Yes, yes, I feed just about all the ships at this point.


One cold and lonely night, a star falls from the sky and sinks into the ground in a booming affair. It's cataclysmic in its might, how its light expands in a spectacular explosion before snuffing out entirely as though it was never there.

It's too late, though. Everyone's seen it and everyone wants it. The pure magical might of a star's essence- every Archon will be after it for their own affairs.

Childe is a Harbinger, loyal to the Tsartisa alone. Eleventh in his title and the youngest to boot- the others find him reckless and stupid. Flashy and arrogant. A menace and a liability. Honestly, it depends on who you're asking.

But, despite their harsh words and hushed whispers behind his back, it's he who's sent out to find the star and bring it back. He, who's been gifted this mighty mission, who will impress the Tsaritsa with his wiles alone.

It's all he's ever wanted, really- to prove himself. Ever since he fell into the dark and abandoned Abyss. The Tsaritsa pulled him from those dark depths like a brilliant star herself, ever encompassing with that love she embodies.

"Don't screw it up," says Scaramouche as Childe leaves. He inspects his nails, not even bothering Childe with a polite look, obviously annoyed that he isn't picked instead.

All Childe does is grin at him, wide and feral.

#

Childe used to watch the night; how the stars twinkle and glitter as they observe the earth. Always felt a little like one was watching over him too. But this mission is a strange one, so different than others before.

It takes forever for him to figure out where to go.

Childe isn't good with directions and he only knows a general point of reference. The star fell far to the southeast, just north of Liyue. He's been sent on missions, of course, he's done his duty loyally as a Harbinger should; sent far away because he tends to cause chaos wherever his arrows land.

Never a job quite like this, though, one that's more subterfuge than anything. Childe has to play his cards carefully, listen to the locals and conjure up a picture. He has to stay quiet and hidden, lest others follow his lead.

He isn't the only one looking for the star. His goal is to get there first and fight off whoever shows up after.

The locals of Liyue, though, are suspicious, and everything they do is bound by the Law of Contracts. An eye or an eye, or, in Childe's case- information for trade.

So, he's kind with his words as he spins together compliments. Spends a day doing chores and worming his way into their hearts. It's different, having his fingers covered in the soil of the ground instead of the blood of his foes. Planting potatoes and carrots into it, instead of bodies six feet under.

Strange, the domesticity of it. Stranger still that he doesn't dislike it.

Childe's hands are broken and bruised by the Harbinger that he is, his body scarred from his tales of woe and the missions he very nearly never came back from.

They aren't meant for this kind of work.

A young girl thanks him with dirt smudged across her cheek. An old woman thanks him too, settling him into her kitchen for a heartily cooked meal set around the family hearth. Childe doesn't have time for this.

But also, Childe wants.

So he stays, feeling strange in his newfound and foreign wish. Must be the star, he thinks, granting him unwanted desires.

"The star," says the grandmother as she spoons noodles onto his plate, "your wish is to find it?"

"Yes," says Childe, graciously accepting the food.

"And what will you wish?"

Childe pauses, his fingers fumbling around his borrowed chopsticks. The question confuses him. "What?"

"We wish upon stars when they fall from the sky," says the grandmother, "Why else would you seek it out?"

Childe has never wished for anything other than to be noticed, but even that isn't a thought truly for himself. His worth is dictated by the Tsaritsa's whims; everything that he does is for her and her alone.

A Harbinger is just that- a master of none, least of all themselves.

"I have nothing to wish for," he finally says, smiling before he pops a dumpling into his mouth.

He hates the way that the lie burns deep in his chest, right behind his breastbone.

#

He finds a woman instead, wearing a dress that's been spun from starlight. Her face, a small and fae-like thing, peers back at him with curiosity as she runs her fingers through cornsilk hair.

Childe doesn't know what to do, something that's never happened before. He's never had qualms about his victims, he's always carried out his orders indiscriminately, however-

The woman watches him back, her mouth twisted slightly in subtle amusement. He doesn't know why, but she feels familiar.

"Harbinger," she greets as though meeting an old friend. "I am Lumine. Have you come to challenge me?"

Childe's already on the defensive, already pushing down the Foul Legacy that sits deep in his core. He can feel it, her power and the way it settles around them.

He never thought it might be the star he'd have to fight.

