A/N: This is the first time I'm doing a 5+1 fic/5 things fic. Please be gentle with me

Exclamation #1—Alas!

One night, at Stone Gate, two men—one with a respectfully high tolerance for alcohol; the other, a drunkard, with a beyond-human limits tolerance for the said beverage—met under the watchful gaze of the luminescent full moon.

One of them was obviously drunk, and it wasn't the drunkard.

"For what reasons does the 'young master' require the presence of this good bard?" Venti inquires as he flits to where a Fatui Harbinger has taken his seat by the edge of one rocky cliff. It was clear that he was in a teasing mood. He brings out his lyre and makes a pass at its strings. "Perhaps to soothe the pains brought upon by drinking with song once it hits hard?"

Childe lazily lifts his head towards the sound. His brows furrow when he finds it difficult to recognize how the sounds—words? Sentences?—work.

He does recognize that voice. Did he call someone in?

To confirm his suspicions, he wills his alcohol blurred, unseeing eyes to register one thing of note: the color of this person's clothing.

It is green.

"Stop rhyming… and, screw you, you Tone-Deaf Bard," Childe says drily, then hiccups. He lifts up the bottle by his side to knock back three big gulps worth of Osmanthus wine, straight from its bottle. "Screw you!"

Yes, the Harbinger is finally remembering bits and pieces of him swearing using the Anemo Archon's name about an hour ago. Or was it ten minutes ago? Well, what matters is that the person of interest is here.

"What, too drunk already that you can't think of a better insult than what floating Emergency Food can?" Venti takes a seat beside the drunk rascal and pokes his cheek.

Childe doesn't see the sneer on the bard's face, but the poking and the tone was enough to let him know. He swings the bottle towards the bard, knowing how much the former Archon loves a good drink. If it manages to hit, that's the bard's problem.

"Ah, thanks, but no thanks." The normally wine-loving bard pushes the bottle back gently. This earns him a raised eyebrow. "An indirect kiss from you will probably send me six feet under. I'd rather not become one of your hubby's clients. But, I'll take that part of you wishing I 'get screwed' as wishful thinking on your part, ehe~"

" 'Hubby ?'" Childe snorts and clumsily uses his scarf to wipe the wine bottle's mouth, missing the mark a few times before getting it right, and offers it once more to the bard. It still doesn't hit him. Drat.

"Then don't mind if I do!" The bard, cheerful as ever, is quick to swipe the bottle from the Harbinger's hands and takes a big gulp—or five—of the sweet, sweet wine being offered to him.

"Celestia knows—hic—how much I want that to happen… but—hic—things are kinda—hic—complicated right now."

Venti takes the bottle out of his mouth and makes a loud noise of satisfaction. It has been a while since he had this particular wine, and it is as sweet as he remembers. He hums at the taste after another sip, then wipes his mouth with a sleeve when he remembers he has company. To show that he isn't some unfeeling bastard, he hums inquisitively at the rant.

"Like how complicated?"

"Eh, you wouldn't understand." Childe grabs the bottle back from the bard and places it by his side with a worrying thud—one so loud that one might think he had cracked the bottle.

He glares at the bard when the other whines and makes grabby hands at it. "You're free as a bird, hic, and your responsibilities are—hic—pretty flexible despite being—hic—an Archon."

"Shhh, keep that bit down!" Venti frantically shushes him, cupping the other's mouth. He wonders if there are some people around—the Millelith doing rounds, and the patrons by the viewing deck. "I won't refute, but you're not entirely right either."

Childe rips the hand off his mouth. "Hey! It's not like—hic—I was screaming that you're Lord Barbatos—hic—or anything!"

"Well, now you are, you drunk rascal! Pipe down!" Venti's hand finds its way back onto the pertinent mouth.

On the bright side, based from personal experience, no one would believe the words of a drunken fool.

The Harbinger leans close to Venti, ignoring his personal space and tries to appear menacing.

It doesn't work, not with the glazed eyes and slurred words that come tumbling out once the pesky hand is pried off once more.

"Don't tell me—hic—what to do, Shrimp… Spring... Roll!"

"Oh, you're hungry now, huh?" Venti notes how volatile his friend's partner is, even more so when he's drunk. "It's your fault for not bringing snacks with you."

The bard simply shrugs and puts on a smirk once more as he eagerly awaits the scary Harbinger's next move.

"No—hic—that was it." The ginger haired man retorts sullenly before withdrawing with a sigh. "That was the insult."

"Pfft, what?" Venti purses his lips, trying not to laugh at that pathetic attempt at name-calling.

"It's cause you're bite-sized, wrapped in green and aaaaargh , never mind!"

Childe groans loudly in frustration as he madly scratches his head before laying down, spread-eagled on the bed of grass behind him. The bard is quick to swipe away the bottle of wine before it gets unceremoniously knocked over by a clearly irritable drunken Snezhnayan.

If Venti's bard's (drunkard's) intuition is right, this bottle came from Zhongli's cupboard. And it would be a crime to let such good wine go to waste, watering undeserving weeds.

