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He remembered many things his father and papa taught him when he was young. Of how much the world had to offer to him and how much he could give back as well. His father was a stern man, a man of great integrity and respect. He remembered how brilliant he was as a person, understanding languages from all regions of their world and how much his papa praised him when he was not around. He was someone he aspired to be and someone he would always hold in high regard.
His papa was a gentle soul, a kind soul who only wished to do the best for everyone around him. Unlike his father, he wore his heart on his sleeve and taught his boy everything there was to kindness and generosity. He held knowledge in high regard too and praised and encouraged him every day to become the wisest person in their city and to learn all that he could from the world around him. He would always have a special place in his heart for him.
Those days among the shade of the great tree, among the quiet nights where he’d lay in bed and watch the world around him pass him by, those days were the ones he remembered the most clearly in his mind. When his parents would sit with him and chat about their days, when his papa would prepare his special dish of fatteh after a long day at the Akademiya, when the world seemed so small to him and he was satisfied with it…
Everything could have gone that way for eternity and the young boy would have never blinked an eye at it. He was still so naïve back then. He still believed that their gods would protect them from the dangers beyond the skies… he still believed that they had their best intentions at heart back then…
Then, one day, he remembered seeing the sky shattering into pieces above their beloved city. He watched it crash down towards the ground like pieces of broken glass and he heard screaming. Confused, horrified screams of people who watched their entire planet be set ablaze in an unforgiving fire.
He remembered his father grabbing his arm and pulling him away from the Akademiya building, calling out for his papa. He remembered tripping at some point and his father screaming his name, his old name, the one he had long since had forgotten. He shouted that they needed to leave, that they needed to run but the boy was still disorientated to even figure out where his voice was coming from.
At some point, he was scooped up by his waist and was hauled away by his parent as he continued shouting his papa’s name. A name he clung onto, a name he wanted to remember. He had to, he just needed to for as long as it would allow him… but papa never showed up, though… and his father soon found himself lost among the crowds of screaming people. Scholars, soldiers, tavern owners, merchants, performers… they all knew the end was drawing near and none of them… none of them knew what could be done anymore…
It was then when his father placed him on the ground again and told him to run. To run from the city, run from the people, and to keep running and not look back. He told him that, at some point, he’d come and find him again along with his papa but, for now, he needed to flee from the danger.
He must have had that realisation then when he looked the man in his ever knowing eyes. As naïve as he was as a sheltered child, he must have realised what his father was telling him then, that ever serious, ever knowledgeable father of his. Of course he couldn’t leave the city without his beloved, of course he would do everything in his power to find him again. He loved him more than anyone else in the world and he would tear the city apart if it meant finding that man again.
But he couldn’t risk their son being caught in the crossfire of the chaos. He couldn’t risk something happening to him if he couldn’t find his beloved in time. Sending him away was the only option that he could think of at that moment and that boy must have seen it on his face the moment he was told to make his escape. Maybe he knew all along that they were doomed… maybe he knew all along that they were not going to make it out of there alive but, at the very least, their son should have the chance to escape on his own…
It was absolute mayhem. Their green city was on fire the moment he ran through the gates. Fire that began to spread across the lush forests he used to play in when he was barely a toddler, burning the last remnants of the happiness he held for the place he called his home. He kept running even as the smoke began to choke his lungs and he kept up his pace until his legs were beginning to give out beneath him.
At some point, he looked up again and saw the cracks growing as the once bright blue sky began to open up to a deep, never ending space beyond his comprehension in the past. He saw things that he didn’t know how to describe then. As the fires lapped at his legs and feet, he finally tripped and fell into a shallow river, the water soothing most of his aching but leaving him limp as he struggled to get back up again.
“No… no! Papa! Dad! Papa?” He shouted but no one was there to answer him.
It was then when he finally felt his tears flowing down his face. He heard a loud explosion and felt the aftermath rush past him as he laid there in the water, barely able to figure out where he was or what was happening. That day felt like a blur in his head, most of the memories of it blocked out as he grew older but he could never forget the utter fear that still burned through him every time he tried to recall any bits and pieces of that dreadful day.
“Dad! Daddy! Papa! Papa!” The confused child kept crying out as he tried to drag himself up again.
He saw lights in the sky, he could see creatures from the beyond tearing through the cracks to make their way onto their planet. He remembered screaming in horror and wishing for it all to be a bad dream. He remembered beginning to run again but he didn’t know where he was going. All he knew was that he needed to get away as quickly as possible, all he remembered was crying harder as he realised there may not be an escape for them. For any of them.
The people of Teyvat… weak, helpless… their gods could not defend them, as much as they might have tried… they were just a speck of dust in a vast universe, they were never meant to see what existed beyond their skies and yet, that day, they saw everything and paid their price for their ignorance.
“Doctor, what is this star map?” The gambler asked as he pulled up an old sketch he had made a long time ago.
