Thread by @morphasia4

Unintentional Final Boss Kaeya thread.
Implied or actual Kaeluc / Luckae.
TW for character death (multiple), violence, mind control, loss of bodily autonomy, gore, and other unpleasant things I might forget to list here.

Thread starts below, so you can mute this ahead of time!

(Before we begin, this thread DOES have songspiration. I'll have this on repeat while I write. Feel free to do the same. :,)

)

It begins like a slow whisper, in the back of his mind. It could not have been carried to him by the wind, because no matter how furious he may be with a spy in his nation, not even Barbatos could be this cruel.

This is something else.

'It is time.'

It's difficult to understand, at first, because the voice is so quiet. Like a spider it spins its web deep in the subconscious of his mind, no matter how many times he tries to chase it away.

He can ignore it, he thinks. He had run this long from the webs tying him to his past.

Khaenri-ah is a world away. He is not the lost long hope of a nation whose lingering existence in the world is measured in grudges that should have died with it.

He is Kaeya Alberich, Cavalry Captain of the Knights of Favonius. He is Kaeya Alberich, adored by Mondstadt.

The whisper is patient, at first. Coaxing. He works through it, he drinks until he cannot hear it.

He lasts a few, tender days, before the one whisper is joined by another.

'It is time.'

'You carry our blood.'

They join together, and their words become a chant.

'Avenge us. Avenge us against the world that left us to die.'

"You're dead in the ground. It's not the world's fault that you died," Kaeya snarls back in a shaking breath, half curled over his desk with paperwork that was due days prior.

He can't even sign his name without those whispers dragging into a migraine.

The whispers do not like that.

Curses rarely admire defiance.

Half a dozen whispers join the persistent nagging before nightfall, that night.

'It is time. You were put here for a reason.'

He throws the bottle of wine he'd been using to try and drown them out against the wall of his room, that night, curling against himself on the floor.

Eventually, he sleeps, and the salt on his cheeks when he wakes suggests that he'd sobbed himself to sleep.

He doesn't make it through breakfast before they start again, in full force.

He's training the recruits the first time they demand blood, /real/ blood.

The recruit has done nothing, but Kaeya blinks and he finds the poor kid lifted against the wall, one of his own hands curled around his throat as the young man scrambles and pleads and apologizes, not knowing what he's done.

At some point, Kaeya had drawn his sword.

The other recruits are clearly terrified to step in, all fresh-faced and on the verge of panic themselves. Kaeya's hands nearly shake when he drops the kid, his command for them to go back to drills short.

He leaves them there, his lungs feeling full of sand.

The whispers are not happy that he'd stopped. The fresh knight was, after all, the descendant of the people of Mondstadt; one of many whom the spirits of Khaenri'ah begrudged.

They let him know in wails so loud they would have pierced his eardrums--had they not all been inside.

He needs to get this out. He needs to talk to someone about this--Jean will insist, in her sweet nature, that he might simply be overworked and put him on break.

Lisa will come close to assuming it's a curse, and be right, but she's too smart.

Gods, he misses Diluc. He misses being able to confide everything in Diluc, more now, than ever.

Well. Almost everything.

He's desperate, though. He can barely hear his own thoughts against the tide now; if there had been half a dozen voices before, there were scores, now. Tens. Twenties. A hundred?

Maybe... Diluc can make an exception, to the bitterness between them.

He kicks off of Mondstadt's walls, his glider flaring out behind him, in the direction of the Winery. It takes precious minutes to get there, stopping only when his legs stagger under him once, and he loses himself for a few precious seconds again.

'It is time.'

They're louder, now, and the Winery crests over the kill as he grits his teeth and slams the side of his fist into a tree so hard it scrapes the skin bloody.

The pain is grounding, at least.

He sees red in the doorway, but unfortunately, the red sees him, too.

Kaeya has not stepped foot on the Winery grounds since that night on anything other but strict Knight Business.

Diluc turns to step inside the door, and closes it, leaving a startled Elzer on the outside--who pales when he sees Kaeya standing there.