"I would love for the chance," he says truthfully, the prospect of the fight boiling the blood in his veins. Such a rare opportunity.

"Fantastic," she says as she stands upright.

Then she's gone, making the first move, energy crackling around them in blinding light. Childe's quick, barely blocking the blow, her blade glancing off his own before he pulls back.

"Didn't think I'd have to fight you," he says, "Though I welcome it."

Lumine cocks her head to the side. "Did you think that a star gives away wishes so freely? No, no- they must be earned."

She moves again and he's more prepared this time, meeting her sword with a hydro blade of his own. They clash, metal screeching as they meet in the middle blow after blow. She's good, so good, and Childe feels that foul part of him rise up once more, suffocating in its bid to take over.

"I won't fight that part of you," says Lumine unexpectedly. She's pulled back and watches him warily. "I wish to fight you, not whatever that is you picked up from below."

"How is it that you know so much about me?" asks Childe.

Lumine smiles ruefully. "What is there to do in the skies aside from watch those down here. For eons I've done just that, entertaining myself on the plight of mortals. None ever caught my attention quite like yourself."

Childe cocks his head to the side and readies his blade once more.

Lumine steps closer, reaching out with her hand. "A boy raised to be a killer, who only wants more."

"I want nothing," says Childe.

Her hands stops short just before his cheek. She's shorter than him, barely reaching his chest, but her presence feels so much larger with her boundless age and might.

"Everyone wants something," says Lumine quietly, "That is mortal nature."

Childe swallows thickly, surprised at how the will to fight within him is slowly flickering away. "What does a star want, then?" he asks.

"I am not mortal."

"And so, you do not wish?"

Lumine doesn't answer, instead, asking a question of her own. "Why ask such a thing?"

"Stars do nothing but guide our way, be it in the dark of night, or by granting us a wish. But what does a star do when it wants something for itself?"

Her sword disappears into the aether, the air sparking around the pocket of space and time. Then, she smiles, a tired and slightly pained thing. "They fall to the earth," she says, "For a star who has a wish isn't a star anymore. We become useless to the realm, and so we are cast away."

Childe's heart pounds because her plight feels so familiar. His desire to be useful, to show the Tsaritsa that he belongs to her- it's all because there are times he wants to be more than that, times that he wants to be himself instead.

There is no place for a Harbinger who isn't loyal above all.

Lumine watches him quietly. Reaches out with her hand once more and cups his cheek. Her skin is soft, so unlike his calloused and scarred palms, and it's warm, like a bright and sunny day.

"I've watched you struggle for so long," she says softly. "For eons, I've never had a want, content with my job within this realm. Until you, of course, the young man so desperate for love he'll do the worst of things. Then my heart burned for him instead."

Childe's blades dissolve into water that splashes against the ground, and he covers her small hand with his own. The stars, he thinks, how he used to watch the stars and feel like they were watching right back.

"And what was the wish you held?"

"To be with that man," says Lumine. "To finally feel whole."

It feels right, thinks Childe, this strange sort of destiny that he's stumbled right across. The Tsaritsa is supposed to be the being that embodied love, but even the tiniest flicker of what he feels here now doesn't compare. And it isn't love- not quite, not yet- but it's a kernel of something so clearly written in the stars.

"You've lost everything," he says to her in a low murmur.

"Oh, Childe," says Lumine, smiling as brilliant as the sun, "I've never had anything before now."

"I have to go back," he says, the words sinking into his gut.

Lumine presses her other hand to his cheek, taking his face properly between her fingers. "You are the master of yourself," she says, "Your very own lodestar. Only you can dictate where your future lies."

"And that wish," says Childe softly, "The one you wanted to make. Would you ever ask for it?"

She smiles up at him, smoothing her thumbs over the high arches of his cheeks. Taking in his face as though she might never see it again. "I have one wish and one wish only," she finally says, "And that's to share just one kiss."

"Only one?"

Lumine's mouth twists into a smirk as her grip against him tightens. "I wouldn't say no to more."

Childe smiles, a strange and dopey thing. His heart pounds with the feeling of potential, and the idea that there's more to him than the carefully erected cage he's put around himself. He leans closer, their mouths just a breath away.

"Eons," he says, trying to imagine how long she's waited to truly live, "Seems like an eternity. And however long they'll spend chasing us down."

Lumine laughs as she pulls him down and melts into his kiss.