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Chapter Text

When Scaramouche became aware, he realized two things: firstly, that he had no idea where he was – and secondly, that he was not alone.

He turned on his heel to face the presence behind him, and upon seeing her face, everything came back to him with horrible, gut-wrenching force.

“You!” He cried with rage, taking a step towards her. “Give it back!”

Her reply was swift. “I no longer have it,” Buer said evenly, and his ears rang so loudly in his head at the words that he barely heard the rest of it. “And just so you’re aware, this is a dream – you can’t hurt me here, so there’s no point in trying.”

Scaramouche bristled, but realized quickly how foolish it would be to try and fight the god of dreams in her own domain. He could tell reality wasn’t quite right – the space was too sparse, too empty and liminal only in the way it could be if it wasn’t real. It confirmed she was telling the truth, but that hardly even mattered to him at the moment.

Instead, he tackled the more pressing issue, his words barely escaping through clenched teeth. “What do you mean,” he hissed, “you don’t have it?”

“I mean exactly what I said,” Buer said, her voice a shrill, grating sound in his ears. “I no longer have the Electro Gnosis – nor my own Gnosis, for that matter.”

Scaramouche paused. “Why.” he breathed, not even as a question, but a demand.

“I traded the Electro Gnosis for Sumeru’s safety,” she said, “and I traded the Dendro Gnosis for knowledge. A worthwhile deal, if I do say so myself.”

Scaramouche could not disagree more, and the rage roiled in his stomach. “What could possibly be worth trading for a Gnosis!” He hissed, his fists clenching. What right did she have to trade away his Gnosis? There was nothing – nothing that could make losing it worthwhile, his desperation gripping his chest like a vice. He considered taking a swing at her just to make himself feel better, even if it wouldn’t do him any good here. “You had it all – you had it all, and you gave it away?”

Buer’s calm, collected expression only made him feel more hateful. She was judging him, and he hated her for it. “Whether I possess a Gnosis or not does not make me any more or less of a god,” she said, “just as holding a Gnosis does not make someone else a god simply by possession.”

That was the final straw, and he lunged at her in rage, only to pass right through her and stumble a few undignified steps forward. It didn’t matter – with a snarl, he turned around and tried to charge her, to wrench it from her where she stood, but there was no physical body for him to reach - and having thrown his entire weight into it, he found himself falling in an undignified heap onto the dark, voidless ground of the empty dreamscape.

“Buer!” He yelled at the top of his lungs, grating in his throat, trying to reach her wherever her real body was. “Stop being a coward and face me!”

“Why?” She asked, standing in his peripherals like a phantom of failure, a beacon of something he’d grasped just for a moment before losing everything. “You’re clearly not in much of a mood to talk.”

His hands clenched into the empty ground, his arms shaking with rage. “Talk? What is there to talk about? You took everything from me,” he said, feeling his anger collapse into something far, far worse, the strength leaving his body entirely from where he’d fallen a moment ago. Just a pathetic, pitiable heap on the ground. “Everything.”

His chest was an empty cavity, just as it had been for all these years, and just as it would continue to be forever. He had what he’d always wanted, finally achieved everything he’d spent so long working for – only to lose it all a moment later. The Gnosis was gone. His heart was gone. And for what?

What was it all for?

There was no air he needed to breathe that could be knocked out of him, and yet, his lungs came up short. His defeat in that moment was wrought by none other than himself, Buer not having moved an inch from where she stood.

“Not everything,” she said, as though this was meant to be some great comfort. “You have your life, and you do not need a Gnosis to make it worthwhile.”

His life. His worthless life that had started as a failure, and now ended as a failure. Unfit for holding it then, and unfit for holding it now. What else was there? There was nothing else.

He would rather die than live without the Gnosis. There was nothing else for him.

“My life?” He laughed from his place on the ground, pulling in a breath that twisted painfully in his chest like a knife. His laughter fell to apathy.  “It doesn’t mean anything. Not without the Gnosis.”

He hated the way Buer looked down on him from where she stood, and yet he had no strength to rise from the floor. He choked back the familiar burning sensation behind his eyes, refusing to show such pitiful weakness before the enemy that took everything from him – and yet—

“Why wasn’t I good enough?” He asked to nobody at all. “Why couldn’t I do the only thing I was born for?”

Buer’s silence was worse than her condemnation, and he snarled at her contemptuous, arrogant gloating as she wordlessly watched him from where she stood.

“You’ll never understand,” he bitterly choked out. “You’ll never understand what it’s like to have nothing.”

His chest felt more hollow than it had ever felt before. It was empty, carved asunder with a knife, and twisted so, so very painfully. There was no procedure Dottore could have ever done on him that hurt worse than this. He clenched at it, feeling a scream in his throat that never came, but there was nothing he could do to make himself whole again.

“I understand more than you think,” Buer told him, “And there is so much more to life than serving a single purpose. But,” she said, “I don’t think that means anything to you right now… so I’ll leave you alone for a while.”

He could throw his fists into the ground over, and over, and over again, trying to smash her patronizing words into pieces, but she was already gone, having left her voice echoing in his head like an incessant noise he couldn’t stop. He could scream to cover the sound, but she wouldn’t stay silent, her contemptuous thoughts bearing down on him without end.

He didn’t care about what she thought. She was the one who stole it all from him – and now it was over. There was nothing left for him anymore.

More to life? What a joke.

Not for him.

Scaramouche wasn’t quite conscious of time passing, but he could sense there were gaps in his memory – as though he’d simply been drifting, sweeping in and out of awareness like the tide ebbing and flowing on a beach.

Time seemed to solidify, though, and he recognized the feeling – it was same as last time he’d seen Buer, and he assumed he had company.

Surely enough, the small girl appeared – and how loathsome was it to lose so badly to someone half his size? Half his size, and yet, so intelligent that she managed to beat him so completely that she had made a complete joke of him. Utter humiliation.

“You again,” he sighed, feeling more resigned and defeated than the sheer rage he’d felt the last time he laid eyes on her. Maybe it was because he knew better now how futile it was to even try fighting back. In the realm of dreams, she was the supreme god, and he was a peon with nothing. “Come to gloat?” He snapped.

“Not quite.” She said, her careful tone as infuriating as ever. “I just came to see how you were doing.”

“How I’m doing.” He repeated, wheezing a mirthless laugh. “Fine. Just great. Never imagined I’d end up rotting in a prison that wasn’t even real.”

Buer frowned. “Is that what you think this is?”

Scaramouche scoffed. “What other reason could you have possibly trapped me here? Do you think I’m stupid?”

She must, seeing how easily she’d used his own battle patterns against him.

“No – quite the contrary,” Buer said, and although this was unexpected, he still crossed his arms, skeptical of her motives. “But I know this hasn’t been easy for you.”

Sparking a flare of anger inside him, he clenched his fists. “Don’t you dare mock me!” He shouted furiously. Wretchedly. She had the audacity to trivialize everything she’d put him through, after ravaging everything he’d ever strived for? Hadn’t she done enough? Hadn’t she taken enough from him?

Hadn’t been easy? Her condescension made him sick. What a joke.

“I wasn’t intending to,” Buer replied, neutral as ever. “But seeing as your physical body is still in rough shape, it’s no doubt your mind is as well.”

Of course it was. He’d lost everything.

Everything.

Was it even worth challenging her anymore?

She’d won, he’d lost, and it was over.

All of it was over.

“Whatever,” he sighed, the fight draining out of him. He felt so… tired. “I always wake up from this kind of so-called ‘permanent’ sleep. You can’t keep me here forever,” he warned her.

His mother couldn’t keep him asleep. That meteorite couldn’t keep him asleep. And surely neither could Buer.

…But what would he do when he woke up? What was the point of doing anything, anymore?

Fight Buer? For what reason? She didn’t have the Gnosis anymore. She was a god just like any other who cared only for herself, taking from everyone else, and she’d already done away with it.

What else was there for him?

“I wasn’t intending to,” Buer said in turn, eyeing him carefully. “I really did just come to check up on you.”

Scaramouche sighed. “Well, far be it for me to stop the God of Wisdom from doing as she pleases,” he said dryly. “Come one, come all. Gawk at me all you want. Laugh if you want to. Just go away and leave me alone when you’re done.”

Buer frowned, not seeming to like what he’d said. “The Rishboland Tiger might pace in its cage,” she said, “but the onlookers are never happy to know it’s been stressed.”

Feeling a spark of indignation, he eyed her sharply. “Are you calling me a caged animal?”

It was apt, he supposed, but he didn’t have to like it.

“Perhaps in a way, yes,” she mused, “though that wasn’t my original intent. More so – it brings me no joy to see you like this, Balladeer.”

The way she said it so earnestly, he could almost believe she wasn’t lying.

Almost.

“Yeah right,” he sighed, sitting down onto the empty, dark ground, curling inward to shut her out. If she’d come to look down on him, she could at least do it silently. Or preferably, not at all. “Just do your gloating and leave. If I’m going to be trapped in my mind forever, at least give me the dignity of not sharing it with my jailer.”

“Then,” she said in reply, “I’m sorry for intruding. I’ll be back another time, okay?”

He was not going to give her a response to that, and he soon felt her presence leave.

He was alone again, just like he always was, and always would be.

Empty, alone, and utterly useless.

The Dendro Archon appeared again as he felt his thoughts become more tangible, and he turned, seeing the girl materialize before him.

“Hello, Balladeer.” She said cheerfully. “How are we doing today?”