"Mas-" The man catches himself, and swallows. "Sir Kaeya." It's a respectful greeting, but the staff had never loathed him.

Kaeya's smile is strained, and even Elzer can tell something is wrong. "Elzer. I need to speak to Diluc. Please, go get him."

Elzer almost flinches, looking back to the door that Diluc had clearly just walked through, rather than speak to Kaeya himself.

"Today is... not a very good day, Sir Kaeya. Is this for the Knights...?"

Of course Elzer would be hesitant. While none of the staff disliked Kaeya, Diluc had been... clear in his instructions.

Kaeya was not to return to the premises. The few times he had, since that day, were... very strict exceptions.

Seeing the hesitation hurt, still.

"Please, Elzer." His voice drops, but at least it's his own. At least he still has his voice.

"...I will try, Sir Kaeya," the butler answers, swallowing as he turned, disappearing back into the manor. Kaeya steadies himself against the door frame, his head spinning.

He can already tell the reply when Elzer reappears. "...I apologize, Sir Kaeya, but it has been.. a rough day here, and Master Diluc has his moods."

The unspoken 'you know this,' lingered at the end of the sentence.

But did he? Did Kaeya know anything about Diluc, anymore?

He can't tell if that particular thought is his own, or the snarls of the whispers reminding him that this is not his home, that these are not his people, and does Diluc's disdain of him not prove this?

"It's fine," Kaeya answers, swallowing down bile. He'll leave with dignity--or what he has left of it.

He should have never crawled back here. Not for help.

It is not fine, but he makes it back to Mondstadt on uneven feet by nightfall.

The whispers are hundreds.

'It is time.'

He makes his way to Jean's office, feeling as if he's moving through an angry mob instead of through half empty streets.

He has to let someone know.

Jean's there, but clearly, she already expected him. There's concern on her features, and she asks him to sit. Ah. The recruit.

"What happened?" She starts, because she will take his side, if need be. He need but explain. If he lies, she will believe it easily, she always does, because she has faith in his methods--as questionable as they may be.

He just needs to tell her something. Anything.

He opens his mouth, loses a few seconds. When he blinks again, she looks even more confused.

"What do you mean 'it is time?' Time for... what, Kaeya?"

Gods, no.

"Jean," he starts slowly, only continuing when he recognizes his own cognition in his words. "I need you to take me to the prison, and lock me inside. No matter what I say. I need you to do this."

He's not convincing enough to stop confusion from writing across her face.

Maybe it's the fact he's begging, when he's never begged for anything in front of her in his life.

"Trust me. I'm not safe right now."

Jean, sweet Jean, who should have never trusted him from the beginning, takes a step forward and rests her hand on his shoulder where he sits.

"Kaeya, just tell me what's happening." No 'Sir.' She greets him like a friend. A mistake.

He blinks again, and he doesn't remember summoning the blade of ice that sinks into her stomach.

'It is time.'

"Jean." He breathes her name, and before she ever looks pained, she only looks... confused, her lips parting, as if in disbelief and speechless.

Blood dots over her lower lip with a sharp cough. It tells him the wound is fatal, immediately. Her body heat will melt the blade.

Nights drinking together. Nights where Jean is the only one who knows how much he laments the loss of his bond with the former Cavalry Captain. Nights of wine and teasing over how many roses she had sent Lisa in secret.

Cut like a thread on the edge of a knife. His knife.

"Kaeya...?"

Her fingers grasp down against the knife his hand has left, but his hands are already as wet and hot with her blood as his cheeks are with his own tears.

"No, Jean, /no/, I'm sorry, I-"

'It is time.'

"Jean, Jean, stay with me," he can't pull the blade out, it'll bleed her out faster, but it's melting already and the ice is doing nothing to help. He reaches out to grasp her, but she's already falling, and in the process, her arm knocks over everyone on the desk.

It's loud enough that it draws attention, and there's only one person in the headquarters that was usually up as late as they were.

"Jean?"

Lisa doesn't knock. She never knocks. He's teased that she'd walk in on something she didn't want to see, some day, but...

