Chapter Text
This wasn’t supposed to happen. Nothing should have gone wrong. Why do things always go wrong? He knows why of course, everyone has been telling him from the very beginning. Broken. Unlucky. Cursed. Bennett has been hearing that from his very first conscious moment. He’d like to think he’d come to terms with it, but deep down inside it still hurt when he heard those comments. Usually he just smiles and pretends to laugh with the people, but on the inside, his heart breaks little by little, soon nothing to be left.
But this time things went tremendously wrong. It was supposed to be a small excursion, an adventure for them to just have fun. Bennett and Razor just wanted to go out and hang out around the beautiful fields and forests of Mondstadt, maybe pick some flowers or catch some crystal flies. While neither of them is defenceless, Bennett purposely tried to avoid any monster hotspots. But his bad luck, his curse had decided that was a no-go, and had to make things bad. Very bad. Maybe even worse than they’d ever been. Because someone got hurt. If it had been Bennett that was hurt, he’d say he deserved it, that it wasn’t that big a deal, but it’d been Razor, his best friend, one of the only people who didn’t judge, insult or avoid him.
The Abyss mages had come out of nowhere, surrounding them before they could react. There were three of them, highly unusual for the area, and it was his fault, because why else would so many show up if not for his bad luck? Both of them had taken a defensive position against the three mages, two pyro and one cryo. The little things bobbed around in their little shields, laughing their maniacal laughter and waving their little staffs sent their, not at all little, attacks at the unprepared teenagers. Razor tried to overload the pyro ones with his electricity, but for some reason, Bennett knew exactly why, his bad luck, his curse, today the reaction just didn’t happen as it usually would. Bennett tried to go after the cryo mage, which had bobbed some distance away. Melting away slowly but surely at the shield of the mage, Bennett dodged and parried the icicles, still getting hit by quite a few, leaving cuts across his arms and the exposed skin of his legs. Suddenly a heart shattering scream sounded out from behind him.
He did one last fire infused swing with his sword, and bolted towards where the wolf boy was. But he was just moments too late. The green eyed boy saw his friend fly backwards from the overload that had shot back at him, fire and electricity dancing across his body in small arcs, sizzling and crackling with a sound that was almost happy, joyful, a cruel irony that made the truth hurt all the more. With a loud thud, he hit the side of a cliff that proudly stood above them, and went slack. The mages cackled gleefully, and teleported away, leaving Bennett sprinting towards Razor. He hoped, he wished, he prayed to any Archon that would listen that his friend was ok, that it wasn’t as bad as it looked from a distance. Finally reaching his friend, he kneeled down, trying to assess the damage on his friend’s body. The fire had died out, burning some of his clothes away and charring the wild grey hair, leaving only little sparks of electricity dancing across the left arm, chest and face of the unconscious teen, the places where the brunt of the attack had hit, the bile inducing smell of burnt flesh filling the air around them.
Bennett felt his heart race in panic, knowing the severity of the injuries. He carefully lifted Razor’s unharmed wrist with a slight tremble to his hand, trying not to hurt the wolf boy more than he already had, and checked for a pulse. He could feel the beats under his fingers become quieter and quieter, eventually dying down into a silence that deafened the teen. He choked back a sob, and held his friend close, putting his head on his lap, and cursed at all the gods for taking the wrong life.
After what felt like hours, but was at most a few minutes, the sobbing boy heard loud footsteps coming from multiple people running towards him and the boy in his hands, covered in blood by now, both his and his friend’s. The footsteps got closer and shouts could be heard, but the white haired boy couldn’t be bothered to look at who was approaching, the only thing he could pay attention to was his friend’s body in his arms, and the burns that were his fault and how he should have suggested they stay near the city and how it was all his fault and he should be the one that got hurt and he deserves it instead and it’s all his fault it always is why is he still alive he doesn’t deserve it.-
A harsh hand pulled him up, making him scramble to not drop his friend who was dead because of him it’s all his fault, but ultimately it proved useless as someone took the weight from his arms, leaving him feeling empty. The green eyed teen finally looked up to see who were the people who found them him it’s only him now no more them, and came face to face with Royce, and some other adventurers from the guild, all of them with various degrees of resentment and anger colouring their faces. Two of them left hurrying towards Mondstadr, probably to get help. Bennett stumbled, tears still rolling down his face and breathing uneven, explanations and apologies about to tumble out of his mouth before any of the adults spoke, but Royce spoke before he could.
“What the fuck happened Bennett? You really outdid yourself this time. Got a person killed and all you can do is sit there and cry.” With every next word Royce’s voice grew louder and louder, eventually turning into yelling. Bennett withdrew into himself, tried to back away but felt as if his legs were stuck to the ground. “You should know fucking better than to drag people along on your suicide missions, maybe then no one but you would get hurt. I genuinely don’t know how you haven’t been kicked out yet, if not from Mondstadt then at the very least from the adventurer’s guild. I don’t know how your dads can still stand you.” Royce was getting closer and closer to the shorter boy, who in turn backed away more and more. Eventually the green eyed teen managed to choke out a few strangled words “I didn’t do anything, three abyss mages appeared out of nowhere and attacked us, Razor got hit by one of them and, and and-” he couldn’t get out more because of the sobs that began wrecking over his body again, making the wounds from earlier throb in pain, even if dulled from the adrenaline.
“Oh yeah because this is prime hotspot for three fucking abyss mages. We all saw the burns on the body, it’s not hard to imagine what happened.” Even through his panicked and hazy mind, Bennett realised what Royce was implying. He wasn’t wrong, it was his fault all his fault, but he’d never lay a hand on someone, much less a close friend. Royce didn’t let him get another word in, bombarding him with accusations, threats and insults.
“You might as well just run away, no one will miss you or your curse. Because that’s what you are, a curse to Mondstadt and its people. We’d finally be rid of the useless burden we’ve been carrying for 16 years.” At this point Royce began punishing Bennett back, painfully shoving at the injuries, making them bleed more than they already were. The only thing going through the boy's head was what the older adventurer had said. Burden, yes that’s what he was. Running away might really be the best for Mondstadt. Let the people have some peace and not have to be burdened by his very existence. His dads will finally be able to rest, no longer having to bear his bad luck. He’ll no longer have to bother Barbara with his constant injuries. Run away run away run away.
Before he realised what he was doing, he felt his legs take him away, far away from all the people he could hurt, kill, curse. He heard some unintelligible shouts behind him, but to him they sounded like cheers, cheers of happiness for finally getting rid of him.