Archive of Our Own

It was common for Tighnari to take on Withering Zones alone. Of course, the general rule for the Forest Rangers was that patrols in dangerous areas were a group effort, but Withering Zones were special in that they were extremely poisonous to anyone who could not wield an element to act as a steady purifier, and Vision-wielders were, naturally, in short supply. So, Tighnari usually handled these things on his own. He could shoot the dendrograna into the infected buds with practiced precision, fight off the corrupted monsters, destroy the tumor at the zone’s heart, and be on with his day.

Unfortunately for him, this particular zone was one of the more difficult ones. At the end of the fight, he felt weak from the corrosion and sore from the several bruises left to him courtesy of the corrupted assortment of overgrown fungi. Not that it was that big a deal; it just left him tempted to find a place to sit down for a bit before he headed back to Gandharva Ville.

That is, until, while still standing there where the tumor once was, he felt the rush of an arrow fly past his shoulder. And unfortunately, it wasn’t from a Hilichurl.

In the same instant Tighnari went on alert to find the arrow’s source, a whole group of people previously hidden in the forest showed themselves, coming in on him in what was clearly meant to be an ambush. Tighnari re-summoned his bow in a heartbeat, letting out a heartfelt groan as he did so. Why now? Really? He didn’t have time for this.

Tighnari was no stranger to dealing with human enemies in the Avidya Forest, as lovely as it would be if only sentient mushrooms were the worst of their problems. They had bands of Treasure Hoarders waiting to rob from travelers or cause some other form of havoc through their treasure-seeking activities, and they also had some rogue Eremite groups traveling about who had decided to see the people around here as their enemies. They had also, occasionally, Fatui agents who decided to show themselves around here as well. Dealing with all of these people had become just part of the job.

However, this group didn’t appear to be any of the above. Some of their fighting styles were reminiscent of the Treasure Hoarder archers and brawlers, but they had no uniform, although they definitely acted of one accord. Some independent bandit group, perhaps? Whatever they were, they were good enough at fighting that Tighnari couldn’t afford to stand around and play games with them.

Dodging attacks by fist, sword, and bow and firing at them back with controlled direction, Tighnari managed to corral the six people ambushing him into a loose group before throwing his Vijnana Stormheart at them, letting loose a thick cloud of dendro to confuse their sense of direction. Then, he made a run for it.

He could fight them better if he wasn’t out in the open like this. It was debatable whether he could actually make it all the way back to Gandharva Ville while avoiding them, as it would probably take him close to half an hour in his current state, but hopefully, he would run into one of the other rangers before that. Either way, he definitely needed to deal with these people quickly. If they were robbers, they may very well ambush someone else once—

Tighnari stopped short before going into the trees, ears twitching. Someone else was there.

“Not so fast, shrimp.” A large guy with a hammer stepped into the open with a smirk, as if his presence was a surprise. “How about you roll over and place nice for us like a good dog, alright?”

Oh, Tighnari was so going to uproot all of these people.

Hammer guy came after him swinging. Tighnari launched a Dendro-energy-charged shot at him, complete with homing arrows he wasn’t going to escape. He ran away from him, only to run straight into yet another new person, a brawler looking like he was about to come at him melee. Tighnari strung his bow…

…and heard the whish of a rope flying through the air behind him just a second too late. A coil sailed over his head and tightened around his torso—before he knew it, he had been lassoed like a newborn calf.

“I got him! Guys, I got him!”

Another lasso of rope came around him just an instant later from the other side. Tighnari fought against it and fought to come up with an idea in that split second that would get him out of this. Unfortunately for him, Dendro was a bad element for tearing through a rope. He needed to brute force a way to get them off balance. He grabbed onto one of the ropes with the small bit of free arm he had left, ready to yank it towards him, but the game was far, far from being on his side. His back felt the heavy crash of a hammer in that moment, sending him careening to the ground with an unfettered shockwave of pain. A heavy boot on his back followed it.

It was at this moment that Tighnari felt the heavy grip of panic on him, a sensation that was nowhere to be found at the beginning of this fight. He was forced to eat dirt while someone behind him took his hands and started tying them together. Tighnari struggled but couldn’t shape the weight of the boot keeping him down. That first group was a decoy, he realized. They still had more people hidden where he meant to run. Why didn’t I notice them? He mentally kicked himself for not being more on top of it, but those thoughts weren’t productive in the slightest. He needed to get out of this…

Someone struck a blow to the back of his head. Tighnari felt his vision blur along with a deep feeling of nausea. Someone was dragging him now.

“Hey, nut, bring him over here. Yeah, that rock. This’ll be good insurance in case the shrimp tries to run again.”

“Uh, what do you want?”

“No, lay him down, keep him still, drape one of his legs over that rock. Yep, that’s it!”

Three sets of hands forced him down and kept him in place, while Tighnari was forced to watch that blasted hammer make a swing at his left kneecap.

He felt himself scream before finally blacking out completely not that long after.

+++

Tighnari woke up to the obnoxiously blaring sensation of pain. He was awkwardly sitting up against some wooden wall, hands firmly tied behind his back. He heard the murmur of several voices going on about something; as he came to, he deduced that they were debating some plan, but he didn’t quite have the presence of mind to deduce what it was about. Something about “supply” and “extractors,” and maybe something about a deadline? Whatever it was, it was probably dumb.

Tighnari opened his eyes blearily, flicking his ears awake with it and taking just a moment to take in the surroundings and let the situation sink in. He was inside some large crudely built hut in some unknown location, sitting on a packed dirt floor with a few spots of moss to lighten the mood. His left leg was definitely broken at the kneecap, a badly-applied bloody wrap of bandages concealing it. There was a cord tied around his right ankle that was connected to a stake someone drove into the ground a meter-ish away. He had been stripped of his outerwear, leaving just the shirt he wore underneath and his torn and bloodstained sarouel, and of course, his Vision was gone. He was in the back of this room from the looks of it, with one, two, three… ten people up front, all of them recognizable from the attack from earlier.

The situation, in its vaguest sense, wasn’t a hard one to grasp. Tighnari had just been kidnapped by these people. In a weird way, he felt a bit of relief. If they went through all this trouble to drag him here, they probably didn’t want him dead. Or, at the very least, not dead yet. Their motives, however? He had no idea. He still didn’t know who they even were. Was there anyone else here, or was it just him? He thought back to the rumors, that the Treasure Hoarders were kidnapping people to sell to the Fatui as test subjects. Just the thought of it made his blood run cold, in no small part because it made him think of Collei. Tighnari had little love for the Fatui and the Treasure Hoarders alike before, but he certainly had no qualms with driving them away from his forest by all means necessary now. He knew far too much about the kind of things they did to people.

He wondered if that was what this was about. However, at risk of thinking too highly of himself, it seemed unlikely the more he thought about it. If all they needed was a warm body, they could have picked an easier target than himself. The “test subject” track record seemed to consist mostly of unarmed civilians and children. Unless, that is, this was an operation far more thorough and methodical than he gave it credit for and they were going to go after…

“…and then, we have to meet our runners and—oh! Hey guys, look! He’s awake!”

Oh joy, he’s been spotted. Took them long enough to notice.  

The woman who noticed him first stepped closer, emitting something between a laugh and a scoff as she crossed her arms and seemed to take pleasure in towering over him. “Well, well, if it isn’t the great ‘Master Tighnari.’ The king of the Forest Watchers himself. How’re ya settling in?”

“Oh, quite terribly, thank you!” Tighnari responded with his best and brightest “go eat shit” smile.