There had been something in her hand. Kaeya doesn't see what it was, he only hears it hit the ground, heavy, as she walks into the room to see Jean in his arms.

She wasn't moving anymore. She wasn't breathing anymore. It had been merciful, unconsciousness.

"What did you do?"

'It is time.'

It had been a whisper. Her voice started just as soft, just as distant, as the first whisper of the ghosts of his people had, weeks ago, now. "Lisa, I-"

When she repeats it, it's just as loud as the screams echoing in his mind even now.

"What did you /do?!/"

"I'm sorry-!" Kaeya starts, because he does not know what else he can be. Guilty. Desperate. He can see the light of her Vision start, and maybe, just maybe, he hopes that she can stop him before this keeps going.

'It is time.'

He blinks, and when he opens his eyes, he is not in Jean's office. He is in the doorway of the Headquarters of the Knights of Favonius, and...

Gods, there is so much blood.

Something is smoking. There is fire--had he set fire? had someone set fire? There's at least three bodies in the hallway.

Two looked as if they were running towards Jean's office.

One lay facing him in the doorway, as if he'd been trying to run away.

One is frozen in place, dropped to temperatures no human could survive.

One is impaled four times by sharp, jagged blades of ice.

Kaeya grasps the doorway, trying not to throw up.

'It is time.'

He lets out a shaking breath, but the next sound rings out loud and clear, for his ears only.

It is his own voice, but the words are not.

"If you will not avenge us, then we will avenge ourselves. You are of Khaenri'ah. You are ours. We are you."

The voices converge into a swirling, black storm, hundreds. Thousands. They scream in unison, they scream for revenge, they scream for blood.

It is time.

This time, he does not blink, because he does not have to.

Someone else, something else, blinks for him, and turns his head towards Mondstadt.

The last thing Kaeya notices inside the headquarters is Lisa's arm, lifeless, stretched into the hallway from Jean's office door.

He tries to plead with them. He really does. He shouts against the tempest in his mind, an endless, faceless void of screams and fury until he feels his physical throat run raw with it.

He begs for the people of Mondstadt. He begs for his home.

'We are your home.'

More guards come. How could they not? The screams that had echoed from the Headquarters could have woken the dead.

The ones that don't die to the ice die to the blade in his hand, and he begs for each of their lives to the unhearing, unsympathetic storm.

They stand little match--not just to Kaeya's vision, but because they fight not one man.

They fight an army of the dead, wearing his face.

He can feel it all, even if he can reign in none of it. He can feel the twist of his blade in countless bodies, faces he values, faces he's come to know and memorize and grow fond of.

He can feel it when some sprout from the adventurer's guild cuts through his shirt.

The kid dies with his throat crushed in his hand while Kaeya chokes on a mortified sob in the way he feels his pulse stop beneath his very fingers. The wound he'd gotten off aches, but Kaeya wishes it had been deeper. He wishes it'd reached his heart.

The same hand reaches up, afterwards, tearing away the useless and bloodied fabric of his undershirt. It leaves him wrapped in his cloak, the fur whipping around his neck, but not yet bloodied.

The tempest does not tend to his wound. It does not need to. It has a city to slay.

It is time.

That night, in Mondstadt, the screams outside of his head begin to rival that within. Between those daring souls that try to cut him down, every lit lantern he passes is either shattered so the oil splatters across nearby walls, or simply thrown into windows.

A city of wood and brick, but mostly wood, it takes to flame faster than almost any Pyro vision might be able to cause.

The ones who the tempest haven't cut down either don't know what is happening, or have fled already. The ones who haven't fled are desperately trying to put out the fires.

They are not spared, either.

The fire crawls the most rapidly up the windmills the city is so known for. The Cathedral catches, from debris. It is visible from the border of Liyue.

The city of Mondstadt is burning.

Diluc can see it from his window, and storms to the city on the Winery's fastest horse.

The tempest uses his Cryo Vision with more power than he had ever been able to muster from it--which is saying something, considering how adept he'd always considered himself with it.

