this same song and dance

3

The next morning, Teucer packed his mask and temporary insignia into his pockets, and tried to leave the house as stealthily as possible.

He had just set a note on the table and was about to creep out the door, when there came a quiet voice from behind him.

"Hey there, little bro, how are you feeling?"

Teucer whirled around, clutching at the first makeshift weapon that came to hand (which happened to be the wooden hatstand from abroad that Tonia had given to their parents a few months ago). How had Ajax managed to sneak up on him like that? Were all toy salesmen so adept at going around undetected?

"Oh wow." Ajax had his hands up in surrender, although he thankfully seemed unfazed by the hatstand being brandished in his face. "You've got really good reflexes, don't you?"

Of course Teucer had excellent reflexes, he was more than just your ordinary, rank-and-file member of the Fatui. He was (unfortunately) the kind of agent that could be called upon on short notice to directly serve under one of her majesty's Harbingers for an undisclosed length of time.

Not that he could say any of that to his big brother.

"It, uh, comes in handy for reeling in all those fish." Teucer carefully put the hatstand back down so the noise didn't wake up anyone else. Everyone in their family was such a light sleeper, and the last thing he needed was for them to hear something going on downstairs and also show up to investigate. "What are you doing awake, big bro?"

"Just wanted to check on you, since you seemed a little off yesterday." Ajax came closer to get a better look at his younger brother's complexion. "Are you feeling better this morning? Also, are you heading out right now?"

"Oh..." Teucer's mind was racing as he scrambled to put all the rehearsing he'd done after dinner last night in his room to good use. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm doing much better, thank you! Nothing a good night's sleep couldn't fix."

"That's good to hear."

"And as for going out, you see..."

Ajax waited expectantly for an explanation.

"I, ah, got called into work unexpectedly. There was something that came up with one of our affiliates -Fishing Association affiliates, you know- and they're short-staffed this week, so they wanted me to come in to help out. I wrote a note to our parents about it just now." Teucer gestured to the note he'd left on the table.

"Oh." Ajax nodded along, then paused as something occurred to him. "Didn't the fishing season in Snezhnaya end two months ago?"

"Did it? I mean, umm...be that as it may, fishing bureaucracy is year-round. I think." There was nothing Teucer wanted more right now than to be out of the house and buried in a hole somewhere far away. But desperate times called for desperate measures, and now it was time to employ one of his secret weapons. "Sorry, ah, I should really get going. I'd thought I could take the time off to spend time with you and Zhongli since you've come all the way back home for the toy convention, but..."

"Oh, no no no no no, it's okay!" Ajax was still just as susceptible as he'd ever been to Teucer's patented 'big, pleading, baby blue eyes' technique that he'd used to get his way ever since he was four and saw a toy he'd wanted from a random kiosk (his big brother had just about trampled everyone else in line to get him the plushie [which Teucer still had in his room, by the way], indirectly teaching him that the cute-little-bro power he wielded should be used wisely...which was to say, all the time). "It's okay! We can still spend time together after you get back home! Besides, we all know everyone is going to hog Zhongli from me every chance they get, so I'll have plenty of time to think of fun things you and I can do when you're not at work! We can do our classic Ajax and Teucer hangouts just like when you were little! How does that sound?"