymore..."
"I'm going home, Arataki, please move away." Sara snorts when he puffs out his lips and shakes his head, the girl only notices that the fool is in only a T-shirt in this weather.
"Make me move away, stupid tengu." he smirks sardonically, enjoying being taller and bulkier, but still cautious, remembering the consequences of his last game. Itto couldn't walk normally for a whole week after provoking Kujou Sara. But now he sees that Sara is not really in the mood for a fight.
"What? Big lady won't put in a good word for you, huh?" He teases, and Sara does not want to listen to him, she simply pushes the guy away with a strong push of the elbow and moves on, ignoring the indignation that comes from behind.
Sara would like to pour out her emotions on Arataki in the form of numerous bruises and scars, perhaps even overfishing. But it's not the idiot's fault that Sara is so... so...
Stupid.
Sara hears Itto being scolded by someone, and he continues to reset until he gets a good cuff on the back of the head.
Maybe she should have called a cab after all?
There's definitely not enough light from the lamps to illuminate the narrow part of the street, but Sara knows the road well enough not to be startled by strange noises coming from garbage cans, or the rustling of bags, or the mewing of stray cats. The howling of dogs is not terrible for her, like the screams of the inhabitants of the local houses, these are old married couples arguing in order to calm down and start all over again the next day.
But the swearing that comes around the corner becomes a new discovery for her. Someone is screaming, Sara hears sounds that she could call scary. The sound of something hard hitting the body, and everything repeats over and over again.
Sara realizes reality again too late, when the noise subsides and everyone is looking at her.
Strangers in strange masks stop beating someone who is lying helplessly on the wet pavement, which is still raining.
She only decides to say something, as one of the scoundrels rushes at her with a quiet cry, Sara does not want to get her hands and clothes dirty, despite her self-defense skills, so she only catches the attacker by the elbow and pushes her away.
"What are you doing?" she says sternly, threateningly approaching the aggressive crowd. Sara really hopes that she won't have to fight each one of them.
There is no answer, they just run away, leaving someone lying on the ground.
This is a woman, tall, with blond hair, she lies weakly, occasionally emitting a hoarse cough, and covering her ribs with trembling hands. Her face is not visible, wet hair, covered with drops of dirt, frame her pale skin.
Sara quickens her pace and hurries to shelter the poor stranger from the rain, the girl's black dress is torn in places and she immediately helps her to sit down.
"Ma'am? Can you hear me?" Sara mindlessly takes off her coat and carefully throws it over the shoulders of a woman who weakly holds on to her shoulders, sometimes sighing with an incomprehensible note.
"My bag." she says, suddenly resting her hand on the girl's shoulder in a sluggish attempt to get up, Sara reacts instantly, clasping the helpless lady by the waist.
"Were you robbed, ma'am?" Sara looks around, notices a small purse on the ground and trudges towards the little thing, dragging the victim behind her, who does not mind.
This woman is... tall, damn tall, which Sara can't help but notice every second of it. She smells pleasantly of salt, roses, despite her not very presentable appearance, and Kujou involuntarily staggers when the stranger completely relaxes and puts her head over her hair.
She looks like she's drunk.
Sara holds her purse in her hand, examines and makes sure that it is intact. The woman lets out something resembling a sigh of relief, but in fact it seems to be the most tired groan in the life of a girl. She becomes interested in the backstory up to this point.
"Inazuma… nasty Inazuma…" she mutters, and Sara notices a dirty red tint on the right side of this person, where the dress is torn especially badly.
"Ma'am, you need to go to the hospital, you don't look well..." Sara reluctantly admits that she doesn't want to deal with the hospital and the police. Documents, submission of evidence. And what if she is accused of beating this woman at all? Thoughts mix into a thick slurry, which Sara prevents by remembering that her apartment is very close. "Let me help you... ma'am?"
The woman does not answer, and Sara screams in fright when she sees her hand covered in scarlet blood.
She carried it to her apartment with incredible difficulty, she doesn't know what to think about it. Carrying an unconscious woman on her back, so as not to catch the eye of the neighbors, is not the easiest task in Sara's life, which she managed to swear with all the words that she knows. Before that, she did not swear, but the first muffled crunch of the spine easily knocked out the annoyed "Fuck" from her lips.
In the light of home lamps, it becomes much easier to see the victim's face, she has a lot of scars on her face, and this is in those places that are not hidden by long hair. The eyes are closed, but Sara feels that the woman's consciousness is slowly manifesting by the movement of the eyeballs under the eyelids.
Kujou carries her to the bathroom, leaving a wet trail on the floor, and only feels how wet she herself is in the rain, the shirt sticks to her body, making her wrinkle with discomfort.