Scaramouche only sighed. “What do you want?”

“Nothing. I just thought I’d keep you company for a while.”

Something about that statement both infuriated him and made him feel strange. He wasn’t sure what he was supposed to say to that, but he resigned himself to it nonetheless. “Not like I can stop you.” He replied dryly.

Cheerfully, Buer summoned a swing of Dendro energy, and climbed atop it blithely. “Nope!” She chirped as though this wasn’t damning as hell, confirming he was trapped by her in his mind until further notice.

…It was just as well, he supposed. It wasn’t like he had anywhere else to go.

There was a question he wanted her response to, though, and figured it was time to just get it over with. He already knew the answer, but he decided to confirm it anyway.

“Hey.” He said to her, who looked like she was in a good mood for some reason. In an ordinary situation, someone might have asked her what had happened, wanting to hear about her day.

Scaramouche could not care less.

“About Dottore,” he said, and suddenly found himself unable to say more. It felt like saying it out loud would make it real, but that was foolish sentiment. He’d been working with the Doctor for long enough to know that he always discarded his experiments when he was done.

Scaramouche already knew.

He took a twisted glee in the way Buer’s expression fell, hoping he ruined her day just by existing. Just a small spite to get back her. But unfortunately it had no such effect, her expression carefully neutral – and by the way she looked at him, she seemed to have gathered that he already knew what the answer would be.

“Yes,” she said, confirming his suspicions. “I’m afraid so.”

Scaramouche felt nothing. He felt empty, and cold, the sting of being abandoned once again ever present like an old traveling companion, but he didn’t feel anything else. This wasn’t a betrayal, because he knew it would be inevitable someday. He used the Doctor, and the Doctor used him. It had worked for a while, but Scaramouche had been a failure. Their deal had come to an end.

That’s all there was to it.

“I see.” He said.

It wasn’t unexpected.

It wasn’t, and he didn’t care.

So why… why did it still hurt?

“But, don’t worry,” Buer said, picking up a more cheerful tone, though she was at least sensitive enough not to force it. “I’ve taken you under my protection. If they try anything, I’ll make sure you’re kept safe.”

Pretty words coming from the god that defeated him. She clearly wanted to keep him around for some purpose, and it was only a matter of time before he found out what it was.

“Whatever,” he sighed, feeling tired. “You don’t need to worry about that. They won’t come.”

There was a question in her eyes, but she didn’t force him – and maybe it was just that he felt tired that he ended up continuing to talk. “It’s true the Fatui usually clean up their messes.” He said. “But in this case, there’s no point. My usefulness ran out. It would just be a waste of time and resources. What’s there for them to recover? Splintered wood?” He scoffed.  “Ha. Not a chance. Dottore wouldn’t bother wasting time putting me back together anyway, not when I’ve already served my purpose.”

Buer’s frown grew deeper, but this time, he took no joy in it. He didn’t care to dig deeper about why that was.

“Oh,” Buer said, looking truly speechless. He should’ve taken satisfaction in that, too, but he didn’t. He just felt tired.

“So really,” he said, his gaze on her turning sharp. “It begs the purpose why the God of Wisdom would bother wasting time with her prisoner. It’s hardly wise to spend so much time on absolutely nothing. What do you want from me? Information?”

Buer, to her credit, held his gaze and spoke truthfully to him instead of looking away and lying to him. “It had crossed my mind,” she admitted, “but that’s not why. It just was the right thing to do.” She said.

She almost had his begrudging respect for admitting her reasoning upfront, but then she lost it. He was supposed to believe a farce like that? Laughable.

“Wow,” he drawled, “how very noble and altruistic of you. Cut the crap, Buer.”

For some reason, it was this statement that seemed to upset her the most, and he did in fact take pleasure from that.

“No, wait.” She said, her tone finally breaking from that neutral, even cadence she was always using with him. “I really do mean that. I just – it felt wrong to leave you. So I…”

“Didn’t think twice about taking a criminal prisoner? What foresight.” He spat. “I’m not stupid enough to believe that. You want your caged animal to do tricks for you now?” He snarled, feeling the old thrum of anger pulse in his empty chest. “It’s rich how quickly you turned from your own imprisonment to imprisoning others, already acting like you’re better than them for it. Don’t be ridiculous.”  He pulled in a breath. “Just tell me what you want from me, and then leave me alone. How much more do you want to humiliate me?”

For this, Buer looked like she wanted to cry, and he finally felt a smirk of satisfaction bubble up from inside him.

“Well?” He asked, goading her on.

Buer only stood from her swing, the Dendro fading away. “That’s enough, Balladeer.” She said, taking no time in leaving his dreamscape, a wisp of green dissolving into inky black.

Laughable. Truly laughable.

The silence rang in his ears, though, and his sense of satisfaction didn’t last long.

Even though it was her who had brought him to his lowest, seeing as he was trapped inside his mind - she was also the only person who he could possibly ever speak to again, and he’d just finished driving her out for good.

That could have been the last time he’d ever speak to anyone, for all of eternity.

Eternity. Laughable.

Ironic, that this dreamscape was probably closer to the eternity his mother yearned for than anything she’d thought him capable of when she discarded him.

And yet, despite being unwanted, she’d still cursed him with being so indestructible that not even death could kill him.

A body to be used for her vessel, a body to be used to experiment, a body to be thrown into places mortals could never survive.

…Was that really all he was good for?

Time began passing more tangibly in Scaramouche’s mind, even without Buer there. He wondered if this was some sort of punishment for angering her, for going too far, and now he had to suffer in the recesses of his own mind forever.

At least before, time had felt nebulous as he drifted in and out of dreams and nightmares he couldn’t distinguish. Now, he felt awake, and more trapped than ever, with time passing by in longer and longer stretches. Endlessly waiting for nothing to happen with no idea how long had passed in the real world, whether he’d already been here for centuries or if it had only been a few scant days.

Hell. Surely, this was what hell was like. And he’d most certainly earned his place in it, so he shouldn’t have been surprised.

He’d expected the solitude to last forever, stretching on as long as his consciousness could remain intact. Whether it was Buer’s ploy to make him more agreeable or a punishment to make him suffer, he wasn’t sure which. And yet, regardless of the reasons, the relief he felt when he sensed the unmistakable presence of the Dendro Archon was tangible.

He turned to face her, pulling in a breath, and something must have shown in his face, because the look of trepidation she wore melted away as Scaramouche spoke first instead.

“You’re back.” He said, and his surprise was genuine. He didn’t think she’d bother returning here – but it occurred to him, then, that she still hadn’t gotten what she wanted from him.

So, of course she had to make good on her assets. That’s right. That would be the only reason.

She looked like she wanted to say something, the draw of her eyebrows almost looking concerned, if he used his imagination, and he had to laugh at his naivete. Was he really this weak? How easily she’d managed to manipulate him – for a moment, he truly was grateful she’d appeared before him. But that was all part of her plan, obviously. He hated her. She’d done this to him, and he was already feeling relieved to see her? Only a short time in this prison and he was already breaking so quickly?

Surely, surely he was more indestructible than that.

“Balladeer?” She asked, her tone unsure.

He scoffed, already regretting how quickly he’d reacted to her coming. “It’s nothing,” he replied, his tone clipped, and he cut right to business. “Well?” He asked. “What is it you want?”

She frowned, but her eyes gave nothing away. It was clear this wasn’t the dialogue she’d planned for, and he watched her rearrange her thoughts in real time before speaking.  “What I want,” she repeated, thoughtfully, her silence lingering as she considered her words. “…Is to have a conversation with you. Is that okay?”

That hadn’t been the request he’d been expecting, but it seemed to him she was just going about business in a far more roundabout way than necessary. So be it – it wasn’t like he had a choice. He sighed. “What do you want to know?”

Her eyes widened, as though she’d not expected that answer from him, and that… confused him. If it wasn’t information she was after, what use could she possibly have for him? He wondered absentmindedly if maybe she was studying his lifeless body in the physical world the same way the Doctor always had, harvesting every ounce of knowledge she could from his construction. Maybe she had already gleaned whatever wisdom she wanted from him, and she was just coming to tell him he’d already served his purpose.

Buer’s frown deepened, but she didn’t say anything. Maybe she really was just planning on discarding him, not even using him for any purpose he could possibly fulfill.

It wouldn’t be the first time.

“I don’t want to know anything.” She said carefully. “I already know lots of things. But… I don’t want to ask this of you as a demand, but rather, as a request. Would you sit and talk with me?”

Scaramouche truly didn’t know how he was supposed to reply to that. And yet, she awaited his answer, as though he even had a choice in the matter.

“It’s not like I’m going anywhere.” He said dryly, but for the hopeful expression that lit on Buer’s face, he might as well have said he was throwing her a tea party.

“Does that mean you will?” She asked with such earnestness that it caught him off guard, and he took a step back, catching himself. What, did she truly think he could refuse? In his position? What a joke.

And yet, she did truly seem serious. That if he said no, she would leave it be.

And that… was unusual.

Pulling in a long, deep breath, he acquiesced. “Fine.” He said. “But don’t expect me to say much. I’m not in the habit of fraternizing with the warden.”

Still, her smile widened impossibly, and she clapped her hands together. “Great!” She exclaimed. “Then, we should have a nice spot to talk… hmm…”

He turned as she did something or other to the dream – a grassy hillside had suddenly manifested from the dark, nebulous space his mindscape had been before, and he looked at it curiously. He supposed that only made sense – she could manipulate dreams. That was her power, as a god.

