Chapter Text
In a world where any uncertainty is obliterated by a system that makes you dependent on it for every thought and action, Zhongli likes to think that his job offers him a greater flexibility to work with. The upstanding and unwavering word of the law is as solid as the decisions he makes, yet he valued the human touch that sets the difference between machine and man.
That hasn't always been the case, brought up in an environment just like the rest of Tevyat where the human mind was touted as a chaos that needed the orderliness of a system to dictate it, he didn't value the ability to see life from a more human perspective until he met Enforcer Childe Tartaglia… who also happened to be the source of his headache right now.
"Rosaria, are you certain that you aren't able to track down Childe's location?"
There was a sigh on the other end of the call and the sound of nails cackling on a keyboard.
"All systems are still down, Inspector. Seriously, whoever managed to take down Sibyl's system's eyes… I want to meet them, it takes some serious skill."
Zhongli muttered a curse under his breath. Childe was still missing in action. And with the chaos that surrounded them, it only meant that one of three situations could have happened.
One. Childe was out there fighting the latent criminals on his own, his ear piece somehow deactivated such that they weren't able to reach him.
Two. He was either dead or unconscious.
Three. Just like Kaeya, he had taken the opportunity amidst the chaos and system downtime to abscond.
Somehow, that last thought had hurt more than the second one. He would have liked to believe that over the course of the two years that they had spent together, the… friendship that they had developed was enough to develop Childe's loyalty to the team.
He leaned his head back against the cold hard wall and sighed. The dominator in his hand slack as he stared out vacantly into the hologram of an ad flickering on the building in front of him, its neon colors stark against the night sky.
But who was he kidding?
At the end of the day, Childe was still an Enforcer, and Enforcers were still latent criminals, someone who's mind cannot be unraveled even by the Sibyl system.
So why should he think that he, a mere Inspector, will be able to do it?
Such a silly notion indeed.
—
The day had started off relatively normal. Zhongli did his usual case filing in the confined office spaces of the Public Safety Bureau with Jean, while Kaeya and Childe fiddled with a gaming device that was all the rage in the market right now. That was until they received an announcement that was addressed to all divisions in the Bureau.
A breach in the containment center that housed all latent criminals and a hack that crippled all of Sibyl's surveillance system. In other words, Sibyl was blinded, and the divisions will be their eyes and hands on the ground now.
The last time all divisions had been mobilized was when the system was first put in place and massive revolts occurred throughout Tevyat. So for them to roll out all officers available… The chaos was unthinkable.
When they pulled up at the scene, the sight that befell them was worse than they could have imagined. Latent criminals poured out from the center in tens and hundreds as they grabbed their hands on whatever they could find as a weapon, the freedom that was taken from them for so long suddenly granted to them, fuelled their rage to destroy everything like oil on fire.
And all the more dangerous for the MWPSB officers that they were.
Parked cars belonging to the officers in the containment center overturned and set on fire, their trampled bodies can be seen peeking through the crowd of criminals rushing out.
"Stick together!" Zhongli barked at his division. "Going in isolated is a death wish here."
The team fought together, dominators blasting down criminal after criminal until a particularly large group rushed at them, forcing them to split up.
"Jean! Childe! Kaeya!" He shouted. He twisted his body away from the man trying to grab at his dominator as he shot down another criminal.
"JEAN!! CHILDE!! KAEYA!! WHERE ARE YOU?"
There was no reply from his team. The number of criminals swarming his view made it impossible to try and catch a glimpse of them. Having no choice, he gritted his teeth and fought the escapees off one by one, angling his body such that he could slowly retreat into an alley and away from the crowd.
Being all alone, he could only take down stragglers that came his way rather than actively pushing forward through the crowd, leaving the rest of the bulk to the other divisions.
"Zhongli?! Are you there?!" The earpiece crackled to life, the high pitched feedback leaving his head aching for a split moment.
"Jean! Thank archons, where are you?!"
He heard her huffing, and the sound of the dominator charging up and releasing sounding off in the background.
