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Struggling to fall asleep on the 28th of December every single year due to the excitement of the day to come is a habit Tighnari hasn’t indulged himself in since he was what, nine years old?
It doesn’t matter, though. A day before his birthday, the forest ranger spent hours upon stressful hours, well, forest-ranging. A specific withering zone caused a severe headache to haunt Tighnari, mostly caused by when, with Collei’s excitement to come along, the Valuka Shuna had let her.
Not surprisingly, the girl had gotten lost on her way to the withering zone, distracted by whatever. Tighnari eventually found her with a scraped knee and elbow from falling over. The withering zone remained contaminated, and the forest ranger is sure he’ll take care of it eventually.
It was, overall, an overwhelmingly normal day. Tighnari fell asleep after tossing and turning for a bit, hearing every sound the rainforest made. He was used to it by now, though, so no big deal.
His dreams were a little more intense than usual that night. The reason is unknown to Tighnari himself, and by the morning, his dreams blur together faintly and get stored somewhere in his brain (he does not really care where) anyways. Though he does recall a specific part of it—
—there’s noise everywhere. Usually, it wouldn’t be such a problem, but they felt much louder in the dream, for some reason. Tighnari was trying to capture a dendro crystal fly for investigation. In reality, he would never do that, but there’s no need to get into that now.
He did catch the crystal fly eventually, which he then started… teaching biology to. The crystal fly. It’s One of those things that never make sense but, in a dream, you’re not bothered to think about it. He was suddenly inside Collei’s hut while teaching the crystal fly (though it seemed confused). Initially, it wasn’t bad, but soon Tighnari started hearing footsteps. Footsteps, headed in his direction! If he was awake, he’d be able to catch just who was approaching him, but he wasn’t.
In his head, it was the Akademiya. Always the Akademiya, trying to catch him disseminating their information to outside students. Crystal flies. Whatever! The forest ranger, panicked, started explaining the subject faster and faster to his only student so that the Akademiya couldn’t reach him in time! The footsteps got closer, while he talked about the needed conditions to make a Nilotplata Lotus survive for long periods of time and— and— the footsteps are getting closer! A pause, a thud. They’re here. To cover up his tracks, in a panic, Tighnari smashes a hand down to kill the crystal fly and then!—
His eyes snap open. The footsteps were real. In a rush, Tighnari sits up and looks around his hut, suddenly wide awake after his half-asleep dream. Once he recognizes the man across his hut, Tighnari sighs and his shoulders relax just slightly. The intruder in question, you guessed it— General Mahamatra himself, Cyno. He shot a painfully soft and maybe a little tired smile to his lover, “Tighnari.” He called, stepping closer after setting his spear aside. He has just arrived, it seems.
“…Cyno.” Tighnari replies hoarsely, a teeny tiny bit confused of what Cyno could be here for, waking him up like that. With a huff and after crossing his arms, Tighnari realizes it’s early morning. Around 5 o’clock, he’d guess. “Don’t do th—“
“Happy birthday, Tigh.” The white-haired man interrupted. Huh? Tighnari stared at him, blinking for a second before it hits him. Right, it is December 29th. That’s his birthday. The two stay there for a second, Cyno looking at him expectantly (slightly pathetically as well) while awaiting for a response, a reaction.
The forest ranger, after a sigh, got up and smiled, rubbing his eye sleepily before wrapping Cyno in a warm hug (which Cyno happily reciprocates), even though the latter was, unfortunately, coated in sand, cuts and scrapes from his trip to the rainforest. He’d done his best to not dirty Tighnari’s hut, though. “Thank you, General.” And Cyno smiles when he sees the other’s tail wagging lazily when he glances over his shoulder.
The hug unfortunately didn’t last long, as Tighnari pulled away to check on Cyno’s minor injuries he always had that he himself never noticed. “I’m sorry for waking you up.” The general mumbled while being checked up. “I tried to be quiet.”