Something he hadn’t been good enough for, and something he would never be again.

She sat down in the grass, and he begrudgingly took his spot nearby, as far away from her as he could possibly get without being too uncooperative. She didn’t seem to mind, as she faced him with a serious expression.

“Balladeer,” she said seriously, “I want you to know that I have not trapped you here of my doing. I’m sure you realize how badly you were hurt from…” she paused, knowing this was a terribly sore subject for him. “…from our battle.”

Hah. As if that phrasing was supposed to lessen the blow.

“Hurt? That’s sure one way to put it. Just say it like it is, Buer. It’s my curse she made me so indestructible that I couldn’t even manage to die from such a thing.” He sighed. “One more thing I’ve failed to do properly, I suppose.”

Buer’s eyes were sad, and it disgusted him. So he looked away from the sight.

When she said nothing, though, he pressed on. “So?” He asked. “What are you going to do with me, then?”

Spending an eternity as a disembodied consciousness may have been what his mother had wanted, but it sounded like an indescribable hell to him. The fact he was facing that very reality now, quite honestly, terrified him, though he refused to admit that out loud.

Buer was quiet when she finally spoke. “I don’t know.” She admitted.

He looked back to her then, wondering what sort of face she was making. She looked contemplative, worried, and guilty all the same.

An interesting expression, surely. But that sort of admission was at least better than the false charity she’d been trying to convince him with before. No one would bother with salvaging their enemy from the wreckage unless there was something to be gained by it.

But this? This, he could work with.

“But,” she continued, “I wanted to make sure you knew this was never intended to be a prison. You’re still deep in a coma, and it’s only because I’m able to enter your dream that we can talk like this. I’m slowly trying to bring you back, but your consciousness is buried very, very deeply inside.” She looked to him thoughtfully. “But… I think you knew that already, right?”

He did, deep down. But it was easier to blame her for all of it – and, really, it had been her fault he was here in the first place. If she hadn’t beaten him, if he hadn’t been so….

Well, that didn’t matter anymore. What’s done was already done.

His silence was as good as admission, and she at least allowed him the dignity of not having to say it aloud.

“I’m not sure that this a coma you’ll ever be able to wake from.” She admitted. “But I hope that you can.”

Her words filled him with a dark sense of dread, even though he knew already. He already knew he’d be trapped here forever, didn’t he? He knew he’d lost, and he knew there was nothing left for him.

What reason really was there to wake up, anyway? To trade one endless hell for another?

“There’s no point.” He said. “Either I rot in here, or I live as nothing. I’m dead either way, yet fate isn’t so kind as to finish the job. And neither are you, Buer.” He paused, pulling in a breath. “Got cold feet?”

She shook her head. “No. Even you deserve a chance to live, Balladeer.” She said, though there was a strange look in her eyes when she hesitated, as if she wasn’t sure she should say her next thought. “I will admit, though, that it did cross my mind.”

Those words might have insulted anyone else, but it almost brought Scaramouche a sense of comfort. Because that, there, was finally the unadulterated truth. None of the morality crap she kept trying to sell to him before. She was the God of Wisdom – surely she wasn’t stupid enough to not consider killing a major threat to her nation. It at least meant she’d seen him as dangerous, rather than something worthless she’d defeated and tossed aside, and had the decency at last to tell him so.

“And why didn’t you?” He pressed. “The real reason.”

She held his gaze and didn’t look away from him, and he could respect that, although begrudgingly. “Because I didn’t want to.” She said. “I didn’t lie before – I want you to be able to live. There are more reasons, but none of them matter so much as this. Do you believe me?”

She held his gaze, and he found that he actually did believe her. It was selfish in her own way, he supposed. She didn’t want to shoulder the guilt of taking a life, so instead, she chose to burden him with living. It wasn’t compassion, it was selfishness.

If he had to have lost, it was at least more palatable to accept his defeat at the hands of a god who had admitted to her ugliness in some way.

“Yes.” He said.

His body was made to withstand anything, and his mind still persisted even when there was very little of him left. How fitting it was – his punishment for the many lives he had taken, and the lives he had attempted to take, including hers – that she would punish him with continuing to live. Wouldn’t let him die like the rest, nor die like he deserved.

Maybe he didn’t even deserve that.

Still, Buer smiled. “Good.” She said. Her gaze on him lingered, as though she had some doubts about his understanding, but she accepted it anyway. “And to answer what I’ll do with you,” she continued, “depends on you.”

Well, that was awfully vague. “I wasn’t aware that I had a choice.” He scoffed. “How generous.”

“You do,” Buer said, “though where that will go remains to be seen. For now, just know that I’m doing what I can. As you’re probably well aware, your body was never designed to be able to function autonomously from the machine ever again. There is a lot to be undone.”

He paused. Extracting information from him in his mindscape was one thing – that was a simple, easy transaction. Scrape whatever was left of him off the floor and use it to her advantage – he had something that the God of Wisdom wanted: information. The efforts she’d taken to pull his consciousness from the dark depths of oblivion made sense to him, even if he didn’t like it. As the loser, he didn’t get a say in what his punishment was. The damage was already done, now – his mind was awake, and pure unconsciousness was no longer an option for him.

But… to what end would that sort of undertaking serve her? What reason did she need his body for? What sort of purpose did she have in mind for him? What could possibly be worse than being trapped in his mind for the rest of eternity? Going back to being an experiment? Being sent back into the Abyss?

…It was an impossible undertaking, anyway. It took Dottore hundreds of times of breaking him to learn how to put him back together. Scaramouche didn’t think Buer had the guts to do that, but maybe he’d judged her wrong. Those scholarly types were always the same.

“Why?” He asked, almost fearing the answer. What sort of terrible plan did she have for him?

“As I said,” she told him, “you deserve to live.”

The strangest part was, he could see it in her eyes – she truly believed in this answer. He’d thought it was some dull excuse to pretend to be benevolent. But she’d actually meant it, hadn’t she?

“You’re either foolishly naïve, or more stupid than I thought.” He scoffed.

“Maybe so,” Buer replied, “but you still deserve it, all the same.” And, seeming to predict where his next line of reasoning would go, she spoke once more. “Regardless of what you’ve done.” She added.

Scaramouche listened to her, let the words silently fall into the space between them, and then he finally replied.

“Then you are crueler than I gave you credit for,” he said.

To this, she seemed to have no reply, and only stood from where she sat.

She inhaled, then, and looked down on him once more before speaking. "We'll talk again soon, okay?" She said, disappearing into a flurry of green, and he was left alone again with nothing but his thoughts.

Why she had continued visiting his mindscape truly eluded him, as she’d never made any attempts to gather information or learn anything from him except for inconsequential drivel – asking him about his favorite food, or what he liked to do. Things that hardly mattered before, and mattered even less now.

He never gave her the satisfaction of a response, but she always told him her own preferences anyway. It wasn’t like he wanted to know, but he was a captive audience. He was forced to listen, whether he wanted to or not – she was the one that came barging into his mind.

“…but they weren’t quite sweet enough, so I’ll have to try again.” She said, swinging on her seat of Dendro. “It’s quite fascinating. One small change to the recipe, and the entire dish is altered as a result.”

Scaramouche only scoffed, finally sick enough of listening to her that he’d reached the end of his rope. “That’s why there’s a recipe.” He said, tired of hearing her go on about this when it didn’t concern him in the slightest, and never would. “It’s not supposed to be changed.”

He pretended not to notice the way her expression brightened when he finally gave her a reply for once, but she at least granted him the space to pretend she didn’t notice that this was the first time he’d ever bothered replying to her.

“But if no one ever tried changing any recipes,” she countered, “how would anyone cook something new?”

He only sighed. “Does it matter? They did, and now it exists.” He said impatiently, his tone clipped. “Why bother with all this? What’s the point? Just cut to the chase already. What is it that you want from me?”

Buer only hummed, as she had several times before. “As I’ve said,” she told him, “nothing important.” She paused, though, falling quiet as she seemed to decide to finally elaborate on something that was relevant. “I just know how lonely it can get, being locked away by yourself.”

Scaramouche paused. That wasn’t the answer he expected, and he wasn’t sure if it made him feel angry or not. Was it true? Maybe it was, but he wouldn’t admit it – and even more so he sure as hell didn’t want to hear it coming from her, as if she wasn’t the one who had done this to him in the first place.

He laughed, but it was humorless. “Speak for yourself.” He said coldly. “I’m not weak like you. Don’t fool yourself into thinking that you’re doing any of this for me.”

“Then,” Buer said, “I do it for me.”

She was selfish, he could give her that. Refusing to give him the opportunity to be used, just leading him on, and on, and on, on some pointless farce she paraded around as though it were compassion.

She roused his consciousness from the dark only to refuse to give him some purpose for existing, even after stripping away everything he’d ever managed to gain in the world. His heart, his divinity, anything that could have ever made him worth something. Why? Was what he’d done truly worth such cruelty?

She wouldn’t even use him.

What was the purpose of having him as an asset, then? Was he just some sponge to her, to absorb her pointless conversation?

His empty chest throbbed painfully, fully aware of what he’d lost. He’d finally learnt what it felt like to have a heart, and that only made its absence more painful. Buer’s words telling him over and over that he deserved to live, despite having been the one who took everything he’d lived for away from him, drove a nail into his skull deeper and deeper every time she said it. Did she truly take pleasure in rubbing that in, entering his mind over and over to remind him that he was nothing?