“Ha! I like him.” The woman laughed, and Tighnari took the moment to observe his captors a little more closely, as they all had their attention on him now. They were all wearing clothes one might expect of a common adventurer, complete with a rough and ragged appearance complete with a dirt stain or two. It wasn’t that unlike the appearance of a Treasure Hoarder, although he still didn’t believe they were quite one and the same. He did, however, realize that their appearances, in both apparel and apparent ethnicity, seemed to denote a variety of origins. If he were to guess, the person talking to him right now could very well be from Fontaine, actually. It was hard to tell with some, but it seemed that about half the group were Sumeran, and the other half were more likely from Liyue, Fontaine, and Mondstadt. So, an international operation? Or just some travelers who happened to make Sumeru their home for the time being?

Well, he guessed that he’ll figure out soon enough, especially since he had a hunch they were ready to talk.

“So, I’m guessing this is the part where you tell me what this’ll all about?” he ventured in a bored tone, fighting hard to ignore the still-blaring pain in his leg so that he could keep a good semblance of composure.

“Of course,” the maybe-Fontaine woman answered with a sneer. “You’re our special guest, after all. But first, introductions!” she announced with a strangely lighter tone. “I’m Knife. And this here is Nut, Bolt, Rock, Rubble, Spade, Shadow, Dagger, Shroom, and Toothpick,” she introduced everyone in that room one by one, pointing them out as she announced their names.

For a brief moment, Tighnari was at a loss for words. “Those are your names?” he questioned with a raised eyebrow.

Knife made a loud scoffing noise in return. “Well, it’s not like we’re telling you our real names.”

“So that’s what you came up with? ‘Nut’ and ‘Bolt’?”

“They’re brothers,” Knife supplied, to the nods of the aforementioned.

“Heh, so I guess ‘Rock’ and ‘Rubble’ are also brothers, right?” he jested, as chances were, they weren’t, at least not by blood. They looked nothing alike, and Rubble was twice Rock’s size, and at least twice his age, as well. Rubble might be the oldest one here, actually, and…oh no, he was hammer guy, wasn’t he? Ugh, he’ll be fun, for sure.

“Ha ha,” Knife scoffed dryly, shaking her head. “Poke fun all you want, Forest Watcher. All you want.”

“Ah, one second, while you’re explaining, let me see how this looks…” Nut approached Tighnari with his eyes on his leg, grimacing expressively at the sight. “Ooh, yeah, that looks bad.”

“Uh huh, no kidding,” Tighnari commented dryly in turn.

“Hmm, I think you did the bandages wrong,” Knife observed.

“Well, I’m sorry!” Nut blurted out with great offense. “Wasn’t I the one who was like, ‘you know, we probably should bring a healer,’ but all of you were like ‘no, why would we need that? If anyone needs help, you can do it!’ Well here I am! I’m trying! I used most of my salve on this guy, and we might still get gangrene, so yay me.”

“Yeah, speaking of, it still hurts where our little friend here shot me with dendro in the chest,” Toothpick complained. “Are you sure you don’t have something for me?”

“No! I don’t!’ Nut let out a long groan. “Ugh, Rubble, are you sure it was necessary to break his leg? It seems like a little much; it’s not like he’s going anywhere.”

Rubble rolled his eyes with an exhale. “Yes. It is. Call it insurance. In the state he’s in, he’s not going to be running that far. Still, don’t you dare let your guard down on him. We’re keeping him incapacitated every step of the way, you got it?”

“Yeah, speaking of…” Rock raised his hand hesitantly. “Should we get rid of his Vision? They can’t still like, call on its raw power and use it even if it’s away from them, right?”

“No way,” Spade countered, shaking her head. “We’re keeping it right here. I mean, don’t worry, it’s far enough that he’s not going to be able to use it or anything. But if a Vision wielder disconnects from their Vision, it does whack things to their brain, and we need his brain. That’s kind of the entire idea. Look, I don’t know how it works exactly, but I know this was like, a whole thing in Inazuma back when they were doing the Vision Hunt Decree. So, I’m not chancing it.”

His brain, huh? Tighnari’s ears perked up at that part, wondering what she meant by it. What did he know that they could possibly…?

“Alright, anyways!” Knife clapped her hands. “We’re wasting daylight. Let me explain it to him. So!” She looked down into his eyes with a malicious gleam in her own. “We have a little project, you see? And we need you to do it. Exciting, right? So, there’s a plant around here called the shekava root. I’m sure you’re familiar with it, yes? It’s a low-lying crawler vine, and a skin irritant for most people. But did you know that, if you extract the sap from the leaves, you get a paralysis poison? Crazy, I know. And here’s where you come in. You’re going to help us make some, with all that precious plant knowledge of yours.”

Tighnari blinked a few times, floored in a special way that had nothing to do with his lingering lightheadedness. Finally, he found his voice. “Excuse me?”

“Ha, as if you’re in any position to be making demands—”

“No, please, kindly, tell me your demands,” he invited. “Tell me what in Teyvat has possessed you to think that—”

“What she means is that we already tried and failed,” Spade explained dryly, earning her a glare from Knife. “We already accepted an order from our client, and we need to deliver. You’re going to help us deliver.”

Tighnari took in a deep breath, fighting a grimace as he did so. Looks like he finally knew what this is all about. He should probably be relieved, if he wasn’t so distracted by the sheer absurdity present. “So you mean to tell me,” he started, “that because you couldn’t get your special poison drug to work for you, which, from what I gather, is an idea that you came up with, you decide to kidnap an entire person to make it work? You couldn’t just find a book, or get your hands on some knowledge capsule to help you? You couldn’t talk to this client of yours?”

“Hey! Don’t get smart with us,” Knife warned. “We have our reasons.”

“It’s two birds with one stone, in fact,” Bolt added on, tapping a finger to his forehead because apparently, the gesture made him feel smarter. “Obviously, doing work in this forest is pretty hazardous with you rangers to dodge. But, take out the head, and there goes the body. We eliminate a threat, and we get one more great mind on our side.”

If he thought that this was supposed to count as flattery, he was failing. “You seriously think that the Forest Rangers would be useless without me?”

“Yeah, pretty much.” He shrugged.

Well, he was wrong, and Tighnari was so tempted to argue about it further, but he stayed his tongue. If these guys assumed that the others weren’t threats, then that meant they were safe. The last thing he wanted was for them to target someone else. Still, the chance of them crossing paths was probably high…Tighnari was both hopeful and deathly apprehensive at the thought that soon, they would notice he was missing and start searching for him. The forest was a dense and expansive place, so it would likely be very difficult, but he had faith that they would figure it out, if they didn’t get the wrong idea from whatever scene they found and derail themselves with searching for his dead body in the river instead.

He just hoped, if they ever got here, that they would be careful about it, and not split themselves up or get fight-happy or anything like that. He silently willed intelligence and self-preservation into each and every one of them.

“Fine then,” Tighnari conceded with gritted teeth, “but tell me, what makes you think that my knowledge is in any way supposed to be helpful to you? In case you haven’t noticed, making drugs and poisons is not part of my job description.”

“Yes, but your knowledge as Akademiya scum might be a little more on brand, wouldn’t it?” Rubble countered with a knowing smirk. “Look, shrimp, the choice is simple: you help us, or I crack open your other knee. Believe me, I’m sure you can figure it out. Are we clear?”

Tighnari would so, so love to punch this guy in the chin. “Crystal.”

+++

The room they dragged him too had no windows. However, although the location was still unknown, Tighnari could gather a few ideas. The air smelled and tasted cool and damp, with a particular crispness that told him they were most likely underground. Unfortunately, in the Avidya Forest, that narrowed it down very little. He heard no running water around, which helped narrow it down a little more, but still, it would take a few more clues to place himself.

They brought him to a makeshift lab of sorts, nearly replacing that scent of the underground with the sharp tang of potent solutions exposed to the open air. He got a little more information; apparently, the client was the one who gave the initial instructions. They were to extract the sap and perform a distillation with it while it was still fresh—the freshness was very important, hence why they absolutely needed their base to be in the forest to do it. Of course, they could’ve taken seeds and grown the plants elsewhere, and he told them as much, but no, that would be too much trouble, apparently.