His body comes to stand at the main gate, leading to the sole way off the city's island.

Until now, his path has been set by the tempest, and he could only see what lay ahead of their goal. He can hear the people fleeing for the front gate even now.

Turning, he sees the city he loves, engulfed with flame.

The people who had been rushing for the gate all freeze at the sight of him. Their Cavalry Captain, one of their city's darlings.

Covered in blood that mostly not his own, his sword soaked in crimson. The tempest smiles, but it is not yet satisfied.

It is time.

His empty fist pulls back, before slamming into the ground.

From it, erupts ice in a wave outwards, growing and expanding, and all who have come to flee are either engulfed by it, or impaled in the street leading to the gate.

Kaeya's scream can't reach them.

The ice grows as Kaeya's body stands straight, building under him into a fresh wall that blocks the exit to the city. There are other gates, but the fire is raging across most of the island now.

The tempest will make sport of those going for the bridge.

Or it would, if not for the figure approaching so quickly, his horse making short work of the bridge to the city. The noise draws the tempest's attention.

The fire of the city makes the red of his hair glow like flames themselves, his sword drawn. He hasn't seen Kaeya, not yet.

It is a problem rectified as the tempest's ice wall lifts Kaeya well over the city's gate, which it then steps down to, staring down at the Ragnvindr heir with open challenge.

'No,' Kaeya begs, but he doesn't know if he's pleading with the tempest, or with fate. 'Not him.'

It is not hard for Diluc, an man far more intelligent than most his age, to piece together what is happening. The screams. The blood that drips from Kaeya even now. The ice trapping those inside Mondstadt, and keeping him out.

As shock burns into pain, then to rage across Diluc's expression, the tempest steps forward, his arms spread as if to welcome Diluc home. To offer him an embrace from so high above.

To rub it in that Diluc was too late.

If Kaeya hadn't screamed against it so much, maybe he'd be able to speak.

But what would he say?

The tempest offers, unhelpfully in his mind still,

'It is time.'

'It was always going to come to this,' a thousand voices remind him, stripping him bare to his very core. 'You were here for our vengeance.'

'Not to fall in love.'

It suddenly makes sense.

Without Diluc, the tempest thinks he will fall into place. He will raze the world, Khaenri'ah's long hidden blade.

Maybe they are right. Maybe he will. For all that his spirit had not been broken so far, there is only one way left to temper him.

His soul feels as if it's clawing out his arms from the inside out to try and hold them back, but he goes deeply still inside when he lays eyes on Diluc's face.

Kaeya wishes that looks could kill. He wishes the hatred written into his expression could stab him in the heart so he never has to see the loathing there again.

He choked on the feeling that rose into his throat, a tangible grief for his old life, now dead and gone.

Even worse than the hatred in Diluc's eyes is the look of betrayal, far more intimate than when Kaeya had dared to tell him the truth four years prior.

That had been rejection.

This? This was disgust.

This was the unspoken 'I knew it' Diluc had never gotten to say. This was Diluc's validation that Kaeya would one day stab them all in the back.

And Kaeya can't even defend himself against it, because his body is not his own, not anymore. He is a man with nothing.

But if there is one person who can end this all, it's Diluc.

It is time.

The scourge of flames from a Vision roars up to meet the tempest as they descend in a frozen blast from the castle wall, Kaeya's bloody sword meeting the swing of a greatsword to parry. There are warriors in the tempest, warriors far older and far more stubborn than Kaeya.

Though Diluc's smart enough to send the horse running back over the bridge, it leaves him stuck there, in the onslaught of ice and the quickness of a blade that is far more brutal than any sparring match of their childhood.

The tempest is relentless.

Behind them, the flames of the city are being caught up in a whirlwind, starved of air. Kaeya doesn't recognize it at first, before the tempest snarls aloud in Kaeya's hoarse, abused voice: "Mondstadt's errant god is too late. We've made our mark."

Ah. Venti.