"How come you can go calling xiansheng 'Morax', huh?" Childe covers his eyes with his forearm.

"I told you to shut it, Whipped Mora Bag!"

Hearing the beat of flapping wings from startled birds that were perching on a tree quite a distance from them, Venti realizes how loud his outburst may have been. That statement would get anyone's attention. He whips his head around to check their surroundings and sighs in relief to find no one there. He turns his attention back to Childe, who appears to have calmed down a little. The hiccupping seems to have settled down too.

"I get it, you know him longer than I do… Can't beat two millennia worth of friendship, yeah, I know," Childe tries to brush it off. "Ha, you'd think he'd let his fiancé have that kind of honor, but he won't."

Ah, so the reason for their meeting isn't very inexplicable after all. Childe needed to drink his socks off for not being allowed to call Zhongli 'Morax', and Venti needed to babysit a whiny drunk for his stone-for-brains heartbreaker friend.

"Aww, I bet you just caught that old blockhead off guard!" Venti tries to cheerfully get the rascal back on his feet. "He's probably shy, ehe~ Don't take it to heart! Give it a few more tries and he'll warm up to it."

"Nooo, you don't understand," the Harbinger bemoans, a sob slipping along with it. "When I called him by that name, he didn't just pause. He froze ! And what's worse is he just told me 'I would be more comfortable if you refer to me as 'Zhongli', dear'. Like, what in Teyvat is that response?!"

Venti doesn't know what to say to that. He kept his silence, but he could feel a headache heading his way. And it isn't because of the alcohol. He pinches the space in between his eyes.

He's under the same predicament, isn't he? Just, without the talk about it. He just assumed it was better never to address Xiao as 'Alatus' in fear of dredging up painful memories.

But, Venti would definitely want Xiao's real name on his lips, and watch. The Adeptus makes him feel like he was a greenhouse full of butterflies when he utters the bard's true name, without an honorific.

It would be sweet, sweet payback, if his proud Yaksha would melt if he does utter his real name.

Childe forcefully brings him back to reality with a wretched sob . He's a weepy drunk too, huh?

"I bet you and that Adepti Yaksha—"

"It's 'Adeptus'. 'Adepti' is the plural form of 'Adeptus'."

Venti stills and looks behind him. The Harbinger looks (there are definitely tears under that forearm) and sounds so pitiful, he couldn't stop him from venting.

"—Bird-brain Adeptus Yaksha of yours—hic—intimately call—hic—each other out—hic—with your real names—hic—when you fuck."

And now the bard regrets letting the drunken fool finish.

"Um...actually..." Venti trails off as he scratches his cheek.

"Should I go take out this Fatui trash?" Xiao walks over to them. "Drunken idiots and high places do not go well together. I'm sure Zhongli-daren would find it believable if we say we found his corpse at the edge of this cliff."

"Xiao, go easy on him," the former Archon faces the Yaksha with the sternest look he could channel. "Can't you see how pathetically heartbroken he is right now?"

Xiao simply scoffs at him, huffing, and places his arms by his waist.

Venti expected a retort from the rascal on the ground, but he received silence. He turns his attention to the Snezhnayan and sees that his breaths have turned slower and more regular.

"It doesn't matter. He passed out." The Yaksha shakes his head, and uses a foot to lightly kick the Harbinger's shoulder. "Let us return him to Zhongli-daren. He's been looking all over for this imbecile."

"But Ala—"

Alatus . Venti almost slips, but mind stops him just in time, and provides a convenient recovery. He couldn't just call Xiao by that name out of the blue, even if it rolls smoothly on his tongue. He clears his throat and flashes the Yaksha with a mischievous smile.

"But Alas! that duty falls on you!"

He winks, even after seeing Xiao's eyes narrow in suspicion.

"You, as in, you have to haul his ass back to Zhongli's home." Venti stands up and dusts himself off, wine bottle in hand. "As much as I'd love to help, I gotta run. I can already feel the misplaced wrath that will befall on me, when all's said and done!"

Venti makes a quick getaway, fleeing to Mondstadt using the wind to accelerate his pace. He does not get to see the withering look being shot in his direction, but he could hear the soft clicking of tongue and the curse that follows it.

He'll probably get scolded and punished in some way when he finds himself back in Wangshu Inn, but the prospect of finding the right moment to call Xiao 'Alatus' has his heart blood racing and hear the sound of something beat inside him loud and clear.

A/N: Hello again, just wanted you to know that this is also cross-posted on AO3. I'm going to upload the chapters every other day, but if you want to spoil yourself, well, you know where to go. hahaha ;)

This is actually still tied to the same setting as Venti Incognito (and follows after another fic before this), but I'm sure it can stand on its own.

Also, I think I may not post the Parent Story here because the codes for linked footnotes and images do not work (not to mention, the strikethroughs). And the fic (at ~62k words), along with its 39 footnotes, will suffer because of it... Unless there is anyone curious enough to demand for it.

If it's possible, please leave a little something for me? I'd love to hear your thoughts on this!