“It’s a nameless galaxy from what I know about it. Don’t touch it, it’s fragile.” Ratio warned the man, gesturing for him to hand it back to him.
“There are some planet names on here. Khemia III, Khemia VII…”
“They’re all uninhabited now.”
“Which means they used to be habitable…”
“Must you bother me when I am working?”
The gambler laughed and leaned himself against the table, curiously staring at Ratio and waiting for him to say something about it. The professor thought for a second or two before sighing and turning his attention back to the amused man again. He reached to take the star chart from the man again only for him to pull the paper away and looking at Ratio with a pouting face.
“Teach me about it, Doc! I’m bored!” The man whined.
“You’re not a child, Aventurine, you… ugh… fine, I’ll tell you what I know about this galaxy.” He rolled his eyes as the man finally smiled at him and handed the chart back.
He went over the simple facts about the planet that they were on when making the chart, Azosite II, an empty desert with very little resources on it. The chart was the first one made of the star system from what Ratio knows and was the first one Ratio was able to obtain when he first joined the Intelligentsia Guild.
There were two habitable planets in the star system, one which was named Khemia III by the Interastral Peace Corporation and the other was dubbed Khemia VII. Khemia III had sat abandoned for a millennia from what was reported by the IPC while Khemia VII… what was left of that planet was rubble and the occasional survivor of the attack that had happened not too long ago…
“Doctor, you look… pale…” Aventurine furrowed his brow at him.
“They were relocated to different places across the galaxy… they could not save what was left… ashes… all but ashes were left…” Ratio let out a weak sigh.
“That was… your home… right…?”
“Was that ever put into question by you?”
“I just want confirmation for your reaction.”
“It was called Teyvat… the people of the planet called it Teyvat… it was our home… our ark through the unknown… we were supposed to be protected by the Archons but…”
“You seem to miss it a lot…”
“I miss the happy days. I do not miss Teyvat itself.”
There were sounds from above, the boy rushed out of his cave, limping all the while as he watched strange ships descend from the broken sky. People clad in strange armour marched their way out of strange pods as they observed the land. Even with their masks on, the boy could see the confusion on their faces as they saw a small child run towards them, crying and speaking in a language they could not understand.
He remembered latching himself to one of them, begging them to help him. He was hungry, he was scared, he was hurt, he needed help, he didn’t care who it came from, he just needed someone to save him. He tried to tell them that he hadn’t seen his parents for weeks, that he didn’t know where they were. He tried to ask them if they were friendly or not but he soon began to realise that none of them could understand him.
One of them took off their masks and looked at the small child. She knelt down and said something to the boy. Even though neither of them could understand each other, the child still felt a small sense of comfort from the softness of her voice. She gestured to the others and then wrapped herself around the child as she carried him up to their ship from the beyond.
“A war broke out… no… it was an apocalyptic devastation.” Ratio corrected himself.
“So those you called gods were the ones who destroyed the planet?” Aventurine questioned.
“I’m not too sure what it was. I was too young to understand what had occurred and none of the survivors’ accounts came from those at the centre of the conflict.”
“All you knew was that powerful beings were fighting each other and the casualties were those who had no power to defend themselves…”
“There were very few who could say they survived… those who did were…”
“Lucky enough to escape the genocide?”
Aventurine stared at him with great intensity. He could not tell what he was thinking then but he could feel a sense of understanding pass between the two of them. He nodded at him and looked away again, his eyes were beginning to burn through his retinas with how intense he looked and he didn’t know if he could look at them any longer without feeling a sense of dread cross over him.
The survivors could not stay on the planet. The vegetation was completely gone and what was left were simply molten ash and broken pieces of what used to be thriving civilisations. The boy did not know what was occurring back then but he was placed into the care of people from other worlds. Moving from place to place, planet to planet, never staying in one place long enough to fully understand what was going on.
The world had opened up to him but the child had never felt more unsafe in his life. He could never stay long enough to grow attached to the lifestyle of the planets he was sent to and he could never find out what happened to the other survivors of their home’s second and final calamity. Then, one day, some people recognised his intelligence and, before he knew it, he found himself in a familiar state of being again.
“What was it like? Living in Teyvat, I mean.” Aventurine asked him.
“Peaceful… simple… I lived in a place the locals called Sumeru, a lush forest region who prioritised knowledge above everything else.” Ratio replied back.
“Huh… that explains a lot… actually…”
“I lived with my fathers and an Akademiya that allowed me to study all there was to know about the tiny planet we lived upon.”
“Did none of your people ever travelled the stars?”
“We never had the resources to do such a thing… or maybe we never were allowed to in the first place…”
“You seem…”
“Confused? Hm… there is much about Khemia VII that I do not know about. There is a lot of mysteries about that planet that can no longer be explained.”
“Do you ever want to find out any of it?”
He looked at the young man in front of him and couldn’t help but laugh a bit to himself. He and that man are a lot more alike than he thought they were. There were many questions they might want answered by those who had taken the places they called home but he, of all people, must know how impossible it was to do so.