It went without saying that Tighnari felt quite uncomfortable with the notion of helping with this “project” of theirs, his thoughts drifting to this mysterious client and wondering what they were going to do with this and what people would be hurt by it, but as of now, he didn’t have much of a choice. Besides, that accursed “Akademiya” side of him was indeed physically pained at the chaotic nature of their experimental process and felt the innate need to fix it for them. And so, he did.

“You’re going at it too quickly,” Tighnari admonished, stopping Nut in his tracks. “Add your reagent one drop at a time. You have to stop as soon as the color changes, or else, you oversaturate the solution, and that is simply not going to give you the same result.”

“Ugh, I guess,” Nut groaned. “But I can never control it right, and it just takes so long…”

Tighnari exhaled a heavy sigh, crossing his arms. “Just, let me show you, alright?”

Fortunately for him, they let Tighnari have his hands free for this. They just hobbled his feet, as if being forced to move on his left leg, though granted a badly made splint courtesy of Doctor Nut, wasn’t difficult enough. For good measure, Toothpick was sitting in the corner with a crossbow aimed at his head.

Tighnari wondered if he might be able to push his luck enough to give Nut advice on how to actually do first aid. The kid at least seemed to be receptive enough. He was even taking notes right now.

Tighnari could, however, do without Shadow hanging close over his shoulder, scrutinizing his every move. “Do you mind?” he finally asked.

“Hmph.” She departed from her perch, just to come back and stare him hard in the eye. “Nut’s right about this being slow. It’s too slow. You’re trying to delay us, aren’t you? Don’t you remember? We have a deadline.”

“Oh, really? Far be it from me to fail to take into account your poor planning skills. Seriously, are you so desperate for time that you can’t do a proper lab procedure? Did you study on this process beforehand at all?”

Perhaps he shouldn’t have been so surprised when instead of answering, she reached over and hit him hard across the face, very effectively causing him to drop the glass elements he was holding and send them shattering across the table.

“Watch your tongue, Forest Watcher,” she scoffed, turning away to leave the room. “I don’t have time for you. Just do your job. And clean that up.”

Well, it was their fault. And their loss, too. Tighnari didn’t know why he bothered.

+++

Being inside, and underground, no less, Tighnari had little sense of the day/night cycle. Still, his exhaustion told him it was getting late, although perhaps with the state his body was in, it was hard to tell. He just guessed it was the middle of the night now, while he was stuck here watching a toxin distill.

And maybe chatting too, apparently.

“And that was it,” Spade concluded with a shrug. “He jumped straight over the waterfall, yelling some kind of victory screech as he went down. Of course, I had to be the one to fish him out and drag his sorry ass to the Birmastan after that.” She sighed loudly in a way that turned into a yawn, leaning back against the chair. “So what about you, Tighnari? I’m curious. Have you ever had travelers in the forest jump over waterfalls on you? Like, not by accident, but just for the fun of it?”

He didn’t, but just the thought of the possibility brought a deep groan into his innermost being. “You know, out of all the stupid things I’ve seen people do, that one I have not seen, actually.”

“Sounds like something Slippery Wu would come up as a test,” Nut mused. “He did that sometimes, make a test to see if you have what it takes to join the Treasure Hoarders? Did that for me, and it was not fun. But then, it wasn’t quite as potentially lethal as the waterfall idea, so…yeah, I’ll count my blessings.”

Tighnari, at present, was accompanied by Spade and Nut, who seemed tired as well but were apparently tasked with watching the toxin as well as watching him. Toothpick was still on crossbow duty, but he seemed like he might be sound asleep already. So, now that he thought about it, it probably was nighttime, after all. The lack of sounds from the other room and the outside told him that at least some of the others might be asleep. It briefly crossed his mind that now might be a good time to make a move, but he highly doubted that he was up to the task. Again, like his dear old friend Rubble told them, he wasn’t going to be running anywhere anytime soon.

Spade and Nut had been just chatting for a while, surprising casual about including him in on it. He somehow already gathered a lot of their backstories in the process: Spade was working as a smuggler independently before this, and Nut and Bolt were former Treasure Hoarders. This little team was put together about a year ago, and they had experience through other jobs before this one, including a horse-stealing operation and an ill-fated collusion with a con artist trying to sell literal water as an Eleazar cure. So yeah, they were the “experts,” alright.

“Oh yeah!” Spade’s eyes lighted up in recognition. “Wasn’t that the time when—?”

“No, no, I don’t want to talk about it!” Nut cut her off quickly. “Not in front of Tighnari!”

“In front of me?” Tighnari raised an eyebrow, suspicious. “What did they…?”

“Eh, don’t worry about it, gramps,” Spade dismissed with a shrug and a smile. “It’s all in the past now, right?”

Gramps? Tighnari blinked his eyes a little in shock. That was a new one. He was not that old. Although, from the looks of them, he would guess that Spade and Nut both were barely older than teenagers, if that.

“That’s right,” Nut agreed. “We were only there for a few years, anyways.” He paused a moment and then smiled at some unknown thought. “Heh, at least I’m old enough to take them in a fight now. This talk of waterfalls is bringing up the very unfortunate memory of that time Slippery Wu stuffed me in a barrel to ‘hide’ me and then forgot. Wouldn’t mind crossing paths again just so I can take him in a spar to get him back for that.”

“Pfffft, a barrel?” Spade repressed a laugh. “You haven’t told me about that one. How big was it?”

“Not that big, unfortunately.” He visibly shuddered. “But then again, I was really small at the time. It was well before my growth spurt, so I was a bit of a shrimp then. It’s no wonder I got knocked around a little, really.”

“Hold on,” Tighnari spoke up again, suspicions returning in full force. Before his growth spurt… “How old were you when you joined?”

“The Treasure Hoarders? I was twelve, why?”

“Twelve!?” Tighnari echoed in shock despite it being, unfortunately, not all that shocking. “Whatever possessed you to do that?”

“Hey!” Nut countered, defensive. “I wasn’t that young. Besides, I had my brother with me. He’s four years older, by the way. He was there to look out for me, so it was fine. And besides, like Spade said, it doesn’t matter, because we aren’t there anymore.”

Dear archons, he really was a child. “Yeah, you left one circus act for another,” Tighnari commented dryly, unable to further articulate anything else.

“Ha!” Spade retorted as if the notion was quite amusing. “You say that, but I’ll have you know, we are a well-oiled machine. I mean, we did a great job catching you, right? Sure, we were a bit unsure of if it would work—morale was a little down after we got hit up with failure again so soon after the con artist incident (good riddance, I never liked him anyways), but, all we really needed was a good plan, and it worked. Targeting you specifically was Rubble’s idea, but the Withering Zone thing was mine, actually,” she pointed out with pride. “I noticed it coming in, and I knew that would be an excellent time to catch you both alone and at your weakest, if someone else didn’t get to it first. We staked the area out, and the chance paid off. So, sorry for your loss, but hey, it’s just business. Don’t worry though; we’ll let you go once we’re done. We’ll even let you have the Vision back. Far be it from us to offend the gods by getting rid of it or selling the thing, right?”

Tighnari sighed deeply, feeling oh so tired. And in pain. “Wouldn’t want to do that,” he droned.

“Exactly. So anyways,” she started with another yawn, “what about you? Your team? What are they like?”

“My team?” Tighnari echoed in confusion.

“She means the Forest Rangers,” Nut supplied.

“Heh,” Tighnari laughed dryly. “You really expect me to just tell you all about them? If that was meant to be a trap, it’s far too obvious.”