He was done. He was done with all of it.

“Don’t bother coming back,” he told her sharply, wasting no time in explaining. She should already know what she’d done. “Unless you’re here to get to the point and use me for whatever reason you spared me for.”

She looked him over, her eyes round and sad. He hated it. He hated her.

“I’ve already told you the reason,” she said. “But I’ll say it again: you deserve to live, Balladeer, whether you believe so or not.” He paused, holding his gaze. “And,” she added, “because I know you’ll say this too – maybe I am more foolish than the God of Wisdom should be, for believing so. But whether my judgement is good or poor isn’t truly mine to decide; it’s not my place to hold your life in my hands.”

And that was a great joke, wasn’t it?

She said it wasn’t her place to, and yet she did.

She held his life in her hands and refused to let go, choking him with cold and unfeeling palms, yet never applying enough pressure to kill him.

“Don’t you get it?” He snapped. “I don’t care whether I deserve it or not. I don’t want to live!”

This should have upset her, but she only looked him over with pity. Perhaps it was the only thing worse than the purgatory he already found himself in.

“I know.” She said.

“Enough of these games, Buer.” Scaramouche said.

Earnest as always, the Dendro Archon looked to him with innocent eyes, despite the slow and agonizing death she was putting him through and yet refusing to grant.

“You know,” she said, “you’re allowed to use my name. You can call me Nahida.”

He scoffed, laughing at the implication. “What, do you think we’re friends? Just because you think you can keep pushing your way into my mind uninvited? Don’t make me laugh.” He said. “And you could call me Kunikuzushi, but you only call me Balladeer. Do you know why? Because we aren’t friends, and we never will be. Stop trying.”

Buer hummed, somehow becoming more and more unperturbed every time he tried to make her angry. He tried harder and harder to get a rise from her, and she never gave him the satisfaction. Not even allowing him one single thing. “Well,” she said. “Maybe I should, then. What do you think, Kunikuzushi?”

Hearing that name come from her mouth felt like something dirty, like he was just some stray animal that had the misfortune of being something she’d taken an interest in.

“That wasn’t an offer.” He said.

“I know.” She replied. “But if I asked you to call me Nahida, then surely, I should respond in turn.”

“It’s not like you can’t just take whatever you want from me.” He spat. “Drop the act. Why should you care about anything other than yourself?”

“Because,” the god said, her voice small, “sometimes, it just feels better to think about others instead of yourself.”

That wasn’t the answer he anticipated, but the more he thought about it, it was the sort of answer he should have expected from her.

“That’s because you’re selfish.” He told her. “It’s not about anyone else, then, is it? We’re all just selfish creatures, and you’re no better than the rest of us. You do it because it makes you feel better.”

Buer might have looked a little upset at the statement, but she also seemed thoughtful, taking his words as they were. “You do have a point, I suppose.” She said after a while. “Though I can’t say if that makes me feel better about it, or worse.”

“And?” Scaramouche replied, wondering to himself why he was even bothering to continue this conversation. “What does it matter? Be selfish then. Anyone who claims they aren’t is either lying, or untrustworthy.”

She gave him that suffocating, cloying look again, and it nauseated him. Yet, he also saw in that expression that she had taken his words to heart as a different perspective from her own, and respected them. He wasn’t sure why, but it made him feel… strange.

“It’s a very sad way to look at the world.” She told him.

“It’s realistic.” He replied. “Surely you’re smart enough to realize that’s just how things are. You act like being selfish is a bad thing, but what’s so wrong with taking what you need from the world? The world will take what it needs from you whether you take back from it or not.” Against his better judgement, the words escaped him anyway. “All humans are selfish, and despite being a god, you’re no exception. You can either admit to it, or keep lying. It makes no difference to me.”

She eyed him curiously, albeit with that disgusting tinge of sorrow to it. It didn’t escape him that he hadn’t ever spoken so much to her before, and worse yet, if he looked at his words from far away, it almost sounded like he was giving her advice.

He couldn’t let that stand.

“You think yourself to be benevolent,” he said sharply, “but you don’t help people because you’re kind. You help them because you’re worthless otherwise. Isn’t that it?”

He could see the way her expression shifted – finally, finally getting under her skin, hitting her somewhere where it hurt. He’d been right, then. He could see it. He wasn’t so stupid as to not notice.

Her silence rung like a hollow victory, and he was sure she’d leave him without another word, just like she always did.

And yet, in all her ugliness, this time Buer had a comeback of her own.

“Then I suppose we aren’t so different, are we?”

As if she’d stolen the air from his very lungs, Scaramouche’s breath hitched. That feeling swirled within him, clenching at his empty chest. His hurt quickly turned to fury, though, that she would insinuate such a thing.

“Don’t you dare call me worthless,” he growled. “I had worth, and you took it from me. You took everything I had from me. It’s your fault I’m here. Your sages only locked you up because you had no worth to begin with. We are not the same.”

He must have finally, finally hit a nerve, because the blank expression that dulled her eyes was unlike any of the other faces he’d ever seen her make.

It should have been satisfying. It should have been vindicating. And yet, for some reason… it didn’t feel good.

Why?

He’d done exactly what he’d spent so long trying to do. To hurt her as badly as she hurt him. So why…

Buer only stood, then, not even giving a glance his way before she left, leaving him alone again.

Maybe he’d done it, then. Maybe he’d finally driven her out for good.

Maybe it was finally time for him to rot in solitude for the rest of eternity.

The worst part of it all, maybe worse than even the hellish prison he was subjected to, was that the more he had to sit with himself, the more he knew the reason he hadn’t gained any satisfaction from it was that Buer was right.

She was right, after all. He knew it then, and he knew it now. He really was worthless. He was born worthless, and he would die worthless.

It wasn’t losing the Gnosis that had made him worthless. He knew he had always been that way, because otherwise, his mother wouldn’t have thrown him out like garbage in the first place. Maybe he’d only been so desperate to have the Gnosis so that he would feel like his life could mean something. It almost made him laugh how easily he’d tried to blame Buer for the exact thing he’d spent his life running from.

Buer had been born a god. She inherently was born with worth. He’d been lying when he said to her that she hadn’t. Because the truth of it was, really, that he was the one that had been born with no worth at all. They weren’t the same, because her life had always meant something.

It was a joke. He was a joke.

Well, it didn’t matter anymore, anyway.

Scaramouche was tired.

He didn’t expect to ever see her again, but after some time had passed, whether it had been days, or weeks, or centuries, he could sense her presence in his realm.

He didn’t bother looking up. He held his head in the crook of his elbows, fitting into the space where his knees were drawn up - just as he had been for all this time, reflecting on every mistake he had made in his life. Time had no meaning in this place, only that he would suffer through it until his consciousness eroded into nothing.

He didn’t know if he was angry that she had come, or relieved that for some reason, despite everything, she’d still come back to break up his endless solitude.

He didn’t speak. This was her prison for him, and he had no right to say anything to her.

Still, footsteps approached him, and he could feel her standing beside him. He felt her bend, moving to sit beside him, the shuffle of fabric signaling she’d pulled her legs up into a similar position to his own.

“Balladeer,” she said slowly, “I’m sorry.”

She was sorry? Sorry for what? Taking everything that he’d ever wanted? Sorry for taking him prisoner?

If anything, it was he who should have been— …no. He’d only lied like that to her because she deserved to feel as much pain as he did. She deserved to feel like what it truly meant to be worthless.

That was it. That was all there was to it.

The only thing that made it worse, somehow, was that she came here and apologized to him for it, lowering herself to the ground, despite being the one whose only crime was to rob a pathetic puppet of something he’d never even had a right to have in the first place.

Why did she come back?

Why did she have to have come back?

Feeling her presence next to him, despite everything he’d done – attacking her country, attacking her, attacking her self-esteem… what more could he take from her that he hadn’t already tried to?

She kept coming, despite never asking for the information she was owed from him. She could have left him to rot by himself in his coma for all time, and yet, she did nothing but talk to him as though he meant something. As though he was worth something.

It was laughable. He wasn’t.

If she truly was so kind as she believed herself to be, why did she keep him like this to suffer? Why couldn’t she just let him serve his purpose, and discard him like all the rest? That was the only kind of relationship the world had with him.

Why was she really here?

“I didn’t want to make things worse.” She said hesitantly, her voice quiet. “I shouldn’t have said that last time.”

As if she’d been the one that said something wrong in the first place.

He should have addressed that, but he didn’t. Maybe he was too selfish to. Instead, he only spoke the one sentence he wanted to say, not even bothering to raise his head to look at her.

“Stop coming back like it means something.” He said.

At the end of all this, what did she truly wish to gain from him? There was no world in which her fervent belief in making him live was the only reason she was doing this, and yet, he couldn’t fathom what her ulterior motive truly was. It didn’t make any sense to him.

She wasn’t studying his body. She wasn’t utilizing his mind for information. She wasn’t even here to gloat about her victory over him. So what other reason was there?

There was only one reason he could think of, and it made so little sense that he didn’t even bother considering it. And yet, it still sat heavy in his chest, every visit from her more suffocating than the last.

He heard her pull in a small, quiet breath, as though she was choosing her words carefully.  “And if I told you it does mean something?” She asked.