What an interesting day.
For some reason, Sara is not at all surprised that the stranger is sleeping peacefully, sometimes fidgeting to get comfortable on the bed. In any case, this is much better than loud tantrums due to the sight of blood and misunderstanding of the whole situation, this woman seems to her experienced in such matters. The sheets rustle softly, the bed creaks as she sits up and carefully runs her hand over the bandages on her body. Sara watches in puzzlement as the blonde leisurely searches for her purse and only glances in her direction for a moment before lazily reaching over to the table beside the bed.
It gets quiet and Kujou casually looks out the window, seeing the sunrise for the first time in two months, but finds nothing out of the ordinary. Her heart is quiet, which betrays a sigh full of sadness.
The woman hums thoughtfully as she rummages through her purse, she remains silent, and pulls out her phone. She spends a few seconds trying to turn on the annoying gadget. Sara would have slapped her face, but silently puts a tray of hot tea on the empty table, waiting for action from the mysterious lady. Something tells her that she can definitely handle everything on her own.
"Dear, can I call from your phone?" she says with a hint of annoyance in her voice and Sara nods, pulling a device from her trouser pocket. "Thanks."
The stranger is quite comfortable in the girl’s apartment, she is not at all embarrassed by her nudity when the bandages on her body are changed, and Sara, to be honest, doesn’t care. She silently eats and drinks everything that the landlady serves her, behaves politely and civilly, allows herself to be treated, sometimes mumbling something about the shitty people of Inazuma.
Sara partially agrees with her, a lingering feeling that this woman from another country is less and less inconvenient every minute. She does not need to go to work, she was fired, and the girl only realizes that she left a box with things on the street.
"Don't you have any questions for me? You didn't let up yesterday."
Hell, of course there is. Sara would have bombarded her with questions not only about what happened yesterday, but she only nods briefly, sitting down on a chair.
"I'll be picked up at night, so hurry up, I think I can give you a couple of hours of my time."
The mysterious voice of this woman, as if she is a significant person, occupying a high position in any society, except for Inazuma. Kujou examines her: her face is serious, concentrated, she is waiting.
"Tell me about yourself." she asks, and the woman smiles slyly, realizing that they do not limit or rush in anything.
She introduces herself as Signora, a diplomat from a neighboring country who could have been killed yesterday. Sara is not at all surprised when she speaks viciously of the Tenshukaku Company, but the news that the attackers were from there is slightly confusing.
A dedicated woman intends to return to her homeland to report a successful assignment from her boss, and only thanks to a passing person is she now alive and relatively healthy. Fortunately, her ribs are not broken, everything worked out with a slight bruise.
Signora sips her tea, noticing its rich and at the same time light taste, while she continues talking about herself. She's an interesting person, Sara thinks, trying to take her mind off her chaotic thoughts.
"Do you know anything about Fatui?" The question causes Sara's brain to reset, and she nods, rubbing the back of her head thoughtfully.
"Do you work there?" obviously yes. She has no idea how to relate to this information. Fatui's company has an unstable reputation and is a threat to both Inazuma warring organizations, but... Sara doesn't work for Tenshukaku anymore, so why should she think about it in a negative way? She decides to remain neutral, after all, they are not in negotiations, they have a personal situation.
Signora silently watches the gears spinning in Sara's head.
"Of course. Enough about me, I'd like to know who my savior is."
The girl hopes that Takayuki wasn't working with Fatui, but her instincts hint that this woman is waiting just to poke this fact in her face.
"My name is Kujou Sara." Signora's face tightens in just a second, somewhere between surprise and quiz. Sara shrugs, expressing complete neutrality. "Interesting coincidence, isn't it?"
"My people were talking about you." Signora smiles as peer into her face. "I suppose I can compensate for your loss in gratitude for your help."
"No need, ma'am."
"You haven't even heard my offer, and you're already refusing." a woman taps her nails on the phone, "My people will arrive now and you will see everything for yourself. How do you like this offer?"
Sara looks around puzzled at the floor and Signora catches this gesture of uncertainty.
"Don't think badly of me, I did my job."
"I understand and don't blame you, that's my problem."
Signora opens her mouth to answer as a loud thud cuts her off. The woman sighs in annoyance and stands up, throwing a blanket over her body. Sara follows her in mild curiosity as to who her people are.
Two strangers in unusual masks stand outside the threshold, and Signora speaks to them in a language unknown to Sara, but the movements of her hands and intonation make her understand that she is clearly unhappy with something. After finishing the discussion, she turns towards the girl and suddenly becomes smiling.
"Let me borrow the bathroom for five minutes."
"Sure." Sara walks her to her room.