“What? No.” Spade sounded offended. “I’m not asking for weaknesses; why would I need that? I just mean your stories, that’s all.”

“A…story.”

“Yep. We told you our stories; I’d like to hear some of yours. If you’re up for it, anyways. Don’t worry; once this batch is done, we’ll call it a night and let you sleep.”

Tighnari let out a loud sigh. “Fine.” He guessed he had a good share of innocuous ones to tell. “How about…there was one time that a Hydroshroom stole a whole slab of meat from our chef,” he reminisced, finding himself smiling at the memory in spite of himself. “Right under his nose. Not exactly common, but the fun part was that we had a visitor from the city that day. A visitor for me, specifically. And not a welcome one; he was stuck up beyond comprehension. But while I was stuck in that meeting, presumably about to have a very unpleasant dinner with this person soon, our Trainee Ranger burst into the room in panic and told me that the shroom had made off with dinner and was now being chased by Amir and Iraj inside the camp…”

+++

“Whelp, there’s good news and bad news,” Shroom announced the next morning, to that common room full of his nine teammates plus one Tighnari shoved back into his original location in the corner on the back wall. Or rather, the storage room—Tighnari observed that there were crates stacked up against the wall now.

Before Shroom showed up to give the report, Tighnari spent the morning hearing the repeated distinctive squeals of shroom boars in pain outside. His guess was that they were the test subjects. He was unfortunately also compelled to wonder if that was where “Shroom” got his code name from.

“Good news: two of the batches worked. The boars with those samples are still awake, stable, and fully paralyzed as we speak. Bad news: the other ten batches we made are duds. Just, little to zero potency. They’re no good; we’ll have to start over.”

The words sparked a wave of discontented, grumbled noises across the room. “You’re serious,” Shadow groaned, making a pointed glance backwards at Tighnari as this was surely all his fault. “So we finally get this guy to make it work for us, and most of what we end up with is still a waste?”

“Sounds like it could have been on purpose,” Bolt grumbled under his breath as if everyone couldn’t clearly hear it.

Knife just broke into a short laugh. “Well, Forest Watcher, anything to say to that?”

Oh archons, why. “I did nothing to change your process. All I did was implement your little formula correctly. However, if you really want to know what I think, it’s obvious that you have nothing to stabilize the reaction. Doing it like this, it’s no wonder that you will have a high rate of failure. So, amend your formula.” Assuming that someone here knows half a brain cell’s worth about chemistry, that is.

“Alright.” Rock nodded. “Guess we’ll just have to get Tighnari started doing just that.”

Oh, right. He was the one supposed to make the chemistry work.

“We need to be more prudent with our resources, however,” Shroom cautioned. “We’re running out of plants. We’ll need to move locations soon, but until then, let’s stop making large batches until we have a process that works.”

“Fine, agreed,” Shadow agreed. “But speaking of—Dagger, you were out scouting last night. Find anything?”

“Ha! About that,” Dagger started with a bitter smile. “We got company. The rangers took less time than I expected—they’re out searching for him, full force. Plus, we neglected the obvious: they have a Vision wielder who can use elemental sight. The trail from Tighnari’s Vision was almost a dead giveaway. I had to go pick up every possible source of Dendro I could find and spend all night confusing the trail as much as I possibly could. And, it was a success, so, you’re welcome.”

“Good call,” Shadow commended. “But yeah, that’s an issue. We should start posting lookouts around our perimeter. If they show up, we have to make a choice to fight them or scram, depending on how many. Still, I think we’ll be fine. There aren’t that many rangers, really, so they’ll likely be spread thin.”

“I second that plan,” Rubble spoke up, followed by some raised hands and noises of the affirmative from the others. “Now, that established, we have to get this right as quickly as possible, and I am sure our resident Akademiya scum can figure it out. You,” he addressed Tighnari with a pointed glare, “will get to do tests to your little heart’s content until you can produce the toxin as it is supposed to be, consistently. All of us will take turns on watch duty. Keep him working, and get him whatever he needs. That man better not be sleeping a wink until this is figured out and we can move on. Any questions?”

+++

Tighnari was put to work just as promised. He got a seat in the lab and was delivered samples of the sap, which he was supposed to turn into a potent toxin that won’t break down after five minutes in its vial. For all that some of them might like to accuse him of stalling them on purpose, he really did find himself wishing that he could figure this out quickly, just so he could be done with it. He was exhausted, and the smell of the solution was giving him a migraine, although that might also just be the blood loss at work. Or some mixture of all of the above. He did end up vomiting once, while under Rock’s watch. It was almost worth it for the vicious pleasure of watching Rock squirm in horror and look like he might just throw up himself, until he got his voice back enough to order Tighnari to clean it up.

Some people kept their vigil over him in silence and broke it just to critique his work as if they actually knew what they were talking about, while others made some attempt at casual conversation. None of them let him outside at all. He was supposed to relieve himself in a jar…while still under watch, which just added a crowning layer of humiliation to everything demeaning about this situation already.

Tighnari kept attempting to think of ways to escape. The lab he was given at his disposal was a tempting tool. He could take hold of one of the burners used for the distillation and use the flames on the ropes around his feet to burn them off; he could use the same as a weapon against whoever was watching him, or let them have a taste of the very toxin he was mixing. They didn’t keep the door locked; he could easily break through and get out.

But that was all he could do. He knew there was always going to be at least a few of the others nearby. The alarm would be raised, and they would catch him, because he couldn’t run. That made this especially infuriating—despite being idiots, they were still brutally efficient. They broke his leg. They never left him alone. They were good fighters. If he couldn’t take them before, how in hell did he expect to take them now?

Maybe the only thing he had was that they didn’t bother to avoid talking about their plans around him. Or their reports. He knew, now, that the Rangers were looking for him. Again, that thought didn’t come without some dread. This group knew they were looking, and so now, they would be watching them in turn. Waiting to see if they manage to get close. Possibly attacking them if they do. And he couldn’t be sure that they would be quite as interested in keeping them alive…

No, Tighnari had to get out of this first, before any altercation went down. He couldn’t risk waiting for a rescue. He just didn’t know how. If he tried to escape but failed, they would just constrain him further. He had to wonder if, as idiotic as this sounded in his own head, his focus really should be on finishing their job for them. He wondered if he could trust what Spade said about just letting him go once this was over. It almost sounded reasonable from their perspective, but it was all suspiciously too good to be true. She might truly believe that, and so might her friend Nut, but some of the others? Not so much. Would Rubble really let him free? That man baffled Tighnari the most, actually—every look he gave him was a glare filled with hate, it seemed, as if Tighnari were the fiend of fiends. It was almost made him wonder if he met the guy before, but he couldn’t recall. Granted, he drove out a lot of ruffians in this forest in the past, more than he would ever remember, and Rubble did appear to probably be Sumeran, so it was possible, maybe.

These thoughts kept cycling through his head as he went as this hour after hour, until finally, he had a string of results that they liked, drilling into their skulls the ways of the scientific method in the process. They were quite excited, and started work on every bit of sap they had left, which wasn’t much before their supply was gone. Tighnari, as much as it pained him to think this way, felt immense relief. He was exhausted, so much so he could barely kept his head up and his thoughts straight. He was glad that they were finally finished with him for the moment being, although, he realized, that also meant that whatever chances of escape he had before were about to close up fast. He failed to take the moment while he had it, if he had it. Because now, it was back to tying his hands behind his back and shoving him into the other room.

Being here, he had too much time to stare at his left knee, which was now swollen and green, much to both his consternation as well as Nut’s. So, Tighnari just instructed him on how to make and apply a cold compress. He might as well. Surprisingly enough, the kid listened.