Scaramouche let the words linger before he eventually replied. “Then I’d tell you that you’re wrong.” He said. “You say you don’t want anything from me, but you clearly do. You wouldn’t keep coming if you didn’t, but you never tell me what it is you want.” He said, finally lifting his head to look at her with contempt. “You refuse to let me die while telling me I’m supposed to live, yet you won’t even give me any reason to.”

He hated the feeling of tears gathering in his eyes, but he couldn’t stop it. He was tired, he was humiliated, and she’d sunk him to rock bottom and still continued to denigrate him. He watched her for any sign of disgust, repulsion at how pathetic and weak and detestable he was, but couldn’t find it anywhere in her face. Not in her drawn eyebrows, not in her eyes that were uncomfortably wise and understanding on such a childish body.

He couldn’t find any trace of her disgust in him, and it only made him feel worse.

Why? Why did she keep coming back? Why did she look at him like that, like – like someone who…

His breath hitched in his throat.

That wasn’t something possible, and he didn’t want to be a pawn in her game. He couldn’t take being strung along anymore. It was mental torture. She could come up with whatever excuse she wanted, be it her benevolence or her selfishness, but she’d refused him the one thing that could have fixed his worthless life and forced him to continue on without it anyway.

If she was truly so kind, she wouldn’t have done so. If she were truly so wise, she would not let a threat to her nation persist. What other reason was there, if not to make him suffer? If that was her end goal, he could at least beg for her to reconsider. He had nothing left to lose.

Scaramouche finally spoke.

"Just put me out of my misery, and get this over with."

Kill him and be done with it.

Buer looked at him with those wide eyes, lacking in any sort of disgust or judgement, and only seemed to look deeper into his soul, prying him open. It made him burn from the inside out.

"…Is that really what you want?" Nahida asked.

It was a foolish question. He was tired. He was tired of being hurt, tired of being angry, tired of having the world take and take and take from him, scraping his hollow insides with a scalpel for every last shred of value left to draw from him until he was completely empty.

"Yes." He said. "Just stop these mind games and finish the job. It's better for you, and it's better for me. Everyone wins."

Instead of shutting him down as she always did, she let his words sit between them for a while. Eventually, Buer hummed, as though she had any right to question his decision. "Wording can be important, Balladeer. Are you tired of living, or are you tired of existing as you are?"

Anger swirled to life in his chest, familiar and biting. "What's the difference?" He spat. "This world has nothing for me. It's never wanted me, and I don't want it either. Why continue playing these games? Maybe you really are just as incompetent as the sages thought you were, considering you won't even kill your enemy."

Nahida only watched him, as though she knew something he didn't, and her lack of reaction at his stab at her only made him more upset. He hadn’t bothered to learn his lesson the last time he’d said such a thing to her, but clearly she had.

She was better than him, in every way. Why did she bother wasting time on him?

"Well?" He prodded, getting desperate. "Do you feel better, thinking yourself benevolent for sparing me? Do you feel superior, lording your victory over me? Stop pretending to be so magnanimous. You're cruel, Buer, and your cruelty knows no bounds."

He hated the way his fists curled, shaking with rage, the way his eyes filled with unshed tears he couldn't stop from falling. "Just put me out of my misery. What sick pleasure do you get from dragging this out...?"

At least the small god finally had the decency to look hurt in turn, the green of her eyes a dark and mournful hue.

"Please," Scaramouche begged. "Please. Just let me die." His voice cracked, his body no longer supporting his weight, his feet sliding out from under where he sat as though all the strength left in his body had been completely spent. He could only brace himself with splayed fingers against the empty void of the ground to stop himself from falling completely.

"I won't do that," she said quietly, still refusing to rise to his challenge, despite her voice sounding mere moments from breaking herself. "You might not see it right now," she said carefully, "but the world isn't done with you yet."

"I don't care," Scaramouche said, defeated, deflating back into numbness. "I'm done with the world. Isn't that enough?"

Nahida only looked down on him, her eyes filled with pity, making him feel worse, like something small and disgusting, like an amoeba in one of Dottore's petri dishes.

“Why isn’t that enough?” He asked her, desperate.

The fact she didn’t have an answer for him only made it hurt worse. Why did she insist on keeping him around? What was her purpose for all this?

Did she want him to beg further? Did she want him to plead? What kind of sick reaction was she looking for?

She still said nothing, and he reached his end. “I’ll tell you whatever you want to know.” He said. “This isn’t necessary, and it never was. Just,” he said, swallowing thickly. “Just.” He said, running out of words he could possibly say. He was tired of all this, and he did not want to face down the stretching and hellish eternity that lay before him. Why couldn’t she see that?

“Please,” he breathed once more, one final time, truly reaching his breaking point. The lowest he could possibly be, the most humiliated, demeaned beyond repair and reduced to absolutely nothing.

Finally, finally she said something, her voice a soft timbre that was nothing like the victorious sneer she should have been wearing. She’d won, hadn’t she? So why was it still not enough?

“Kunikuzushi,” she said gently, and he stilled, his breath catching in his throat. No one had ever said his name like that, and it sent a strange, dizzying feeling through his chest. “Please… please stop.” She said, her own voice cracking with unshed tears.

Why was she crying? Shouldn’t she have been glad she finally managed to break him?

Why…

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t want things to be like this.” She sounded nothing but distraught, and it made him feel hollowed out. Nothing made sense, and he was tired.

He didn’t want this either, but he didn’t get to choose his fate, did he?

Here he was, trapped in some endless space by something as mortal as a stupid coma, with no one but the god that put him there to talk to. One that wasn’t even satisfied by seeing her enemy reduced to nothing.

Why didn’t that make her happy? Couldn’t he at least have been enough for that?

She pulled in a deep, steadying breath, trying to reign in her emotions, and when Buer spoke again, her voice was more even. “Kunikuzushi,” she said again, so gently that it sounded wrong, like the syllables should have corroded her mouth from where they left her lips, and yet – and yet, she only spoke to him like he was something that deserved concern.

That wasn’t a tone of voice people used on him. Least of all the people that hated him. Should have hated him.

“I’ll ask you this again.” She spoke slowly, purposefully, each word with weight. “Is dying what you really want? Or,” she said, “is it just that you feel that you can’t have what it is you truly want?”

What he truly wanted?

What he’d wanted was the divinity he was owed.

…What he’d wanted was to have his promises kept.

…What he’d wanted was to be accepted despite his differences.

What he’d wanted, all his life, from the very beginning, was just simply to be wanted.

He did not gasp, he did not breathe, but he didn’t need to. He had no heart to beat in his chest, and he never would, yet it thrummed with pain as though there were something there to wound him. She had laid it all bare, and he had no defense against it.

Despite it all, despite everything, Buer was right. There was something he couldn’t have that hurt even worse than losing his Gnosis. But what was worth spending a lifetime of pain chasing that would never come to be?

Surely she knew that. Surely she knew, and was just using this against him.

But…

He looked to her, and despite how badly he wanted to see through her lie, to see the satisfaction of hurting him so thoroughly wrought on her features, to see the pleasure she took in stripping him of his dignity and exposing his insides, to see her disdain at such a pathetic wish a detestable little puppet held in place of a heart – he didn’t see any of that.

It was not pity, nor belittling, but pure sincerity. A question she truly meant to ask, not to spite him, but because she wanted to know.

Because she already knew, and just wanted him to admit it to himself.

But what good did that really do for him? Why did it matter so much to her?

It didn’t make any sense.

Repeating what he’d said in response to the same question earlier, his voice was dull. “What’s the difference.” He replied, though this time, he was not asking. It didn’t matter either way. Death, or kindness - he wouldn’t have either of those options, anyway. He’d given up on the latter a long time ago, and his captor would not grant him the former.

Yet Buer, born to be wise beyond her years, spoke true. “I think you already know that.” She said.

He did, but he didn’t want to admit it. Of course he knew. He had walked this world for hundreds of years, and every scrap of kindness he’d ever been shown came at a price.

Maybe it was something he wanted, but it wasn’t something worth spending his life searching for. It was something he would never have, no matter how long he lived. He hadn’t lived a life worthy of such a thing, anyway. He’d killed for vengeance and didn’t regret it, and Buer – Buer herself was proof that his actions deserved no such thing as kindness. Surely she should have known that firsthand.

Still, she persisted. Why?

“What do you gain from taking me apart like this?” He asked, so spent that his tone did not take an accusatory edge. “You aren’t happy. You aren’t vindictive. You aren’t experimenting to see how far someone can go before breaking.” He said. “So why? What’s in this for you?”

Her silence was not damning, but contemplative. When she spoke, it was with understanding. “Do you want the right answer,” she asked, “or do you want the real answer?”

He sat up straighter, then, tiredly pulling himself back together. What kind of choice was that?

And still, somehow, the fact she’d given him a choice at all filled him with some kind of small, strange, hopeful feeling.

“Why?” He asked her, knowing that she already knew what his answer would be. No lies, no pretense. All he wanted from this, from Buer herself, was to know what her angle was. He was tired of trying to figure her out.

Buer sighed, though it was an unserious thing – and she took a light tone as she spoke. “Darn. I’d hoped you’d pick the easy answer,” she said lightly, and if he’d been another being in this world, he might have cracked a smile at the tone. But the Balladeer didn’t smile unless it involved the suffering of his enemies, and he would never let his own enemy get through to him so easily.