“Those responsible for its destruction have long since destroyed themselves along with the planet. Those who are left have no knowledge on the matter…” Ratio replied, plainly.
“Don’t you want to know what happened, though?” Aventurine pressed again.
“I am satisfied with what I have. There is not much more I can ask from the dead.”
“I… I see… it makes sense…”
“Would you want answers?”
“Hm… I don’t know… I guess I always thought you would…”
“You have a point but… what can the dead tell me that could change the outcome of everything?”
He thought back to the final moments, the last time he saw his father. He had smiled at him as he told him to run, a reassuring smile he thought meant everything would be okay. He thought about what that man might have been thinking at that moment. He must have known it was the end, he must have known that nothing he could do would change the outcome. All he wanted was to get his son away from the chaos and that would have been enough for him.
He thought about what his final moments were like. He hoped he was able to find his papa in time and they were together at the very end, holding onto each other as the world came to an end around them. He hoped they were unafraid at their last moments, that they had each other within their grasps. Such thoughts felt unsuited for a man of his status but Ratio still wanted to have a little bit of hope in his heart.
“Are you okay? I’m sorry…” Aventurine spoke again in a much softer tone than he usually heard from him.
“Don’t think too much about it. It was a long time ago, there is nothing left to speak about it.” Ratio replied back, brushing him off.
“You’re acting a bit too nonchalant about all of this.”
“Like I said, it was a long time ago. There is nothing left of the place once called Teyvat. Only Khemia VII exists in its place now.”
Those lush, vibrant forests he used to play in… those green pastures… those great mountains and cities filled with people and liveliness… those festivals he used to attend as a child and the people who were a part of its celebrations… they were gone… wiped from the universe it once resided in…
Only existing in the mind of a lonely scholar on a spaceship millions of miles away from where it all took place. It felt cruel to think of it that way. It felt crueller the longer he lingered on those thoughts and he quickly tried to shove them away again. Yet, as the Stoneheart looked at him with that sad expression, he had to have realised that nothing could last for an eternity.
“All good things are punished at some point.” Ratio sighed out.
“I wouldn’t say it like that.” Aventurine pulled a face at him.
“Was that too pessimistic?”
“For you, yes. Even the great genius, Veritas Ratio, must see he’s being too cynical here.”
“Maybe… I guess some memories are a bit too strong for me…”
“Come, let’s grab something to eat. Maybe a good sandwich might cheer you up more.”
Ratio rolled his eyes at the gambler as he grabbed him by the hand and led him out of his office. The star map sat lifelessly on the desk, a single pencil pinning it down. A peaceful planet that once was shut out from the rest of the universe, a place where a boy and his family once lived, staying in relative peace.
A memory still stirred in his mind of two people standing together, watching merchant ships sail off in the distance while their son rushed in between them, holding a funny looking wooden toy in his hand. He can’t remember what he said to them but he remembered tripping and falling over in front of them. He picked himself up and did his best to not cry in front of them, he didn’t want anyone to think him weak.
“Oh, my silly little one. Are you okay?” His papa knelt down to check on him.
“Kaveh, he’s bleeding a little.” His father looked at him and grabbed a cloth from his bag to wrap around his knee.
“You’re so brave, dear boy. Such a strong boy.”
“I broke my head!” He remembered crying out and his papa instantly froze at this.
He saw his father pause and hold back a laugh at the sudden outburst. Tears had blurred his vision but he remembered hearing a light chuckle escape from his papa from genuine shock before he felt a light tap on his head. Looking up, his father was standing over him, petting his head instead of checking on him before noticing the boy looking up at him, unsurely.
“I know you’re hurt, it is okay to be hurt. But you’re strong enough to not let it overwhelm you, am I correct?” The man asked him in a monotoned voice.
“Alhaitham- “ His papa wanted to question his parenting but was stopped.
“I’m asking you, boy. Are you strong?”
“I… I’m strong…” The child whimpered a little.
“Are you brave?”
“I’m brave…”
“Then there is no need for so many tears. A little cry is alright but you are strong enough to pick yourself up again, am I right?”
“I’m strong… I’m brave… I’m papa and daddy’s strong and brave boy…”
“That is right. Come on, let’s get going.”
He felt a smile pull on his lips but he did his best to hide it from the gambler. He thought over his loneliness again, the aching feeling of emptiness that might never go away. No matter how far from the peace he once knew, those feelings would always linger in the depths of his being. It was something he had known for a long time and it was something that he knew would never go away.
But he was his fathers’ son and he was stronger than those feelings. He was their brave boy who had survived the end of everything. He saw the sky crash down around him and yet he still stood in its wreckage in one piece. He was their boy and nothing could ever change that about him.
Facing the end, he came out alive. Even if the loneliness might never fade, he still hoped to become a child they could proudly call their own. No matter where they are, he hoped they could see him, somehow, giving back to the world that had opened up to him. That might just be enough.