+++

“It’s functioning,” Shroom told them all, to everyone’s (except for Tighnari’s, of course) visible relief. Shroom laughed. “Looks like our Forest Watcher friend actually came through! But of course, we still have to get a move on to our next location. Dagger?”

“Yes, we got a spot,” Dagger affirmed. “Have a route too, that would be best for avoiding the rangers. I’ll tell you the rest outside while our captive’s not present, obviously.”

“Yeah, we just need to build another lab,” Spade added. “It’ll take a minute, but we can make it happen. And I can meet our runner in the meantime with the news. Tell them that those boars won’t know what hit them!” she jested with a grin.

“Mm, about that,” Dagger spoke up, with an expression that said he might not be jesting in the slightest. “I’m wondering if Shroom’s tests would be good enough for them. Testing on animals is fine for a start, but they aren’t the intended target. If we really want this client to take us seriously, we need to try it on a human.”

“What?” Spade questioned incredulously. “Who’s going to volunteer for that?”

“Ugh, I’m not asking for volunteers!” Dagger retorted. “Get with the picture already—this stuff lasts up to twenty-four hours. We all need to be functioning, and unfortunately, we still need Tighnari functioning, too. So we need to kidnap another human.”

What!?

“Again?” Knife questioned. “From where?”

“Well, if you ask me,” Shadow spoke up, “Vimarya Village might be our best shot. The rangers are busy; we can use that to our advantage. Snatching someone from the outskirts shouldn’t be that hard.”

“Agreed, but honestly, it might not be necessary to drag them all the way back here, right?” Rock supplied. “We just need to set up an ambush, attack a few people with this stuff, and then see what happens.”

“Good point,” Toothpick agreed. “But still, we might need more proof. Maybe we could—”

“Are you serious!?”

The moment Tighnari spoke up, the room went silent, every hostile eye resting squarely on him. Tighnari didn’t care. He glared at them back, and he said his piece. “Do you hear yourselves? You’re just going to walk in and paralyze a few civilians? And for what? To prove that you could? To brag to your special client that you’re oh so talented at taking out a few unarmed bystanders? You—urnnk!”

Not long after he started talking, Rubble started marching towards him with a seething glare. Now, he grabbed Tighnari by the collar of his shirt and pulled him upright by it, now slamming his back against the wall. Tighnari felt the wind get taken out of him in the act, but it wasn’t going to stop him from keeping eye contact with the man. It wasn’t going to stop him from talking, either. Yeah, it wasn’t like they were going to listen to him, but he just didn’t care. He didn’t care what they did to him. He didn’t care how they abused him. He wasn’t cowering. Not now, not ever.

“Yeah…look me in the eye,” he challenged breathlessly to Rubble’s face. “Look me in the eye and just try to tell me you have the high ground. You all really like to string one terrible idea after another, don’t you? Unfortunately, no matter how much of this damn toxin I make for you, there is nothing I can do to make you grow a brain.”

“Heh, you would think that, wouldn’t you? Akademiya scum?” Rubble told him with a twisted smile. “Only scum like you would think you could get away with that.”

Rubble dropped him to the ground without another word, sending Tighnari collapsing to his knees. He then stomped down on his shoulders to make him fall to his side. Then, he kicked him.

Tighnari winced against the pain and barely got a chance to catch his breath before he was kicked again, harder, sending him rolling across the floor to the point that the rope around his ankles strained against the limited range granted to it by that stake. He was stomped on again, and then, with a blurry glance upward, he saw that Rubble had his hammer in hand, raised above his head…

“STOP!” Nut blurted out, hastily getting between the two of them. “What the hell are you doing!? Are you trying to kill him!?”

“I’m teaching the dog a lesson,” Rubble said in a cold tone. “Don’t worry; I’m sure you can put him back together again.”

“No! No, I can’t! This is pointless! Aren’t we supposed to keep him in one piece? Isn’t that the plan?”

“Hmph, we’re almost finished with him, aren’t we? Does it matter if he’s in pieces when we’re done?”

“Okay, hold on, that’s not the plan, either!” Spade protested. “Nut’s right; this is pointless. The plan was that we get him to help us, and then we leave him. He can have his forest back, and we take off, deliver the toxin, get our money, and move on to Mondstadt. That’s all we have to do. So what if he has a mouth on him? It’s not like that’s weird for him or anything. Gag him if it bothers you so much.”

“Hm, you see, that’s the problem,” Rubble mused, pointing his hammer at Spade as he did so.

“What is?”

“Letting him go. He’s bound to be a problem in the future, you know that, right? You really think he’ll let us go on our way? No, we can do better than that. I say we sell him to the Fatui.”

The room went quiet, just as Tighnari felt his heart stop cold at the words. The room erupted into murmurs just as quickly.

“Wait…what!?” Spade questioned with what sounded to be pure incredulity. “Since when did you have that in mind?”

“I have contacts who work for Il Dottore,” he explained in a plain tone. “They need test subjects, and I see no reason why the deal they extended to the Treasure Hoarders can’t apply to us, as well. I’m sure we can get a good price.”

“But…but the Fatui? We can’t just—”

“Calm down, we’ll put it to a vote. All in favor of selling him off as a test subject after we’re done with him?” There was a moment of silence. “Hm, only six? Fine. Majority rules. It’s settled.”

Rubble started to walk away, his footsteps loud and heavy. “Oh, and by the way, I’m against the idea of trying to find a human test subject for the paralysis. It’s not like our client is going to take our word for it anyways, and it’s too risky. We already have the Rangers on our tail; if we cause a scene, we could have the Corps of Thirty after us as well. And we wouldn’t have time for that, would we?”

+++

They left Tighnari tied up in that room, while they prepared this second location of theirs. Once again, they took turns staying in there with him, watching him. And as it so happened, it was Rubble who had the first shift.

Tighnari felt numb. It didn’t help that his head kept ringing and he felt so intensely bleary with nausea again. It was hard to think. But then, he also didn’t exactly want to.

He knew something like this could happen. The announcement of his fate wasn’t exactly a shock, despite whatever he was told before. Still, he felt cold with the uncertainty of not knowing how he was going to get out of this.

However, he had the chance now to distract himself from that feeling with another one: bitter curiosity. Now was a good time to resolve it.

“What is your problem with me?” Tighnari broke into the silence without any prior warning to ask Rubble the question. “I know, most of you aren’t trying to be friendly, sure, but you specifically have something against me. What is it?”

Rubble angled his eyes over Tighnari’s way, letting out a scoffing huff as he did so. “Well, took you long enough to catch on. What do you think? Maybe I’m just not a fan of Forest Rangers, hm?”

“No, that’s not what you call me. Everyone else calls me ‘Forest Watcher,’ but not you. To you, I’m ‘Akademiya scum.’ Why is that? You do realize I’m not affiliated with them anymore, right?”

“Pfft, you wish,” he scoffed. “Once scum, always scum. You’re all the same. You feed people lies and bask in your own self-righteousness. You decide what people can and cannot do, or what they can and cannot know. You’re tyrants, and no one even suspects a damned thing. So yes, I have something against the Akademiya. You got it.”

So…was that it? Tighnari wondered as much; he just suspected something a little more. But that? Well, the worst part about this spiel was that Tighnari couldn’t refute it, because he…agreed? Kind of? He had little love left for the Akademiya. He wouldn’t deny that, but in the present circumstances, it felt wrong just to be even vaguely on the same side as him.

“There’s better targets, you know,” Tighnari finally said in a quieter voice, breathing out a heavy exhale. “Better ways to get back at them, too.”

“Oh, I know. I was in the business of smuggling knowledge capsules for years. It was immensely satisfying. Hmph, might even still be doing it, too, if that Dori brat hadn’t blacklisted me. Said I was too ‘volatile’ and ‘bad for business,’ like I was going to caught or something. Ridiculous.”

Well, she wasn’t wrong.