Taking in a deep breath, she finally spoke. “Well,” she said at last, “you didn’t ask to hear it, but I’ll tell you anyway, first. The right answer is what I’ve told you before: you deserve to live. And this is not false – I truly believe you are worth my time. There are still things in this world for you to do.” She said, and he didn’t know how he was supposed to feel about that. “But, as you’ve pointed out before – you’re right, I am selfish. And my selfish answer is that, even though I’m not sure it could ever happen, what I most hoped to gain out of all this,” she said quietly, “was a friend.”

Scaramouche laughed, a lifeless, wheezing sound, but it died on his lips the moment he realized she was serious.

“You can’t possibly mean that.” He said.

To her credit, she did not let her resolve waver. “I do.” She replied.

That… just didn’t make any sense at all. None.

He opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out.

What kind of preposterous answer was that? He could think of several reasons why it was the most ridiculous thing anyone had ever said to him. And coming from the God of Wisdom, no less, made it truly the most absurd thing his mechanical ears had ever heard. Scaramouche was not friend material, not to anyone, and certainly not to the very god he’d tried to destroy and replace.

He'd only heard those words once before in his life, and that was… that was a long, long time ago, and ended in the ashes of a blazing fire.

It didn’t matter what she wanted, because it never ended well, anyway.

Whatever she must have been thinking by saying such a thing might’ve been proof her mind was completely warped, but it made him feel… it felt like – like perhaps those flames should have stayed only in his memory, yet here he was, burning from the inside out. His chest was empty, but there was nonetheless something inside, refusing to perish even as he’d tried so hard his entire life to stamp out any trace of his accused emotions.

They always found a way back, though, clawing up his throat. There were very few words he could think of to reply to that statement with. What could he have possibly said to that?

Finally, he found something to say. There were several things he could have said, but nothing was more pressing at the moment than the sentiment he spoke.

“Are you crazy?” was finally what he finally managed to eke out.

The girl only laughed, a smile gracing her features as though she hadn’t just verbally grown the equivalent of two heads. “Maybe I am,” she said with a soft lilt, “but I think we have a lot in common. I hoped that maybe, one day, we could talk about it.”

What could Scaramouche possibly say to that?

Any refute he might have had died on his tongue. Why him, of all people, being the most prominent – but she’d already answered that, too.  Even if he disagreed.

He had spent all this time in this dreamscape thinking he’d been losing his mind, but maybe he wasn’t actually the one going insane after all.

“Well,” he said dumbly, “I’m sure you have plenty in common with literally anyone else in the entire population of Sumeru.” He said dryly. “Or the rest of Teyvat, for that matter.”

She looked at him, then – really looked – and he bristled defensively, feeling scrutinized. But whatever she had been looking for from him all this time, whatever end goal she’d spent weeks or months torturing him with avoiding, whatever use for him she’d been waiting to extract - it seemed like she’d found whatever it was she was looking for in what he’d just said.

He couldn’t fathom why, but something in her face told him that was it, whatever it was.

Buer smiled. “Maybe so,” she said, “but I’ll be honest – I’m not so sure. I don’t think it could be anyone else.”

It has to be you, is what she didn’t say, and that bewildered him more than anything.

Maybe he should have felt something more, but he was just so tired. It made no sense, and he couldn’t understand what had made her say something that preposterous. He could have easily brushed it all off and moved on, believing it to be a lie with some ulterior motive to manipulate him, but the sincerity writ on her face only made it all the more confusing. She didn’t look like she was lying – which was utterly absurd, but he was sure his eyes weren’t deceiving him.

So… why?

He didn’t know what to say to any of this. He felt wrung out and tired, and he still didn’t know what she wanted from him. Not really.

“The thing about being a god,” Buer said, taking a more conversational tone, “is that you’re different from everyone else, and everyone is always looking up at you. I’ve made friends in Sumeru – it’s true, and I cherish them greatly – but I am still their god. They will never treat me the way they treat other humans.” She looked to him then, her gaze deep. “I think you understand what this feels like, don’t you?”

And he did, begrudgingly, admit that he did, truly, know how that felt – not as a god, but as a puppet with both very little humanity and too much of it to ever really belong.

“There are other gods in Teyvat, then.” Scaramouche said bitterly. “And as you well know, I’m not one of them.”

“That is true,” Buer replied, “but that’s not what matters to me.”  They fell into a silence that Scaramouche, for once, would have liked to have filled, but he certainly had nothing to say, and neither did she. Still, eventually she pulled in a breath, her tone evident that she was at least taking pity on him and ending this conversation. “In any case,” she said, “it’s not something I would ever force on you. But that is the truth, whether you choose to believe me or not.” He looked away, unwilling to meet her eyes as she continued speaking. “The part of all this that matters most,” she finished, “is that I want you to come out of this alive. As for my other reasons for that – perhaps you will find out, someday.”

And that was the rub, wasn’t it? That was where all his suffering began. She kept him alive because she wanted to, regardless of how he felt about it, and none of her other reasoning changed that.

“But like I said,” Buer added, “that will depend on you.”

It was as cryptic as it had been the last few times she said that, and Scaramouche was no closer to understanding its meaning now as he was before.

She fell silent, waiting patiently for him to say something, but he had nothing to add to any of that. At the end of the day, he was still her prisoner, whether she bothered to dress up her words with pretty linings or not.

She waited, though, so eventually he had to speak.

“If you’re not going to force me,” he said, “then just leave.”

Did he want to spend eternity in this place alone? Of course he didn’t. But there was no other way he knew how to be, and spending it alone was better than the exhausting twist of emotions she was putting him through. He felt empty and tired, and if he could sleep in this place, he would have, even though he didn’t need sleep in the first place.

For all the words she paraded about that he had a choice in all this, Buer only shook her head. “No,” she said resolutely. “I’m not going to leave. Especially not after putting you through all that. This is my burden to bear, too. Besides,” she added softly, “I don’t think that’s what you want, anyway. Right?”

He looked away, refusing to dignify that with a reply.

Still, even without looking, he heard her smile through the tone of her voice. “I will have to go, eventually, but I’ll stay with you as long as I can.”

Perhaps she really had managed to break him so thoroughly, because he did allow himself a small, tentative smile that Nahida would never see.

"I brought you something." Nahida said the next time she came, but Scaramouche had no way of knowing how long it had actually been.

"You can't ‘bring me’ anything." He said tiredly. "This isn't even real."

Nahida hummed, her bare feet leaving ripples of Dendro energy where she walked. "True," she said, "but it's real enough to exist, and it's real enough for you right now." Producing a small seed from behind her back, she held it out to him. "See?" She asked, as though he was supposed to know what the hell he was supposed to do with that.

"Great. And?"

Undeterred, Nahida smiled, squatting to the nebulous ground and digging, rolling back to sit down once the job was done. Scaramouche watched her work silently, and eventually, she spoke. "A seed," she said, "will die if it isn't cared for. Sometimes nature will do all the nurturing; the rain provides water, and the sun provides light. But," she continued, "sometimes, the seed won't get either of these, and without that, it will eventually wither and die."

Scaramouche sighed. "Did you really come here to teach me basic biology?"

Only smiling softly, Nahida carried on unperturbed. "Sometimes," she repeated, "the seed just needs a little bit of extra care to help it grow." Reaching out with both of her hands, a tendril of verdant Dendro sunk into the ground, and from its place, a small, green sprout grew. Nahida smiled brightly, as though this signified something to her.

Scaramouche scoffed.

"See?" She said. "Even the most hardy of seeds still need a little bit of nurturing sometimes. If we don't care for it," she said, "the seed would die. Does it deserve to die just because it was not planted in the right spot?"

"It's just a seed." He said impatiently. "What does it matter?"

Nahida's smile did not waver. "It matters," she said, "because this is your dream. If you didn't believe that caring for a seed could make it grow," she said, "then it never would have sprouted here."

Scaramouche felt exposed in a way he didn’t like, and worse yet, he didn’t even understand why. He recoiled immediately. "This has nothing to do with me," he spat. "You're the one that came in here and started spouting all this nonsense about seeds. Controlling dreams isn’t my power. In fact, I don’t even have power at all, anymore. So why don’t you just take your seeds and your rhetoric and go someplace else?”

Nahida summoned a swing of Dendro, just like she so often did, and sat down, making herself at home in Scaramouche’s psyche, not giving him a choice in the matter. A prisoner of hers not just in body, but in mind as well.

“It’s too late for that,” she hummed. “The seed is already planted.”

Feeling hollow and desperate, Scaramouche clawed for anything. “I don’t care,” he said, “and I didn’t ask for you to go around planting seeds inside my mind, either. Can’t you just leave me alone?”

Nahida stilled, the kicking of her feet coming to a solemn halt. “Balladeer,” she said seriously – uncharacteristically solemn enough for the small, strange god that it caught him off guard, and he turned, listening to her words. “Just because a seed wasn’t given water or sunlight,” she said to him, “do you believe the seed truly wishes to die? Or does the seed simply wish it had been given the chance to grow?”

In that moment, Scaramouche realized this wasn’t about the seed at all. The fight rushed out of him all at once, sucking air he didn’t even need right out of his artificial lungs.

He just felt worn out, tired of all his years of living.

What did it matter, anyway? She had some future planned out for him that he would never see. His body was laid out prone somewhere in an endless sleep, and his consciousness was already half-dead, straddling the world between wakefulness and nothingness. In the Dendro Archon’s dreamscape, at the mercy of her whims, what reason could he possibly conjure to lie about anything, at this point? She’d already seen the worst of him.

Eventually, he sat down on the ground opposite her.