“Your quiet is different from my quiet.” The Valuka Shuna stated simply, looking back at Cyno when the man started shamelessly petting his ears, soon cupping his face and leaning in to press their lips together comfortably for a moment. Tighnari is yet again the one to pull away, unable to help the smile on his face. “Are you trying to kiss your way out of me checking on your wounds?” He asks, carefully removing Cyno’s helmet and setting it aside.
The General Mahamatra smiles stupidly and watches as the forest ranger does his thing. “I think it worked.” He says while completely ignoring the sting of his cuts. Tighnari snorts, resting his hands on his hips and softening his gaze. Being away from each other for extended periods of time is something they’re both already used to, but it still hurts. On compensation, Tighnari gets this… terrible, horrible feeling that he loves of overwhelming affection. Archons, how he missed him. It’s always Cyno who verbalizes this, but he wishes he wouldn’t do it so often so that Tighnari had a chance to say it first too. To not look like he only said “I missed you too” for obligation.
“It’s not my fault. All I do is speak the truth, you should be attentive to say it before me, then.” And when Tighnari realizes it, he doesn’t mind that he spoke that out loud. He’s smitten and stupid now, with the biggest idiot in all of Teyvat. “I did it this time.” He smiles, leaning forward and placing another fond kiss on Cyno’s chapped lips. They bleed often from the dryness of the desert heat, but Tighnari doesn’t seem to mind much.
“I’m thankful you visited on my birthday, though.” His ears twitch and he feels so stupid. It’s what months of loneliness does to a man. “It’s only fair that I do so. I ask Lesser Lord Kusanali for a free day every time it gets close to the end of the year, you know. Even though I’ll be on vacation soon.” A pause. Cyno sighs and buries his face in Tighnari’s shoulder while the latter wraps his arms around him and checks on the injuries on his back. He’s clearly exhausted, and Tighnari doesn’t mind.
He doesn’t really answer, either, because he knows Cyno can read him. There’s no need to say “thank you” one more time, Cyno knows he’s thankful. Cyno knows he loves him. He knows.
“How’s Collei?” The man in question asks, after placing a lingering chaste kiss on Tighnari’s shoulder blade, looking him in the eye once again. “She’s doing good,” he tidies up the top of Cyno’s hair, scrunched up by the helmet. “Scraped her knee yesterday, but she’s used to it by now. Nothing serious.”
“Good. We’ve been exchanging letters recently, and her writing skills are great.” Cyno smiles proudly, even though all of the teaching came from Tighnari, who sighs, “She still has a lot to learn. Even so, I’m glad you’ve been writing to each other. She always asks me when you’re coming over.”
“Really?” He’s so glad she cares for him, even if he does feel a little guilty for not being able to assist much in Collei’s training. But she’s in good hands. “Of course. Did you ever doubt that she’s fond of you?”
And for that, Tighnari does not get an answer. But he doesn’t need one, he already knows what it’d be. The general changes subject, though. “Did you… forget it was your birthday?” He smiles a little. Tighnari seemed very confused when he woke up, and Cyno wonders if that’s the reason.
He gets an almost frown from Tighnari, who justifies his confusion, “It’s not like I forgot it. I just, like… I didn’t pay attention to when it was. I wasn’t thinking about it.”
“So you didn’t remember.”
“…yes?” His ears twitch.
“So you forgot.” Cyno smiles smugly. This man!
“Shush!” He demands, scoffing at his own lack of argument.
Ah. When Tighnari looks back to Cyno’s eyes, he gets a little sad he can’t really see them in their entirety due to his colorblindness, caused by his Valuka Shuna genetic.
Since he’d met Cyno, he knew they were either red or green, the only colors he can’t, in fact, see. Can’t admire his plants either, can’t know what the forest really looks like in the human eye, doesn’t know what shade of green Collei’s hair is, doesn’t know how vibrant the glow of his dendro vision is.