“And I also know,” Rubble said with a sharp look back at him, “That there are plenty of people I could hate more than I hate you. But that doesn’t change the fact that you are one of the scum who played a personal part in killing my daughter.”

His…what!? Tighnari felt floored. That was entirely not what he was expecting. “What are you…!?”

“She was a student there,” Rubble explained, his tone and his aura as tense as a cord. “A fellow student of yours, to be exact. That is, until she lost her mind.” He laughed bitterly, shaking his head. “She had gotten so far; she was excited to go into Satyavada Life. And then, it killed her. She went mad connecting to Irminsul, or whatever it is they’re doing really. Kept speaking jargon, no sense of space, couldn’t put two thoughts together. She’s technically still alive, by the way, but she might as well not be. She isn’t there anymore. And you know what they told me!? They said it was the ‘price of knowledge’ and some other bullshit like that. They said that she was ‘brave’ and that it was ‘truly a tragedy.’ I couldn’t stand even the look of those so-called professors after five minutes of that. And where are they now? Just going about their way, telling more lies. It’s been years, and my daughter is still broken. They shipped her off to Aaru Village, and that was the last I saw of her.”

So…so this was it. This… “What was her name?”

“Farhana. Although I doubt you remember.”

Farhana… Yeah, that name was familiar. Wasn’t she…?

“She looked up to you. She almost quit, you know. She was stressed by the workload. Then she got in on your little tutoring club. She showed me that damn picture she took with you and told me that she had her confidence back. She said she wouldn’t let me down. You encouraged her, and then, look what happened.”

Farhana was from the Rtawahist Darshan, someone who might not have crossed paths much with Tighnari in the Amurta if it wasn’t for her needing thermodynamics help. He never knew what happened to her. He wouldn’t have known. He did know that it wasn’t uncommon. For all the many, many people who strived to get into Satyavada Life, the fact remained that a large number of the people in it did not make it through.

“I’m…”

“Save it,” Rubble cut him off. “Now you know, okay? Now you know why, no matter how much pain I can make you feel, it isn’t going to be enough. Hmph, but I guess I won’t have to. The Fatui will do the job better than I can. Oh, I hope you don’t die quickly. I hope you last for a long time.” He paused, his expression morphing into some kind of twisted satisfaction. “Maybe even as long as that Eleazar-ridden brat you took in.”

Tighnari’s heart stopped. Collei. “How did you—!?”

“I have contacts who work with Il Dottore, remember? Ten guesses as to what projects they were working on a few years ago. So believe me, I know about the one who got away. It’s a shame, really. She could have been a nice weapon. Now she’s just going to die of Eleazar as pitifully as everyone else—”

“Stop,” Tighnari cut him off, seething. “Don’t you dare talk about her like that. I’ll—”

“Do what?” Rubble mocked. “Talk me to death again? Oh, carry on, I’m all ears.”

“I don’t know what relation you have with the Fatui, but listen to me—Collei doesn’t belong to them. She never has, and she never will.”

Tighnari went silent, then. He had nothing more to say.

“Master Tighnari—!”

“Please don’t call me that.”

“Ah, yeah! Got it! Well, I don’t know if you’re busy, but I got this friend, Farhana, from the Rtawahist school, and…”

“Please, can you help, please!?” she burst into the scene around her friend, book clutched tightly in front of her chest as if she were about to squash it into an accordion with her own two bare hands. “I’ll pay you—wait, no! I’m sorry. I know that’s illegal. But like, I could…”

Tighnari let out a heavy sigh. They were multiplying, weren’t they? “You don’t have to do anything for me; just, let me see what you have…”

“I’m so tired…” Farhana groaned, faceplanting into the desk. “I don’t want to do this anymore.”

“Well, you do need actual sleep before your thermodynamics test tomorrow. If you want to call it early…”

“No, wait! Just…just a little longer. I got this. I promise.”

“Ha, take that! Physics, thy name shall scare me no longer! You are but a stepping stone in my path!” Farhana exulted, her test papers raised high in the air.

“Um, good for you?”

Farhana laughed. “Ha! No, really, thanks Tighnari. To be honest, I was seriously thinking about quitting before this. Being a part of your study group has really helped me remember why I wanted to get into the Akademiya in the first place. So, thank you. For everything.”

“TIGHNARI!” Farhana burst into the room. “Rasheed told me you got a Vision!? Is it true? Can I see?”

“What? Oh, that. Yeah, it’s right here; I put it on my belt.”

“Woowww, that’s amazing! You have to tell me what happened!”

“Eh, it’s not that dramatic of a story, really?” Tighnari shrugged. “It kind of just happened. Honestly, I’m surprised I got a Vision for it, but I guess what I did must have made some god happy?”

“Well, tell me anyways!”

“Hey, Tighnari! Remember me? I just wanted to tell you—I got into Satyavada life! I’m still pinching myself over it; I can’t believe I was actually accepted! I know it’s a long journey from here, but I’m ready. I’ll finally make my parents proud!”

“Heh, really? Well, good for you. Just remember to take care of yourself out there.”

“Of course! I promise!”

Sorry, Farhana, Tighnari thought, his chest feeling as if it was full of stones. I’m sorry.

+++

“Won’t be long now,” Shadow told him with smugness after taking over for Rubble on watch duty. “Hang on tight, and soon, you’ll get to witness the final phase, dog boy.”

“I have to be on watch again?” Toothpick groaned as he stepped in with his crossbow. “I’d rather scout for worms; this is boring.”

“We need to keep patrolling our route,” Dagger told someone outside, where he likely didn’t think Tighnari could hear. “I don’t trust those rangers to not be lurking somewhere, watching. We need to keep away from them as much as possible.”

“Shroom, what do you mean you want to take the boars with you?” Rock spoke with incredulity. “How will we haul them all the way over there?”

“Well, I don’t want to catch more of them, soo…”

“Bolt, how could you vote ‘yes’!? I just—I didn’t think we would be doing that!”

“Nut, listen to yourself. You playing ‘medic’ has gotten you too attached. Don’t think for a moment that Tighnari wouldn’t kill you in a heartbeat if it meant getting a chance to escape. This is just the way it works. Rubble’s right; getting rid of him is better insurance for us than letting him go. And don’t forget that we’ll both get a cut of the profit, too.”

“Argh, these Forest Rangers! I hate them!”

“Whoa, Knife, what happened!? You’re all wet…”

“Hmph, I was watching them, and the quiet one, like, caught my scent or something. I swear she couldn’t have seen me. She just knew where I was and made a beeline. That one is creepy as hell, I tell you. I almost wasn’t able to shake them, and yes, that is the reason why I took a swim.”

“Call me crazy, but I think I saw a ghost. Or…ghosts. Like, tiny eyes watching me. No, I’m not high!”

“I think we’re making good progress, actually.” Shadow sounded satisfied with herself. “Heh, and also, don’t worry about the rangers too much. I just got finished making a deal with one of those Eremite bands that have been hanging around here to go attack them and buy us some time. Yeah, it’s a cut out of our profits, but it’ll be fine. Anything to distract them from their beloved Forest Watcher, right?”

“Hey…so, how’re you holding up?”

Tighnari looked up with tired eyes, turning to face the new person on watch duty, Spade. She was speaking a little more quietly than usual, her face seemingly intent just on staring at the other wall.

“What do you think?” Tighnari responded dryly, in too much pain to come up with anything else.

“Yeah, yeah, I get it. It’s bad. I know.”

There was a weighty pause after that, and Tighnari could have just kept silent, but… “What about you?”

“What—huh!?” Spade stuttered, shaking her head as she was quickly brought back to life. “What do you mean, me? Why should that matter to you?”

“Just wondering.” Tighnari shrugged.