“I don’t know anymore.” He said to her at last, returning her candor with vulnerability of his own. “How am I supposed to know that?”

Nahida only smiled softly, as though she’d just shared a secret with him – a gentle expression, a kindness he didn’t deserve.

But for some reason, it didn’t make him feel entirely awful.

“What are your hopes and dreams?” She asked him, swaying on her Dendro swing like she always did.  She’d made one for him, too, but he refused to acknowledge it, let alone sit on it. “Something you really want.”

He scoffed. “That’s a loaded question.” He eyed her narrowly. “Have you forgotten where we are?”

“Nope,” she replied cheerfully, a small laugh on her lips. “Of course not. But as for me, I’d want to ride on Long-Necked Rhino. Natlan has so many interesting creatures, but Long-Necked Rhinos are my favorite. The world must look so small from up on their backs!”

Scaramouche sighed from where he’d laid on the ground, looking up into the inky darkness of his subconscious as though he were cloudgazing. Except, obviously, there was nothing to see, just like always.

He wasn’t going to reply to that.

“So?” She pressed. “What are yours?”

Seeing as she wasn’t going to let this go, he grumbled. “I don’t have any.” He said plainly.

She still wouldn’t let him dodge the question. “Even the smallest sprout dreams of growing,” she said in that voice of hers, as though she knew all the secrets of the world. Maybe she did, for all he knew. “There must be something you want to do.”

He rolled his head to the side, looking towards that blasted seed she had so ominously planted in his psyche, its green leaves poking out from its shell. It hadn’t seemed like a good thing then, and it still didn’t seem good now. It wasn’t like he’d had a say in it, though.

Scaramouche sighed, sitting up. “There really isn’t.” He said in reply. “Not anymore, anyway. Need I remind you, the last time I finally got something I wanted, it ended up putting me into a coma.”

There was no way she could say anything to him about that. Satisfied that he’d ended her topic of discussion, he moved to lay back once more, but her voice piping up again stopped him.

“Just because your hopes didn’t go the way you wanted, doesn’t mean it went wrong.” Nahida said, her tone as sagely as her expression. “How can we see the destination on the horizon when there are no signs along the way? All roads will eventually lead somewhere, even if it wasn’t where you were going.”

He hated when she spoke in riddles, because she was always saying something that made sense in ways he didn’t like. In this case, though, he couldn’t imagine how the series of events that had landed him here could be anything but disastrous. Sure, maybe being a god for a short time changed him, but probably not in a good way. Even though that was all he’d ever wanted, he only felt emptier now for having lost it. How was that not going wrong?

Scaramouche gestured at the dark, empty sky of his mindscape. Case in point – coma.

Nahida chuckled, catching his drift. “I never said you were already at your destination, did I?” She laughed. “This is but one bump on the road. Your current state isn’t permanent.”

She said that with such certainty that he almost believed it, but he wasn’t sure which option filled him with more dread – staying trapped in his mind for the rest of eternity, or waking up and facing a world filled with people that hated him.

Dying was still the kinder of all the above options, but Nahida would not grant it to him.

“So?” Nahida asked, persistent.

What he wanted… did he still want to be a god? He really wasn’t sure anymore. Now that he’d lost so thoroughly and had time to reflect on it, he wondered if his mother had been right about him all along for casting him aside in the first place. He’d tried, and ultimately, he’d failed. There must have been some fatal flaw in his system that prevented him from successfully reaching divinity. He wasn’t smart enough, he wasn’t strong enough, and he lost to someone who was born a true god. Maybe divinity was something he would never be able to artificially attain, and maybe that was just how it would always be for him. He wasn’t even sure anymore that having had a heart had even truly made him feel whole anyway.

None of that made it hurt any less.

“I don’t know.” He said more honestly.

Nahida held her feet out, gently stopping the motion of the swing. “There’s a whole world of things to choose from,” she said encouragingly. “Do you want to go sledding from the peak of Dragonspine? Or maybe go swimming with a blubberbeast?”

He sighed irritably. “Why are all your suggestions so childish?”

Humming, Nahida turned it back on him. “Is that a bad thing?” She asked.

Scaramouche held her gaze for a moment, and then deflated. “…No.” He said. “Not really.”

Smiling, she leaned forward in her seat. “So,” Nahida said, “even if it’s childish, I still want to hear your thoughts. It doesn’t have to be something fun.” She said.

What he wanted to do…?

There really was nothing. All his aspirations died alongside Shouki no Kami.

What did it matter, anyway? He was stuck in a coma, and even the god of dreams had said she didn’t know if he would ever be able to wake up from it. What he wanted was already irrelevant, clearly, but that went twice over if he wasn’t even conscious to go anywhere or do anything.

Nahida’s eyes were watching him expectantly, though, and he resigned himself to her demands.

He sighed. What did his life boil down to, at it basest?

For once, he gave her question serious thought, and she allowed him time to think, resuming her swinging in contemplative silence.

At the end of it, there really only was thing he could answer with.

Eventually, Scaramouche spoke.

“I just… want to be useful.” He said quietly.

Her motion stilled, and he felt her gaze fall on him heavily.

When he turned to look at her, she wore a small frown. “Your worth is not defined by your utility.” She said.

That was rich, coming from a god who was born with inherent worth. Even if she did nothing, she would still be useful to her nation by virtue of existing. How could she possibly say something like that without even understanding it in the slightest?

Everyone had always cast him aside because he had nothing to offer them. How could she possibly understand that being useful meant that he was wanted?

Bristling, he turned on her. “Isn’t it though? If you have nothing to offer, what are you even good for?”

All the experiences in his life had shown him this, over and over. If nothing was brought to the table, it was a waste of time, and a waste of space.

He’d brought nothing to his mother, so she discarded him.

He’d brought nothing to Niwa, who made a mockery of him in cold blood.

He’d given everything to his fledgling, who gave him nothing in return but a broken promise.

And, ultimately, he’d brought nothing of value to Sumeru, either.

This was how the world worked. This was how it was, and how it had always been.

Nahida looked sad, and he hated that expression. The only thing worse than her obnoxiously cheerful attitude was her stifling pity, and he didn’t want it.

“You’ve seen it for yourself, haven’t you?” He spat before she had a chance to reply. “You offered nothing to the sages, and they gave you nothing back. Gods, humans, it doesn’t matter. They’re all fickle and only care until you lose your value to them. This is how the world has always been. You should know this better than anyone, Buer.”

She did, and maybe that was why she fixed him with that look of sorrow.

“Still,” she said, “you’re worth more than what you can offer.”

Hearing those words, something he’d so desperately yearned to hear for so long and only having it said too little too late, Scaramouche deflated completely, his anger dissipating like a puff of smoke.

“You wouldn’t know.” He said weakly. “You were born with so much to offer.”

Nahida’s gaze was kind, and he didn’t deserve it. Not after everything he’d done to her, and he still didn’t understand why she kept coming back. Kept treating him like he mattered.

Treating him like she cared.

“And so were you.” She said.

“You won’t remember this,” Nahida said. “You won’t remember any of this. But,” she told him, “the seed has been planted in your subconscious.”

Scaramouche looked down at the small thing, pathetic in its attempt to grow out of the soil within the mindscape, as though this place were actually capable of supporting anything other than imaginary constructs. It was a meaningless void, and nothing could grow here. Surely she knew that.

“So why bother?” He asked her, not liking the way his question came out sounding more genuine than he’d intended. “Why spend so much time here when I won’t remember any of it?”

“Because,” Nahida said, “even if your brain forgets, your heart will remember.”

His sigh was long and tired.

A heart. What a joke. “I don’t have one.” He said.

“You do,” She replied, “because you feel.” He didn’t believe her, and she knew this, but she let him keep his skepticism. “And I didn’t want you to feel alone. It was all worthwhile, because I know who you are now.”

That sentence was a contradiction. Who he was, was a failure who killed in cold blood without a second thought and worked with the Fatui to bring her down. What could possibly be worthwhile about going through such an arduous process just to know him?

What was worthwhile about wasting all her time to keep someone like him company?

“I know you don’t understand,” she said, picking up on the way his expression narrowed. “But I never promised my explanation would make sense to you.” Nahida hummed. “When you wake up, I will already have the experience of getting to know you once, and your heart will remember that you knew me, too. In that way, it’s not unlike a samsara of its own.”

Oh, great. Another samsara. She’d defeated him with one before, and now she was going to use one on him a second time? Was that ironic, or was it just cruel?

Scaramouche scoffed, humoring her for the time being. “Fine. I’ll wake up, and we’ll do this entire song and dance again. What’s in it for you?”

She looked to him then, and her eyes were clear. “I won’t lie to you,” she said, and the honesty in her tone bade him to listen. “In truth, I do actually have something I’d like to ask for your help with. But, as you already know,” she continued seriously, “that isn’t the main reason. I don’t get anything out of it, really, but it’s still worthwhile to me.” She said. “I just wanted to help. I think we’re not so dissimilar, Balladeer. I think you know that, too. It is my hope that in time, you’ll learn that not all interactions between people are transactional.”

Opting not to address the second part of her statement, he only responded to the first. “Why ask for my help? I’m your prisoner. Just demand it of me.”

Nahida shook her head. “That’s not how I want to do things,” she said, “and I think you’ve had enough of other people dictating the direction of your life for you, anyway. Haven’t you?”

Scaramouche’s gaze fell. He didn’t know the answer to that, but he wasn’t going to admit it.

