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It was surprisingly easy to escape Inazuma without tipping off the Fatui. He’d simply walked down to the docks of Ritou, dressed in the unassuming clothes of a traveler, and approached the strongest captain he could see and asked where they were going.
“Liyue Harbor is stop number one. Why, do you have somewhere you need to be?”
“Out of Inazuma,” he said gruffly, taking a pouch of Mora from his pockets and holding it by the string. “Will this be sufficient fare?”
“No, no. Most definitely not,” she said, pushing the pouch back to his chest. “Lend a hand around the ship and I’ll call it even.”
The strange woman cracked a smile while Scaramouche narrowed his eyes.
“Physical labor, is that all?”
“Hmmm… actually, one more thing. What should I call you?”
Scaramouche scowled. “Are you sure I just can’t give you Mora?”
She full on cackled this time, slapping his shoulder heartily and ignoring the cracks of electro he released into the air in irritation.
“You’re a funny one! I’m sure you’ll fit in with the crew just fine. What’s one more criminal to add to the bunch?”
“How do you-“
“It’s not hard to tell you’re running.” She said, cutting him off. ”Like I’ve said, you’re not the only one. The name's Beidou, I forgot to mention. Only fair I offer my own first.”
She releases his shoulder, and with a slight delay he reigns in the static.
“I don’t have one,” he snapped. Not that she deserves to know anyway. He is no longer the Balladeer, not for long at least, and the name he gave himself has no place here.
“I’m not asking for your own, but I do need something to call you. Surely you’ve been called something?”
He hates it, linking himself back to who he was at the start of at all, but in a way he’s come full circle. He gave it, but not without a scowl most severe.
“They call me the wandering eccentric.”
“Well then Wanderer, welcome to The Crux Fleet!”
—
Someone new is aboard the Alcor, but Kazuha has been too occupied to run into him quite yet. He’s heard a few names for this new fellow, many calling him “Wanderer,” and a few more bolder calling him ”The Eccentric.”
Curiosity got the best of him, and he ended up asking Beidou himself.
“You haven’t run into him yet? Actually now that I think about it, you’ve been making yourself pretty scarce lately, what’s up?”
“I have been a bit… troubled since we left,” he admitted.
She frowned. “Anything I can do?”
“Not that I can think of. I’m sure it will pass. Ah, not to divert attention but, you were saying, about the new guest?”
“Oh right. He introduced himself as ‘The Wandering Eccentric’ and hasn’t given me anything else to call him since. He’s strange all right.”
Kazuha chuckled lightly. “Aren’t we all here?”
“Oh you know the answer to that,” she said with a wave of her hand. “But he’s different, I don’t quite know how to talk to him. Maybe you should give it a try, think about something other than your troubles.”
Kazuha hummed in thought.
“Maybe I will. Thank you Beidou, for the advice.”
“No problem kiddo! Let me know if you need anything, alright?”
“You know I will.”
Kazuha wandered back onto the deck. It was empty, save for himself.
After departing from Inazuma he’d taken to odd hours, though he’s not certain why. He thought he’d laid his heart to rest when the Shogun was reasoned with and he let go of Tomo’s vision after relighting it once again.
Perhaps he sought the cooling touch of night, to quell out any anger that may arise in him.
But it never came. Rather, he found himself disturbed by the lingering hum of Electro that followed him from the shores.
It grew louder at random, and each time he saw along with it the unsheathing of the Shogun's sword as she looked down on him with apathy.
Kazuha climbed the crow’s nest and stilled the air around him at the top. He pulled from his pockets the herbs he had prepared in a roll of paper in his room and lit the end with the aid of Anemo guiding the spark from his flint and steel.
When the end is lit he released his hold on the wind and took a drag. The smell was carried off quickly by the salty winds, but the taste lingered on his tongue. It reminded him of Tomo and the conversations they shared while lazing in the sun.
His peace was broken by the nearing sound of thunder, louder than ever before.
Kazuha frantically scanned the horizon but not a single cloud was in sight. Still the taste of gentle smoke was overwhelmed by the tang of metal on his tongue. He was suffocating, he realized. His eyes watered as he choked on ozone and desperately scrabbled to pull the absent hands away from his neck.
Kazuha awoke to the sight of pale skin and indigo hair. Fearing the worst, he quickly pushed away with a burst of Anemo and reached for his katana.
Before he could unsheathe his sword, slender hands grabbed him by the wrists and pinned him to the deck. When he looked up his heart clenched in fear, as the face that greeted him was just like the one that haunted him.
