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It wasn’t supposed to end like this.
He wasn’t supposed to be defeated.
He was supposed to become a god.
He wasn’t supposed to be betrayed, abandoned, yet another time.
First it was his mother.
Then it was the mortals.
And now the fatui he worked with for so long?
What’s next for him?
Will he be betrayed by his own self one day?
Why…why did the armor fail?
Why did he fail?
The humanoid crumpled to the ground with a smash. It lay there, broken into pieces, as Scaramouche could only watch as the dendro archon ascended up towards him, her palm glowing.
She approached the center of the humanoid.
Exactly where the gnosis was located.
"No…" His eyes widened as the god broke the glass covering.
The realization slammed into him.
Not the gnosis…
"No…no, no!" He screamed, dashing forward as he clawed at the dendro archon. The glass from his armor shattered into pieces upon the impact. The shards drew lines of blood on his skin.
"Give it back..!"
He reached out desperately, fingers outstretched before him as he nearly toppled out of the humanoid. The glass dug into his abdomen painfully, tearing a rip in his clothing. But he ignored it. He ignored it all. He ignored everything.
The gnosis.
The electro gnosis.
It belongs to me.
"Give it back!" He yelled out again, fingers grasping at the dendro archon. He was so close.
It's not yours.
It doesn't belong to you.
Pain exploded on his back as the tubes began to tear. He bit his lip to avoid crying out, biting it so hard blood dripped down his mouth.
The gnosis was inches away from the archon's hands by now. Her hands, glowing with dendro power, were opened and ready to receive the piece.
He's not going to make it.
"Stop..!" He shouted, struggling against the hold of the tubes on his back. They pulled him back harshly, as if they were trying to pull him back to his previous pathetic self.
No…
I can't go back.
Not to that time.
Not to her.
Scaramouche's voice wavered as he spoke with a tone he once hated so much. "Please….”
He watched as the dendro archon's eyes glinted with a flash of guilt. Her gaze softened. Her eyes were kind, far too kind for an archon.
Pitiful.
"Don't…" Scaramouche cried quietly, "don't take it away from me again… please ."
He hated how he was begging, groveling at the feet of an archon. He hated how utterly humiliating he looked.
Disgusting.
Revolting.
The dendro archon’s fingers brushed against the gnosis.
It’s too late.
“Please …” he whispered, voice trembling, “I can’t go back…”
He refused to believe it. He refused to believe it’s gone. Not like this. He can’t lose it like this.
The archon wrapped her hand around the gnosis, the electro glow diminishing almost instantly. Dendro blossomed around the piece.
Scaramouche’s world shattered.
And really, he just gave up at that point.
Hands outstretched, eyes widened, and a broken voice, he was a mess. Unfit to be the vessel of a god. Unfit to be the vessel for the electro gnosis.
The tubes snapped.
A silent gasp left his mouth as his entire form tumbled out of the humanoid.
The light from his eyes flickered away like a burnt out candle.
It felt like his life force was draining. He felt his consciousness leaving him as the air flow gradually sped up around him. He felt the wind blow through his indigo-colored hair, he felt the pain of the emptiness inside him, he felt the pain…of losing the gnosis, losing himself.
He let his eyelids slide close, shutting the world around him out.
And that was all he could remember.
Aether wanted to let him die like that. He wanted to make him feel the pain of losing something dear to him.
He killed Teppei. He killed all those innocent soldiers.
He doesn’t deserve to live. He deserves the cruelest death possible.
He’s a fatui harbinger, a merciless killer.
Just how many lives has he robbed? So much that even his life alone wouldn’t be enough to atone for it all.
But something about the scene in front of him made Aether…uneasy.
Scaramouche, the esteemed Balladeer, the sixth fatui harbinger, with an expression like that?
He looked completely broken, his voice desperate and eyes widened to the point where Aether was taken aback by the sheer pain in his voice. He screamed for the gnosis, pleaded and begged, when Nahida took hold of it.
Saying Aether was shocked was an understatement. He even went as far as to say he felt bad for the harbinger. For just a split second, just a split millisecond, he wanted to ask Nahida to give it back.
But then the images of all the soldiers who died from the delusions he distributed out made Aether shake the thought out of his mind.
No mercy…not for him. Remember Teppei and all the others.
When Nahida finally snatched the gnosis from the giant humanoid, the look on Scaramouche’s face completely changed.
The light from his eyes dissipated almost instantly.
The painful-looking tubes on his back snapped and Aether felt himself internally wince.
And then, the Balladeer slipped out of the armor.
He was falling. With no intention or plan to break his fall.
Aether couldn’t believe his eyes.
He didn’t even feel himself summon a burst of anemo at his feet before he leaped into the air. He didn’t hear Paimon’s surprised shouts. He didn’t see Nahida’s shocked expression.
The wind blew past his golden locks. The ground was far from his feet. He was in the air.
His golden eyes landed on the falling harbinger who was plunging down at an alarming speed.
Within seconds, Aether found himself wrapping his arms around the frail body, cradling his non-responsive limbs with a light squeeze.
Trying his best to lessen the fall with his anemo powers, he landed rather harshly on the ground. He stumbled to a stop as he felt the harbinger’s head loll limply in his arms.
Paimon and Nahida rushed over, the latter quickly hiding the gnosis from sight. She still wore a guilty expression, her eyes glowing with dendro.
Aether focused on the small figure before him. He was light as a feather. Aether could practically support his entire form with one hand.
But what concerned him the most wasn’t how he was light, or how there was blood pooling around his body. It was the fact that his eyes weren't looking at him; they were almost looking through him - at something nonexistent.
The Balladeer blinked his eyes in a strained manner, looking completely drained of all energy. It seemed as if even blinking was too tiring for him.
“Mother…?” He whispered faintly, his lips barely parting enough to make a sound. “I…I’m sorry.”
Aether unconsciously felt his grip tighten around his arms.
“I have failed…Mother,” he mumbled, breath hitching in his throat. “I-I…failed.”
Aether flashed a glance at Nahida, who was completely silent. She fumbled with her fingers, biting her lip. Paimon wore the same expression. She didn’t whine about defeating the enemies this time.
The harbinger in his hold shifted slightly. His fingers grasped weakly towards the air. He was looking at something. He was trying to reach something.
“I…I’m tired, Mother…” he cried softly, tears forming in his eyes as he wore a pained expression. “I…I’m really tired…”
Aether couldn’t take it anymore. He knew the last thing he should be doing was pitying a fatui harbinger, but this…this was just too much. This was too cruel. The Balladeer may have killed thousands…but even then, to be utterly defeated and brought to the point where he outright sobbed, was too much. Maybe he was growing soft…maybe he was too influenced by Childe, but–
The next thing he knew he had his hands draped lightly over the harbinger’s icy cold fingers, unmoving and still as death. His fingers twitched.
Aether nodded at Nahida. She returned the expression and slowly placed her hand, glowing with dendro, onto the puppet’s forehead. The god carefully wiped the tears from his cheeks with her other hand.
“Rest,” she whispered gently, “rest, Kunikuzushi, and you will be reborn as a free being. Free of all the shackles binding you down.”
The puppet’s eyes widened just the slightest fraction, his dark purple orbs glistening with tears.
A soft exhale left his mouth as he smiled, a pure, genuine, smile with no malice whatsoever.
“Thank you.”