Sara would be lying if she said she didn't like it here. If she pays less attention to the fact that Signora is feared like hell here, then she is quite comfortable in her campaign. She calls it an "internship" and drags Sara with her almost throughout the Fatui building, of which, as it turns out, there are ten more divorces in Inazuma. Agents communicate with her with restraint, someone completely avoids the conversation, with a bow sent to important matters.
"Fired, you say." Signora pensively sips a reddish liquid from a glass and grins with such a smile, as if she were drinking not wine, but blood. “If you lose your job at such a prestigious company, you won’t be hired anywhere without outside help, do you understand that?”
The bar is nicely lit, cool and breezy enough, and Sara plays with her glass of alcohol before nodding in agreement. Lately, she doesn't feel like talking at all, as if needles are constricting in her throat and spinning in all directions. It sounds more painful than it really is.
"Your father was more talkative when you mentioned money, the pupils of his eyes dilated like he was on drugs."
"Do you know where he is now?"
"No. I'll get my agents to figure it out if it calms your nerves." She smiles slyly, glancing at the untouched liquid that dangles in a glass beaker.
"It would be great."
Signora laughs hoarsely and quietly, with one glance beckoning an agent in a special uniform who comes to hand. Sara deduces that an elderly man is hidden behind the mask, listening to his voice and looking closely at his limping gait. Judging by the way he quickly rushes towards the exit, work is no joke here. Kujou sighs.
"And how did you end up behind that lane?" she asks, resting her chin on her folded hands. How did such an important person get beaten up in a dark corner? Signora seems to be a strong woman, and her mind also stands out, Sara involuntarily begins to believe that all this is just part of some brilliant plan of a diplomat from Snezhnaya. Not that it will make the girl's situation worse, she doesn't care, but is she a threat to their ideas after a crushing dismissal? Sara hasn't even logged into social media, but she's sure the internet is teeming with articles about what happened.
Signora does not answer her question, but silently puts her smartphone into her hands.
The traitor is now on his way to the airport, escorted by personal guards.
Sara lazily returns the gadget, she doesn't care anymore.
How quickly it all happened.
"I dare say you haven't seen the arrogant foreigner, which is rather strange, since he opposes Fatui."
Sara hears about him for the first time, and is annoyed by the fact that under her nose all sorts of things were being done that went unnoticed by her.
"The authorities are pleased with your resume. If you decide, just call, and now if you please, I'll go on business."
The woman does not wait for an answer, but leaves a business card with an interesting logo on the table and slowly leaves the bar, leaving her alone.
When Signora said that they would not take her anywhere, Sara did not think that she meant literally anywhere. An incident in a prestigious company significantly affected her resume, and the girl is simply denied a job as if they see some kind of mistake in her. Sara stopped her job search after a week of rejections, scrolling through the script in her head, how to proceed and how to pay for housing with basic needs.
She often walks around her neighborhood, and always stumbles upon the obnoxious Arataki, who suddenly wanted to invite Sara to join his gang.
Kujou increasingly remembers the mysterious woman, her unusual way of speaking, and freezes with a cup of tea in place, staring at the set of numbers printed on a business card.
"It doesn't get any worse, does it?" she says to herself and dials the number.
Masahito calls Sara to ask for help sorting through Takayuki's old apartment as Kamaji rummages through documents and suffers the consequences of his father's betrayal, which reporters say is doing well in Liyue.
A massive guy confidently rakes the weights I teach and carry them outside to free up housing for new settlers, while the girl deals with the locks.
The apartment smells of mold, dust and alcohol, which is not new for the three guys, Sara arms herself with a mask and breaks a rusty lock that falls with a bang on the old carpets.
"How are your studies, Masahito?" Sara breaks the silence, the situation begins to strain her.
"There are exams ahead, but I can handle it. The teachers have become tougher on me, but I'm used to it. What do you have? Where have you been?" The guy puts down the boxes and wipes the sweat from his forehead, trying not to get his face dirty with gloves that have managed to get dusty in ten minutes of work.
"I found a job." Sara grunts as she picks up pieces of iron from the floor, and Masahito sighs in surprise before her sister can continue.
"Really? They kick me out as soon as they find out who I am. What kind of job is this?"
"Nothing special, I deliver cargo from point A to point B. Better than nothing, right?"
"It's a shame your talent is being wasted on a job like this, Sara." The brother frowns with impotence in this situation. He was terribly reluctant to ask his sister for money, even if he could starve to death. "I'll get some air, okay?"
"Of course." She follows him with her eyes, as she feels something small under her foot.
Lighter. With purple fire.
The next day, the Kujou clan is informed of Takayuki's death in an accident on one of the yachts.