“Are you a fucking idiot?! Using hallucinogens up there, are you trying to die?”
He met the eyes of his attacker and Kazuha’s vision cleared. The face of the person holding him down was twisted in rage, such emotion would never be seen on the Shogun. Now that he looked closer he could also discern that their hair was cut short, and not quite as vibrant. His eyes as well, they were more gray than purple. When he looked into their eyes the sound of the storm quieted.
“Well? Are you even listening?”
“Naku Weed is a depressant, not a hallucinogen,” he said plainly.
The stranger scoffed and let him go, and Kazuha realized this must be the Wanderer.
“I think somebody laced it then because whatever that was it certainly wasn’t relaxed.”
“Not possible, I picked it myself. I simply… haven’t been in the right mind lately, and I find smoking helps settle my thoughts.”
“You know that shit can give you panic attacks right? Case in point, it just did.”
“It wasn’t that. My senses have been hindered since leaving the island, and I mistook you for someone else.”
The Wanderer scowled. “Of course you did. Well as you can clearly fucking see, I’m not her, so you can stop staring at me now.”
Kazuha didn’t avert his eyes, instead, he only looked at him closer. “I never said anything about who I mistook you for.”
“I look in the mirror every morning, dipshit. And for the love of- stop fucking staring at me I have nothing to do with that bitch anymore,” the Wanderer spat. “I’m not here to enact her revenge or whatever you’re thinking.”
At this Kazuha finally does break eye contact, but the very moment he does his vision goes white, and thunder booms in his ears. He reeled back, clutching his head. He thinks he heard a scream but he can’t tell over the roar of lighting in the air if it was the Wanderer’s or his own.
Strong but delicate hands wrenched his head up from where he’d curled into his legs. Red eyes met stormy grays and the light faded. His ears still rang as the sound of yelling slowly became less muffled.
“-ve you told anyone about this? You need a healer or something… Should you even be on the sea right now?!”
“I’m- I’m fine,” Kazuha said breathlessly, clutching onto the Wanderer’s arms. “It comes and goes, and usually if I avoid certain areas at certain times it goes away. It’s nothing.”
The Wanderer grips him harder, digging his nails into his flesh through his sleeves. “Nothing my ass. You seem like you’re barely keeping it together. Look at you, you’re shaking.”
Kazuha hadn’t noticed the tremors throughout his body before, but now that he did it seemed the Wanderer was the only thing keeping him from collapsing. He tried to steady his breath while the man continued to glare at him.
The Wanderer didn’t even know why he cared. Maybe it was because this asshole looked achingly familiar, or the fact he delivered a great “fuck you” to Ei that was more direct than anything he ever had the chance to do. Maybe it was because he knew Beidou and the rest of the crew are fond of him, even if the Captain is a dick that ruffles his hair and pats his back whenever he shows the most basic form of competence.
Assholes, all of them, but still he waits for Kazuha to gather his thoughts and start explaining.
“Since I left Inazuma,” he said weakly. “The storm has been following me. I hear it at night in my room, and during the day when I try to go out on the deck. Usually, it’s quiet enough out here at night, but this time… I don’t know why it followed me out here too.”
The Wanderer’s eyes darkened and the Gnosis felt like it was burning in his pocket. The thrashing rage of Electro was nothing to him, a vessel made to withstand its charge, but it must be hell to Kazuha, a man allegedly so in tune with the elements that he could smell the next day’s weather in the air.
“Show me your room.”
“What?” Kazuha asked, startled by the sudden question.
“You should sleep, and if the hallucinations follow you out here, it’s better to have them in bed than on deck where you might flail off into the ocean.”
“I see… Well thank you, but I can go back on my own.”
He moves to stand but the Wanderer holds firm on his arm. Kazuha only shakes his head before leading him down below deck to his room.
It’s right beside the Wanderer’s, of course.
He drops Kazuha off and when the door closes behind him the visions attack once more, until footsteps fade out from the hallway and he’s left breathless and panting in his bed.
The Wanderer returns to the deck, Gnosis in hand looking out onto the dark ocean.
“So fucking troublesome. I should just throw you in, shouldn’t I?”
There’s no response, as he expected, and so he puts the Gnosis away with a sigh.
For the rest of the voyage, no one can find the Wanderer except during the night, steering clear of the cabins with his hand resting on his pocket, watching the sea in silence.
And for the rest of the voyage, Kazuha’s mind remains clear and quiet.