“Well…well fine, thank you. I’m doing fine. The mission is practically in the bag. Everything worked. I’m fine. We’ll finish up, make our profit, and move on. It’s not like I actually care about anything else.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“What!? Don’t mm-hmm me! This is your fault! I mean, if you hadn’t made a scene back there, Rubble might never have brought that idea up, and everything would have happened according to plan. You wouldn’t…” She shook her head, turning away from him again. “Look, I’m just…don’t worry about me. You should be taking this time to worry about yourself, gramps. I just don’t like it when things get out of hand like this. Like I don’t even know what’s going on anymore.”

“Hmm, so I’m guessing your ‘plans’ have derailed before? If you can call them that, of course.”

“Hey, look! I’m not as dumb as you think I am, okay!?”

“No, I never said that.”

“Wait, what?”

Tighnari exhaled a deep sigh. “What I mean is, yes, the schemes of your team are absolutely harebrained and idiotic, and you are feeding yourself a fantastical delusion to think that you have everything as ‘under control’ as you say. But I did not say that you are dumb. Only that your choices are. You’re capable, and frankly, you can do better.”

“Mmmm…” She eyes him suspiciously. “You’re not saying that to try to get me to help you, are you? I’m not a traitor.”

“No, I’m not.” He wouldn’t dare give himself hope by entertaining the thought. “I’m just wondering: why are you here? I do remember you mentioning being independent before.”

“Eh, I got bored.” She shrugged. “I was on my own for a while, but I knew some of the guys here and got convinced to give it a shot. A gang looks out for each other, which is more than you’ll get navigating alone.”

“Alright, understandable, and how is it working for you now?”

“Uh, I don’t know. It’s complicated. I’m…wary, that’s all. I used to do work in Inazuma, you know. I made a good profit smuggling supplies into Watatsumi Island. But…then the Fatui showed up and got involved and, well, I laid low. I didn’t trust them.” She looked away, staring back into the wall. “You know, I kind of liked those days, actually. It was dangerous, and I was honestly only in it for the money, but I had…purpose, I guess. Those goods helped people.” She made a loud scoffing sound, shaking her head. “So, what do you think, gramps? Am I just ‘better off alone’?”

“Not necessarily,” Tighnari told her. “Yes, you’re better off alone if the alternative is working with people who’ll drag you down with them. But…it’s a choice. You choose your team. And money is not a good reason to make that choice with,” he warned, speaking in pure sincerity, now. And in some degree, with experience. Sure, he could be making plenty of money teaching in the Akademiya, but that wasn’t where he wanted to be. Those weren’t the people he could be allies with. “No, you find out who it is that you care about, and what purpose it is that you want, and do it. You care for them. You fight for them, and you let them have your back too, just as you said,” he added, fighting to keep his own voice from choking up in the process, and becoming far, far too aware of where he was right now.

“And…you do everything you can to protect them, as long as you have still have the freedom to do it.”

+++

They were finally finished with their new base and ready for the transfer. Tighnari didn’t know how many hours or days it had been; he lost track. He was sleeping when they pulled him up and announced the change in scenery.

Rubble was the one walking him there, because of course he was. The last Tighnari got to see was his stupid smile before he fastened a blindfold around his eyes, to keep him from seeing where they were going, as if he didn’t have his other senses, too.

“Toothpick, Spade, you’re on watch duty. East and west side,” Shadow ordered. “Rock, you can help Shroom with the boars, I guess.”

The air felt so much fresher and cleaner, now that they were outside. It definitely felt like one of the narrower spaces underground. He guessed their secret passageway to this other place must be a tunnel, too. It made sense. That root they were looking for could be found in such places, although, it really wasn’t common in the slightest. Tighnari actually didn’t know how they were getting so much, which made him wonder if they actually somehow managed to find a place that wasn’t even on the map.

It turned quiet quickly as most everyone else scattered, and Tighnari was left with Rubble, who kept a firm grip on his arm, with Tighnari struggled to keep up without putting too much weight on his left leg, and not being able to move his joints regardless. At least the splint he got was decent enough, now.

If only he had the power to just shove him to the side and run. He just couldn’t find it in him to entertain the possibility. Instead, his brain just had to dwell on…well, on other things.

“For what it’s worth,” Tighnari spoke up in the silence, his voice quiet. “I’m sorry about what happened to your daughter.”

“Hmph,” he huffed. “So, you see things my way, now?”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Tighnari snapped back. “I’m not justifying you.”

“Yeah, figures. You wouldn’t understand. You don’t know what it’s like to lose a kid.” He then gripped him harder, and leaned into his ear with a whisper. “But if I could help it, you will.”

Tighnari froze, his blood running cold and hot all at the same time.

If you dare touch a single one of them, I will—

Tighnari didn’t know what he was talking about. He wasn’t a parent. He didn’t have any kids. And yet, the threat in return was still on the tip on his tongue. He thought about Collei. He thought about the other rangers. He even thought about his parents. If Rubble hurt them, he would murder him. Except he couldn’t. And he couldn’t say anything, either. Because that might be placing the idea into his mind, and there would be absolutely nothing he could do about it.

Collei, please, stay safe. I’m sorry. I’m sorry I had to leave you so soon. Please, everyone, take care of her. Take care of each other. Amir, Nasrin… you’ll teach her how to read, right? Cyno, you’ll look after them? Collei, you’re going to be a great Forest Watcher someday. Or a great doctor. You’re going to be fine. You’ll live. Please, promise me you’ll live.

“Hey!” Shadow greeted with running footsteps. “Rubble, here, I got some cotton. We should stop Tighnari’s ears while we’re traveling; the sounds might give him too many clues, especially if he gets ideas about escaping.”

“Alright, sounds good. Stop squirming, dog!” Rubble hit him over the back of his head. “Just play nice.”

The cotton in his ears didn’t block out sound completely, but it did turn everyone’s voices into an indistinct mumble. They really did manage to make his world dark, this time.

They tied him to some post when they got there, his senses still solidly sealed away. Tighnari didn’t realize how much he would miss them. He felt stuck inside himself. His leg throbbed his renewed vigor, given the journey it had to undergo. For want of anything better to do, Tighnari tested his bindings. His wrists chafed against the ropes with no give, no way to brute force his way out. The thought finally crossed his mind to bring up his bound ankles to his mouth and let his teeth do the work, but even moving it a little caused too much pain. He didn’t feel like he could press through it. He didn’t have the energy. And this time, he couldn’t even tell whether or not there was anyone in the room with him, standing there with some blade or crossbow at his head like they always liked to do.

Then, he heard noises. It was muffled, so he couldn’t tell, but it was somewhere above him? Around him? His attention piqued, and he strained to make it out, until he realized what he should have done earlier. He flapped his ears quickly, beating them up and down so the cotton would loosen. And then he heard a very distinct thud. Followed by a small yelp of pain.

He recognized that sound immediately. That…that was…

“Master Tighnari!”

“Rana!?” Oh no, please no… “Rana, are you alright!? Did they hurt you?”

“Tighnari, what are you talking about? Just, stay calm and keep your voice down. We’re here for you.”

Tighnari felt a twisted wave of too many emotions all at once. That meant… “You’re…here to break me out?”

“What? Yes! What else!?”

She removed Tighnari’s blindfold and the cotton first. Tighnari saw the new room for the first time, another crudely built wooden structure, but with a rock overhang making up half the ceiling this time. An overhang with a hole in it.

“Rana?” Iraj called in a loud whisper from up above. “Are you good?”

“Yeah, I just slipped on the wet rock a little!” she called back.

They were okay. His eyes could see it clearly now, but brain still begged that he repeat it over and over again to himself. They were here. They didn’t get caught. Rana wasn’t injured. They…

“I’m sorry it took us so long,” Rana expressed with heavy regret as she started cutting through the ropes with a knife. “None of us have even seen this place before. Even the—I mean, we’ll talk about it more later. Right now, we’re getting you out of here.”