"I'm about 200 metres north of where we split up! I'm with division 2 at the moment, but we're surrounded. Hang on a while more on your own alright?"
Shit. Not ideal. But he could hold them off on his own for some time.
"Roger. What about Kaeya and Childe?"
There was no response for a moment and Zhongli felt his heart sink. He had a sneaking suspicion on what Jean was about to say.
"Kaeya… He…He threw down his dominator and earpiece set… And escaped with the crowd. I… There wasn't enough time for me to shoot him down."
A chuckle escaped his lip as he closed his eyes and sighed, the feeling of bitterness bubbling through his chest.
He was strangely calm when he replied Jean, much to his own surprise. "... And what about Childe? "
"No sighting of him, we lost him at the same time we lost you, but the last I saw him he was still fiercely locked in battle."
"I'll contact Rosaria and take it from here. Just focus on making it out alive Jean, I'll find Childe."
If he didn't yet escape , left unsaid by both of them.
Childe… He…
He couldn't have run away, could he? Not after the two had shared such a long time together, not when he couldn't yet figure out whatever was going on between them.
If he disappeared now, it would be the biggest regret that Zhongli would ever have in his career as an Inspector. (And maybe as a friend...or whatever they were. )
—
NAME: Ajax Tartaglia
CRIME COEFFICIENT: 299
HUE: Midnight blue
That, along with the circumstance that led to his arrest was all that was in the file that Zhongli found while searching for a potential enforcer for his team.
He was fourteen when he was brought in for rehabilitation by the system. Fourteen, an age so painfully young that you couldn't even legally drink yet, yet enough to set you in rehabilitation for life.
He was fourteen when he first killed. The man he murdered was a latent criminal that had managed to evade the system for his violent tendencies and drinking problems, who had wanted to make a quick buck from an unsuspecting family to further fuel his addiction. A robbery gone wrong, basically, that left Ajax's mother, father, younger brother and sister dead, and for him to stumble across the scene of the man plunging the knife into his young brother's heart, the poor boy's hand outstretched towards him and a cry ripped from his mouth as he saw the moment Ajax opened the door.
He watched as the light died from his younger brother's eyes and that hand dropped down onto the floor, limp. It triggered a rage so primal in him that he managed to pin the intruder down and wrestle the knife from him, stabbing it into the man's heart again and again.
Over and over.
The MWPSB team that had arrived after receiving an Area Stress alert had to pry the knife from the boy's hands, and when that was unsuccessful, he was nearly executed on the spot, the only thing saving him was the one digit off the lethal elimination crime coefficient threshold of the dominator.
A crime coefficient of 299.
"Stared enough at my file yet, pretty face?"
Zhongli's gaze shifted from the tablet in his hand to the man behind the bars. Ajax's grin was all razor sharp and vicious, boyish features dashing, and his ginger hair lighting his face in a reddish glow. All in all, he screamed danger. But danger was something that Zhongli dealt with on a daily basis as an Inspector. He wouldn't be scared by him.
"Whatever it is, I'll agree to it. Beats having to stare at the wall for every minute of the day. Rehabilitation my ass. It's just a glorified prison cell. " Ajax scoffed.
Zhongli's brow arched in surprise.
"Really?" He questioned. "Not even going to hear my preposition before accepting it?"
Ajax threw his head back and chortled, the sound like bubbles popping on the water surface, before he abruptly snapped his head forward and a dark smile crept across his face.
"You MWPSB officers already ruined my life by locking me here. You think I'll be afraid of you guys ruining it again?"
Hmm. Fair point.
"Then consider it a done deal. Welcome to Division 1, Enforcer Ajax."
Zhongli slid his hand through the metal bars to offer him a handshake. The strong hand that gripped his palm back tightly caused goosebumps to spring all over his arms.
"Call me Childe. Ajax died in that house when he was fourteen. I am not the same useless guy he once was." He said.
"Well then, the truck will pick you up tomorrow for your first day of training. I'll look forward to seeing you display your said usefulness in the field."
And that was how he had first met Childe.
—