It drags the firelight high into the night sky, illuminating them both. Kaeya wishes he didn't see the flash of confusion across Diluc's face at the tempest's wording.

It's uncertainty. Kaeya doesn't speak like that. It's thrown him off guard.

"'We?' Who are you working with?"

Things would be so much easier if Diluc thought it was him. If Diluc hated him, and ended this, quickly.

The tempest just laughs, and strikes out again, wielding a blade of ice when the one of metal was caught against Diluc's greatsword. It slices through Diluc's jacket like butter, narrowly missing the skin below.

Kaeya has never been a praying man, but in that moment, he begs for nothing from the tempest, and cries out for Barbatos instead. Barbatos, trying his best to save the city behind him. So close, yet so far.

Just a moment of freedom. A sliver of it.

There is no answer, but this is not a surprise. Khaenri'ah is a godless land with a godless people, dragging his soul to some unimaginable hell with theirs, now. A stream of tears breaks from the corner of his eyes, cutting down through the blood on his cheek.

He hates himself for that weakness, too, because the sight of it makes Diluc's blade pause from what would have been a clean hit. Shoulders heaving with the force of his breath, Diluc glowers. It seems he's finally caught on.

"Who are you, and what have you done with Kaeya?"

The tempest's laugh is short, but the reply is everything that Kaeya dreads.

"He is one with Khaenri'ah, and he will never leave again."

He can feel their ghostly claws sinking into every fiber of him, and he knows they are right.

Diluc knows they are, as well.

Kaeya doesn't understand the fresh horror that writes across his face, but it leaves him open for a nasty jab in the shoulder with a blade of ice.

No, anyone but him. Anyone but Diluc.

He can feel how deep the ice goes, but seeing how vividly Diluc snarls in fury, he knows this time such a wound is /not/ fatal. He expects to be stab.

Gods, he prays to be stabbed.

Instead, Diluc jerks forward, disarming the tempest and slamming them both to the hard ground.

His blades are scattered, both--and Diluc's smart enough to grasp at his Vision, no longer allowing the tempest to summon such terrifying, cruel weapons.

"Give him back!" Diluc snaps, straddling Kaeya's body hard at the stomach, grasping his cloak.

Diluc is a man who only knows how to take the things he wants, since his father's death. The world is unkind, and he has learned that he will receive nothing if not by the force of his own will.

He did not expect Kaeya to be taken, though. Not like this.

The tempest laughs.

It is time.

Diluc slams Kaeya's body back down into the ground, dazing even Kaeya within the confines of his own mind from the impact of his head on stone. It allows the storm to rage more violently around him.

To stop the laughing, Diluc's fingers wrap around Kaeya's throat.

The laughter certainly stops, because a thousand vengeful souls never imagined that their vessel would be stopped by one, furiously crying man leaned over them, choking the life slowly out of the one they had sought to use against him.

Their desire for vengeance had slid into the glee of the slaughter, and now the indignance began. The tempest's hands grasped and clawed at Diluc's wrist, and in a last ditch effort, they sank low.

They let Kaeya speak, again, thinking he would be desperate to live.

"Please, Diluc," he whispers instead, eyes still wet, as his gaze closes. "Make it quick."

It's beg for mercy he clearly didn't think he deserved, but one he would plead for, none the less.

Diluc chokes on an ugly little sound, burying his head forward, and closes his grasp tighter.

"I love you," he whispers into his own arms, as the tempest's clawing goes weaker. "Gods, I love you, Kaeya Alberich."

Maybe, in the end, Kaeya's hand is his own again. It's too familiar not to be, in the way it rests against the back of Diluc's head, tangling loosely in his curls, feels like how Diluc would touch Kaeya's hair, when Kaeya would fall asleep into his chest when they were younger.

It's the last time he moves.

Under palms and thumbs, Kaeya's pulse flutters to a stop.

The world is very quiet, then. The crackles of a burning city are distant, and the cries of the dying and injured are drowned out by the wind keeping them from burning to death, instead.

But finally, the whispers of a dead nation in their last, living legacy have stopped.

/// end.