He doesn’t sulk about it too much, though. He doesn’t even tell people that he’s colorblind, but it’s not rocket science. It wouldn’t be fair if he had perfect hearing, perfect flair, perfect reflexes and perfect eyesight. He has all that but the last one.
Only people close to him know about this. He could count… seven? Cyno, Collei, Nilou, Kaveh, his parents and probably Alhaitham too. Not that anybody told him, from what Tighnari knows, but the scribe is probably observant enough to figure it out.
He once asked Cyno about it.
“Hey, what color are your eyes?”
They were sitting on the branch of a tree next to the Akademiya, where they usually met for lunch. Though Cyno didn’t go to the Akademiya, he kept Tighnari company.
“…what?” The boy had asked, yet not confident enough to speak too many words at once in front of his friend. “Do you not know?”
Tighnari had swished his tail, crossed his arms and looked at the horizon while thinking on how to answer. He didn’t want to elaborate, though. He just wanted to know.
“I can’t see some colors.” And Cyno had blinked. “…has it always been that way?” The Valuka Shuna nodded, not too upset about it at the time. It was his world, and he didn’t know any different one.
“Orange.” The boy answered after acknowledging Tighnari’s quiet nod. “My eyes are orange. Close to red, but not too close.”
Tighnari squinted his eyes and looked deeply into Cyno’s, hoping that if he squinted hard enough, he’d be able to see the vague color he had just described. Nope, nothing. It’s… gray. Still gray.
“They must be really pretty.” He answered nonchalantly while moving Cyno’s bangs out of the way from his covered eye to look at them better. Tighnari really didn’t pay attention to the way Cyno bit his cheek from the inside that day.
“They really aren’t.”
(Not as much as yours.)
He didn’t really like to admit it, but now Cyno felt a little self-aware after being stared at intensely for so long. “What? Are you zoning out?” He asks with a small smile that could be interpreted as condescending. Tighnari blinks and comes back to the present, grimacing when he sees Cyno’s expression.
“I’m too tired. It’s your fault for waking me up.” He rolls his eyes a little fondly and now is his turn to use Cyno’s shoulder as a pillow for emphasis. “I’m sorry. I had to be the first one to wish you a happy birthday this year.” Cyno holds him tightly.
“Why?” Tighnari asked, voice muffled by the other’s skin. He wasn’t truly, actually mad. He wouldn’t be able to sleep for much longer anyways, but he really wanted to complain about something. “Inner forces were controlling me.” What a nonsense answer. Though it did make Tighnari snort, looking back at Cyno and placing a kiss on a small scar present on his neck. “Incredibly stupid reasoning. I’ll have to give you an F for that.”
A pause. “Why not give me a D?”
“What?”
Cyno tries so hard not to laugh. “Forget it. I’d give you an H, though. And then a B, an L, and then an O, an M and another L.”
“…’Hblomol’? What are you—“
“For Happy birthday, love of my life.” Ugh!
An excruciating second of silence passes by and then Tighnari sighs. And then he laughs.
Cyno wonders what he’s been on for a second before smiling as well. He was thinking about giving Tighnari a break from his jokes during his birthday, but now that he’s laughed at a completely nonsense one, Cyno might even make some new ones to surprise him.
After laughing (not too hard) for a few seconds, Tighnari looks back at the general and sighs, a silly smile still plastered on both their faces. “You’re incredibly cheesy. I’m laughing out of pity.”
And Cyno chuckles and looks him in the eye, “I can see that.” Maybe they’re both hopeless and smitten. Maybe they’re both dumb, and it’s fine. It’s fine because they’re in love. “I hate you so much.”
“It’s fine. I love you enough for both of us.” And Tighnari clicks his tongue with a smile. Damnit! And they kissed once more before the forest ranger pressed their foreheads together firmly and sighed.
“We should go check on Collei. She’s missed you too.” He almost whispers, tail wagging.
“Wait,” Cyno asks before pulling away and reaching for something somewhere in his pocket.
“I have a gift for you.”