“Heh, you don’t have to apologize for that,” Tighnari assured, feeling a laugh coming on in spite of it all. “Thank you.”

“Well we—oh! Tighnari, your leg…” Rana grimaced once she got to the ropes around his ankles. “Can you walk?”

“Ugh, technically.”

“Alright, we’ll help you. Just hang on—”

She stopped short at the sound of yelling outside, followed by the clear sounds of fighting. “Oh, looks like they made contact,” Rana said as if she knew what was going on. Which, well, she obviously would.

About as soon as Tighnari was free, someone burst in through the door. Rana bounced back to her feet immediately, axe in hand.

“Stop right where you are!” Rock held his sword in front of him, coming in for the attack with a second’s more of hesitation.

Rana blocked his strike with her axe, and then pushed him back against the wall. “Iraj, get Tighnari!”

“Got it!”

Iraj was already behind him, helping him get up. Rana drove her fight to the corner and gave the two of them the opening to get out the door. Outside, Tighnari saw a wide clearing filled with scattered supplies and open fighting. The cavern’s ceiling was not high above them. From the corner of his eye, Tighnari could see many clusters of luminescent plants.

Toothpick came to meet them almost as soon as they stepped into the outside, seeming to fumble his way through stringing his crossbow. Iraj rushed to draw his own bow to fight back, but he was beat to the punch by a boomerang from behind. Toothpick was knocked forward into the dirt, replaced by the sight of the Trainee Forest Ranger behind him.

“Master Tighnari!” she yelled, her face the portrait of anxiety meeting relief. Blood trickled down her face from a cut in her forehead, but otherwise, she looked like she okay. “Tighnari, are you alright!?” She ran up to meet them. “Oh, who am I kidding, you’re not alright, I’m so sorry, I—”

“Collei.” Tighnari smiled with a weak laugh. “You don’t how glad I am to see you.”

“Hey, Collei!” Iraj alerted her, bow drawn at Knife running at them with a sword. Collei didn’t miss a beat, throwing the boomerang again and then firing off a shot of Dendro. It was in that moment that Tighnari also noticed flashes of Electro from around the corner. What was…?

Iraj pulled him off to a spot that was safe, keeping watch on the battle in a guarding position, an arrow notched in his bow. Tighnari breathlessly took in what was happening. They were all here, every one of the Forest Rangers except for a couple. He realized that must have planned this as a joint move, to free him and attack the gang from the front at the same time. Tighnari couldn’t guarantee that he still wasn’t a liability, with his limited movement, but it worked. They didn’t split up into small groups; they planned this; they worked together; and they were still in one piece at the end of it.

Tighnari felt…really proud right now, actually.

A blur of Electro showed up in the clearing. Tighnari felt his eyes widen as Rubble and his hammer clashed with a very, very familiar polearm, and was knocked out cold by it just seconds later.

“Cyno!? What are you doing here!?”

Cyno stepped over the unconscious body and rested his polearm on his shoulder. “Enjoying the scenery,” he replied with a straight face.

“What?”

“No, you see, that was a joke, because my purpose here is obvious and—”

“Stop, stop! I get it.” Tighnari released a long breath, shaking his head with a laugh. “Thank you.”

They were then immediately distracted by a flash of Cryo. Just as the battle seemed about to come at a close, Shadow sent Amir flying into the cavern wall with an icy blast.

“What!?” This was new to him. “She has a delusion?”

“Well, things just got more interesting.” Cyno ran again into the fight to take her on, wasting no time in letting claws of Electro shroud his arms. “JUSTICE IS SERVED!” And Tighnari could barely see a thing after that, his vision going blurry again…

…

…

“Hmph, she got away. Was there another way out?”

“Sorry, General. We know basically nothing about this cave system.”

“Hey, Tighnari? Are you blacking out? Are you okay?”

Tighnari felt some kind of sickness pound through him like a drum to his skull, but he was still awake. Or, awake now, anyways. “I’m fine. Just…need a minute.”

Everything was quiet. It took Tighnari a few seconds to realize that meant they had won. He anxiously took stock of everyone present. Some of them were injured, most likely, but they were still standing. They were walking. And that alone was as great a relief as he could ask for.

“Shadow got away?” Tighnari asked, pointing his question at Cyno.

“Shadow? Was that the name of the person with the Cryo Delusion?”

“Yeah, her codename.”

“Unfortunately, yes,” Cyno admitted. “But I’ll get a search out for her. For now, we’re going to have to haul the other six back to the city.”

“Wait, six?” Tighnari echoed. “There were ten of them.”

“Ten?” Cyno cursed under his breath. “Then, that means they must have been elsewhere, or they just ran away at the start of the raid. Cowards.”

Tighnari pulled himself up to his feet, stumbling as he did so but immediately getting supported by Nasrin. He looked over at the gang members remaining, all tied up and loosely gathered as a group on the ground. He took stock of who was there. “Dagger, Spade, and Nut…” he spoke, mostly to himself.

“The...who?”

“That’s…that’s who’s missing.” Tighnari shook his head. “Umm…Dagger is the one to watch out for. He’s about a head taller than me, with reddish hair. His clothes looked vaguely Mondstadtian. And…there was a scar on his right hand.” Tighnari stood there, thinking quickly without knowing what he was thinking about. He felt like he should do something. He—

He caught sight of Bolt, and without warning, he ran forward towards him, getting rewarded with a sharp stab of pain through his knee. “Bolt!” He looked down on him with intensity. “You and your brother! What are your real names!?” And where is he?

Bolt just glared back, and spat at his direction. Tighnari winced only a little as the spit hit his shirt, as if his clothes weren’t so thoroughly filthy already. “As if I would ever tell you, you mangey, low-life—”

“That’s enough!” Rana cut him off, holding her axe near him like it was a warning.

“We’ll question them later,” Cyno said with a gentler hand on his shoulder before walking. “We’ll start moving them now. Rana, Kamrad, Nasrin? You’re with me.”

Right, they’ll question them later. Tighnari fell back to his knees, suddenly realizing he didn’t have the energy to keep them up anymore. He felt the eyes of the others on him, and suddenly became very aware of how horrible he looked right now, and how he must smell…

“Tighnari!” Collei rushed towards him, sounding as if she had been waiting hours to do so. She dropped on her knees in front of him. “What was that? Is everything okay? Is…Is there…”

“Sorry,” Tighnari expressed again with the release of a held breath. “Sorry, it’s…it’s nothing. I’m fine.”

“O-Okay. Okay.” Collei nodded rapidly, and then, her expression twisted up, as if she tried with everything to hold it back, but then couldn’t anymore, and started crying. “Tighnari! I…I…we saw what happened, but we didn’t know, and we wondered if you were dead, and I…I couldn’t stop thinking about the Fatui! And I wondered if it was them, and if it was, it would have been all my fault, and I…”

“Hey, don’t forget what we said about going on slippery slopes like that,” Tighnari spoke gently, feeling his own eyes start to water up. “Even if that was the case, it wouldn’t have been your fault. It would never have been your fault.”

Collei sobbed once more, and then she fell into him, grime and all. She hugged him and held him tight, and Tighnari did the same. Collei was never all that comfortable with touch, but this time, it didn’t stop her. “Sshhh…it’s alright, it’s alright.”

“It’s…we…I should be telling you that. You’ll be okay. We won’t…we won’t let you go.”

Tighnari felt tears stream down his face, landing in drops on Collei’s back. He was exhausted beyond measure, and he was bound to have a hard several weeks ahead of him, but he…he was fine. He was home.

“I know,” he told her, feeling the resolve he almost lost grip hold of his heart again. “I know.”