@visionheldâ / @unblotââ, from diluc : â Â itâs almost as if you were never here. Â â ââ grave suggestions ( accepting )
    â perhaps i wasnât, â a smile plays on a painted face. this should be a moment caught in eternal ink, kept in the boughs of libraries only to be brought out once a decade for a showing, a viewing, such that appreciators of fine art may recall it with fondness and argue over the true meaning of it.
    here is the scene : two brothers stand before an empty manor at the dawn of a new day whereupon the sins of the day ( the night ) prior are washed away by the dim lavender morning light. they stand apart, flanked by either side of the gate which leads down the path that they had once trodden, ground wellâloved by their hurrying feet, their footprints long since worn away by time and grief. they are the same / they are not : one burning bright as the sun and swathed in darkness, the other deep as night wrapped in layers upon layers of frost. one ( red red red as blood red as the blood they had once spilled for each other red as the blood that their father spilled when he died ) stares at the house, determined, perhaps, and the other? the other stares at his brother, a smile playing on his painted face.
    where can meaning be drawn? what is the intention of the artiste? is this careless brush strokes or everything infused with meaning? is this their first or hundredth meeting in the past year? is there truly tension in both shoulders whereas one brother is smiling as if this is the most relaxed they have ever been, or is that simply how the artiste painted automatically.
    âââ see? a moment meant to be caught in eternity.
    KAEYA LOOKS AT HIS BROTHER, ( oh brother mine it hurts it hurts it hurts to look at you ) and feels a bone deep compulsion / something ancient and long dormant tender and bleeding and frozen over, burning with warmth from the inside out but, oh. itâs far easier to lean into goading, into needling, into pulling at the threads that hold diluc together and just begin to unravel them but âââ not too far. never too far.
    ( here is the awful truth : they could tear their brother apart, they know precisely how. but then âââ doesnât diluc know just how to tear him apart, too? )
    â who could say, really? â kaeya turns and begins walking towards diluc, their smile widens at the way that his brotherâs shoulders raise, tensing even further. oh, brother mine, youâll work yourself into a FIT at this rate. â you said it yourself, after all : you havenât the faintest idea who lived with you all those years, â it tears at their throat to say. I AM YOUR BROTHER IâM YOUR BROTHER WE ARE ALL BUT TWINS OUR LIVES INTERTWINED âââ diluc looks at him sharply / in response to his words spoken aloud? or had he heard the screams? an echo chamber, words ricocheting, never quite landing never quite settling. they will bear their teeth at each other, fling venom at each other, but not strike. not again.
    he does not know what drew diluc to this place, to what once was their home, a monument to their unbreakable bond, and how humorous that is to think about now, indeed. a monument that has been torn down, broken, split into pieces and given away âââ perhaps it is fate which drew them here in the early morning light / kaeya can feel exhaustion pulling at his bones, can see the outline of the dark knight heroâs mask beneath dilucâs coat. silly boy. my ridiculous brother.
    there is that aggravation in his burning eyes. there is that thing that lingers nearby hatred / but kaeya knows that it is not hatred that lies between them. WOULDNâT IT BE SO MUCH EASIER IF IT WERE? if only he could despise diluc, despise the whole of mondstadt and all of its people, be what he was born to be âââ if only love, pure, simple, straightforward LOVE had not changed him so.
    â isnât that why you sold this place, our fatherâs manor? â the distance between them closes with every step / widens with every step. perhaps they can never again cross that chasm. no, there is no perhaps about it. â it was full of ghosts, wasnât it, brother? â FATHER / BROTHER âââ would you believe them if they said they do not say it to cut, but because here they can? because it has been years since he could look at this man FACE TO FACE and know, deep in his very marrow, that this is his brother?
    ( here is the awful truth : they would never dare tear their brother apart / their secret keeper / his sole confidante. )
    diluc begins to turn to him, face set in a determined fury which lingers just beneath his porcelain skin. strange, how he seems to translucent and fragile in this early morning light, where once diluc had seemed unbreakable and strong. the starry eyes of the younger sibling. he looks as though heâs preparing himself for a FIGHT / and kaeya brushes by him, their hand landing on his shoulder for a fleeting moment. ( he remembers, once, that he had clung to diluc every time he stepped foot outside, desperate for his stability, terrified of falling into the sky. a lifetime ago. an eternity ago. ) they know without looking, even without touch, that diluc leaned away from him âââ wary. untrusting. it would hurt, it would hurt, if only kaeya hadnât expected it.
    what a mess weâve made out of love, brother. what a mess weâve made out of this family out of this home out of our fatherâs grave but we can never go back, can we? we would never choose to go back, would we? here i am âââ ME, MYSELF, MY TRUE SELF, here : peel back my layers and know the rotten depths of my truth and know that youâll love me still. the way that i love you still, though you should be my enemy, though i should feel NOTHING FOR YOU. remember how we ran together there, in that yard? remember how you found me crying there, beneath that tree? remember how i carried you to our homestead where our father waited when you twisted your ankle just down the way? remember / remember / remember. because i remember EVERYTHING.
    â but then i suppose itâs almost as if you were never there either, master diluc. â