“If you want to help me,” she said, “then it will be your choice. But first,” she continued, “you’ll need to wake up.”

He held his breath. That was the root of all this, ultimately. Waking up meant facing the world again, facing all the pain and betrayals and the ugliness of humanity thrown incessantly at him, over and over, without end.

That, ultimately, was what this was all about, wasn’t it? He’d treated this space like his coma was inescapable, but nothing had ever kept him asleep forever and nothing ever would. The raw truth of it was that the alternative somehow still felt worse.

A breath caught in his throat, and he didn’t know what compelled him to speak so honestly.

“I don’t know if I want to.” He said, his voice small, and weak, and pathetic.

The truth, deep within his core, was that he was afraid.

He opened his mouth, but nothing more came out. Maybe he was tired of the pretext, the bravado, the anger and the roundabout reasoning. He’d told Nahida he wanted the truth, but he would not admit the truth to himself.

The way she looked at him, though, with her wise, deep eyes, made him try.

 “I,” he choked out, deciding he had nothing left to lose at this point. “I’m afraid to.”

He was afraid of finding something he cared about once more, only to have it inevitably ripped away again. Afraid to feel all the emotions he so deeply felt and had tried so desperately his entire life to smother into nothing. Afraid to pay the price for everything he’d done, afraid to live forever and achieve nothing at all. Afraid to be faced with the fact that life never had any meaning to begin with, and that he was brought into this world to suffer for no reason other than a god’s selfish whims.

And, ultimately, being forced back into it by another god’s whim.

Nahida smiled softly, so compassionately, and he hated it. Hated that she could direct such a thing at him, someone who had tried to kill her – not once, not twice, but 168 times, in her stupid, stupid samsara. The same one she was using now to figure him out, as if she could cheat her way into his trust when he wouldn’t remember anymore. What so-called benevolent god manipulated people in such a nasty way?

And yet, her gaze was kind.

“That’s okay.” She told him, her tone just as gentle as her expression. It made him feel exposed, vulnerable, like she’d torn off his outer layers to take a look inside and see how all the inner machinations of his mind worked. She’d done this before, and she would inevitably do it again. That was not a tone of voice he was used to hearing, and he did not know how to navigate it. “In truth, I’m scared of living sometimes, too. But that’s just part of being alive, isn’t it?”

Scaramouche frowned. He didn’t know the answer to that.

“What’s the point?” He said. “Why does it matter if I’m alive or not?”

The real question remained buried beneath the words, not unlike the seed in his dreamscape’s ground: did he really know if he wanted to live? What did it even mean, to live?

 “That’s the secret.” She said to him. “Nobody knows that. We simply must accept that we do live, and find a reason why it matters to us.”

Scaramouche looked to her appraisingly. All this time she’d spent invading his mind, prying answers out of him that he would never dare to share in the real world, and for what? She spoke so wisely, despite being far less experienced than him in the world, and yet still so hopeful, despite having suffered at the cruel hands of humanity.

So why…?

For what reason did she care?

“Why?” He asked her, and it wasn’t about living at all. She seemed to realize this.

“I told you that already.” She said. “Because you deserve it. Isn’t that enough?”

No, it wasn’t. He didn’t understand at all.

“You will.” The small god said, and he hadn’t spoken that thought aloud – but it seemed she’d read it from him anyway, despite his hesitation. “Maybe someday.” She smiled, looking past him, seeing something he couldn’t. “You deserve to live. Doesn’t every seed deserve a chance to grow?”

He spoke sharply in turn. “Not all seeds grow.” He said. “Some simply die in the ground where they fall. Some things can’t be changed, Buer.”

And despite everything he’d said, despite all the feelings he’d unwittingly shared, maybe this was the rawest truth of them all. He couldn’t be changed. She could bring him back into the world all she wanted, but he’d still be the same rotten puppet he was before, and always would be.

Even if he wanted to live, it didn’t matter. He would still face misery wherever he went, and he would bring misery everywhere he goes. That was a fact of the world that could never be changed. He would never find the kindness he was looking for, because it didn’t exist. Not for him.

Nahida gave him an appraising look of her own. “That wasn’t an answer to the question.” She said, taking a breath to repeat her original query. “Don’t all seeds deserve a chance to grow?”

There was a moment of silence where the truth settled in his stomach, cold and hard and searingly painful in the empty cavity in his chest.

One truth at the bottom of them all.

“I missed mine.” He said.

Maybe he’d had a chance, once, but he’d long been stripped of it. By his mother, by Niwa, by his fledgling, by himself.

Nahida only shook her head. “I don’t believe that.” She replied.

“Well I do,” he snapped. “You sure are stupid for the God of Wisdom.  Nobody wants someone like me in the world. I’ve killed a lot of people, you know. I even tried to kill you. What makes you think I won’t try again?”

Her tone was thoughtful when she spoke, as though she had already given this same topic some thought. “I don’t think you will.” She said. “What you did in the past can never be justified, it’s true,” she said, “but I don’t think that’s who you truly are, and it doesn’t preclude you from living a better future. You can make that choice, but it’s up to you whether you do or not.”

He didn’t like the way she had aimed that so precisely into the depths of his soul, so he chose to ignore it. “And?” He probed. “What will you do if I decide to kill you instead?”

“Then we’ll cross that bridge when we get there.” She replied smartly. She was still too cowardly to finish the job, or maybe foolish enough to believe in the falsehood that she had projected onto him. “I think a better question is this: do you want to kill me?”

Scaramouche looked Nahida over, from the way her eyes shone with knowledge and compassion despite the ways she’d been wronged by the world, wronged by him, to the way she exuded goodness and light as though it were even possible to do such a thing.

She was everything he wasn’t.

He thought of the way she kept coming back to sit with him despite the way he’d tried so many times to tear her down. Never giving up on him, for reasons only she understood.

Believing he could be more, despite the fact he was nothing.

“No.” He said at last, finding he truly meant it. An emotion he didn’t understand swirled in the pit of his chest when she smiled at his admission. “I don’t.”

“Then,” she replied, “what’s there to worry about?”

A lot of things, he could have scoffed – the world still hated him, even if Nahida inexplicably didn’t. He’d faced pain and betrayal at every turn of his life, even before he’d joined the Fatui. So there was no way that after everything he’d done…

Well, it didn’t matter. What ended up coming out of his mouth was completely different.

“You said I won’t remember this,” he said. “So what’s to stop me from killing you the minute I’m awake?”

Nahida shook her head. “Because you won’t.” She replied, so confidently he almost could have believed her. “Like I said before, the seed has already been planted - aside from the fact that your body is still badly damaged, too. You won’t be up and about for a while, so we’ll have some time to talk things out.”

Right, he’d almost forgotten – by design, he was never supposed to be able to move autonomously from the machine ever again. He hadn’t cared, before, willing to do anything to attain godhood. But he’d had it - even if just for a fleeting moment, he’d had everything he’d ever wanted. And for what? Did it make him feel fulfilled? Did it make him feel like he had purpose?

Was it worth it? Was all of this worth it for that one fleeting moment?

All that, for an eon of torture stuck in his mind and a body that would never function properly again?

Nahida must have seen something in his expression, and her smile brightened as she spoke. “Don’t worry,” she said cheerfully, “I’ve learnt a lot from the Kshahrewar scholars. And no, they don’t know why I was looking into such things – I told them it was mere curiosity. But there are some things I’m not sure I can fix without your help, and also…”

She trailed off, hesitating to speak her next words, and it only made him more curious.

“What?” he demanded.

Nahida looked to her feet, then, a sad expression moving over her joyful one. “Well,” she admitted, “I know how awful the procedures you underwent were.” She said, bringing up memories of the many agonizing months he’d spent being torn apart and put back together for the sake of building a god. “So I’ve been worried about…”

He knew what she was getting at, and he sighed. “It doesn’t matter.” He told her. “Whatever you could possibly do to me, I’ve had worse.”

Nahida frowned, but a spark of determination burned in her eyes as she addressed him. “But it does matter. I just wanted to make sure you’re okay with it.” She said. “Will you let me?”

That… wasn’t what he’d expected her to say.

He paused. Had anyone ever asked that before? He couldn’t remember.

 That strange feeling swirled in his chest again, and he looked away, unable to hold her persistent gaze.

“…Do whatever you want.” He said quietly.

Nahida smiled, taking it for the answer it was, and nodded. “Alright,” she said. “Then I’ll try and make sure the most painful things are done soon, so that it won’t hurt as much when you wake up. Okay?”

When he woke up, she’d said, as if she was so sure he would.

He looked back to her, wary as usual. Why care so much about causing him pain? It wasn’t like anyone else had ever bothered, and pain was something trivial to him by this point of his life. Even more, he’d caused her pain. Why was she always so kind to him, when he hadn’t done anything but make her life terrible? What did he do to earn any of it?

Was it because she felt bad for taking so much from him? Was it out of guilt? Why would she even feel bad, when he had been the one trying to destroy her in the first place? Why treat him so kindly for it in return?

She didn’t make any sense to him at all.

“You sure sound confident that I’ll do what you want me to.” He said in reply. “Maybe I’d rather sleep forever instead.”

She knew he didn’t, and unfortunately, by this point – he was beginning to think he didn’t, either.

So, she didn’t even dignify him with that statement. “When you wake up.” She repeated.

All the air left his lungs, as though the weight of reality had finally pressed on him.

“Okay.” He said.