The Puppet And The Past

The Accident

Scaramouche was the most horrible man she'd ever met he was self centered, arrogant, rude and downright cruel,so she doesn't know why the stars has been cruel enough to get her stuck with a murderer piece of Fauti scum like him watching her every move in Dragonspine of all places.

Mona had decided to visit Albedo and Sucrose in their lab in Dragonspine the night before while checking constellations on starsnatch cliff. She mostly only checks on constellations for clients but once a week she uses it to check on all her friends to see how they are doing. She had been quite surprised that Albedo's constellation had given her clear signs that Albedo is in love. She didn't quite know who it was BUT if his behavior was anything to go by if was almost definitely Sucrose. 'and about time too.' She thought with annoyance ' Sucrose has liked that oblivious man for so long it was just painful to see how hopeless were...' her mind couldn't help be slightly mad at Albedo even though the poor homunculus had no idea that they both have obvious crush's on the other.
With a smile of relief ghosting her face and good fortune for her friends she starts to look at her other friends constellations when she notices something peculiar ... a sign of danger..

Scaramouche.

Dragonspine was colder than Mona remembered. It could have been from the lack of a proper winter coat being in her possession after she sold it to buy a new set of cards or from the fact that scaramouche was there had made her whole body tense in harsh discomfort. That man got under her skin so easily and Mona hated herself for it. The first time they met he had said the stars aren't real and tried to kill traveler, the second time they met she had been fighting some hilichurl camp in Mondstadt effortlessly if she says so herself but paused mid fight when she saw someone watching her from the top of a cliff. She knew that ridiculous hat anywhere. It had to be that foul man. In fact she 100% knew it was him cause when she stopped to look at him a stupid abyss mage had attacked her and made her fall on her back and she could hear crazed hysterical laughing coming from the cliff.
He made her bold boil..
She started to make her way up the mountain slowly dealing with enemies easily. Normally when she visits them she just teleports up to their lab. Mostly to scare them not that a proper lady like her would ever admit to that anyways but since she knows that harbinger is somewhere on the mountain she can't risk not checking the mountain for him on her way up. As she started going farther up the mountain her she only got more worried as there had been no signs of him anywhere. She decided to go a bit faster, running towards Albedo and Sucrose's camp and going through the cave opening slightly out of breath. Albedo and Sucrose didn't notice her immediately as they had been inspecting some sort of device. When she got closer Sucrose noticed her and jumped, her ears sticking up as she did so. Albedo was unfazed and just gave her the usual greeting "Hello Mona, what brings you here today?" Mona sighed and decided to explain the great danger they are both in "The 6th Fauti Harbinger Scaramouche is on this mountain I'm not sure why but it would be safest for you both to let me teleport you back to Mondstadt." She explained with much urgency. Sucrose looked extremely terrified while Albedo had only slightly widened his eyes in surprise. He looked at Sucrose with a worried expression then grabbed her hand. Sucrose squeaked in surprise while her face was heating up. Mona was too worried about them to celebrate Albedo possibly making a move on Sucrose and was about to teleport them away when Albedo stopped her with his hand. "Mona before we go I need you to keep this with you. Make sure it's safe." He said as he shoved the strange device from earlier into Mona's hand. Mona paused her worrying for a second and looked at the device in her hands with wonder. "What..does it do?" She said slowly as she inspected the gadget. It was rusty with a glowing star on it. It almost looked as if it could be from some device from khaenri'ah. Albedo sighed and said in his usual cold tone
"That's the problem..we don't know."
After teleporting Albedo and Sucrose out of danger she decided to start looking for Scaramouche. It wasn't like he was hard to spot after all with his ridiculous hat but after looking for him for an hour she was starting to get tired and decided to rest near an abandoned hillichurl camp. She had been too distracted with trying to figure out what the strange device she had gotten from Albedo does to notice that a Ruin Grader had spotted her and was about to attack. When she finally noticed it was too late and she didn't have time to react. Then something happened, a flash of lighting had made the ruin grader short circuit temporarily and gave her a chance to attack. She was avoiding attacks easily now while dealing damage to the ruin grader. She knew she had to kill it faster but her body being extremely cold from her lack of a proper coat wasn't helping her here. A onlooker rolled his eyes and decided it's less fun for him not being the one to kill her. He dropped down next to her and the flashes of lightning from his catalyst had been able to finish the Ruin Grader off quickly. Mona looked horrified when she looked to the side and saw that disgusting man looking at her with a smug expression. She was about to say something but he beat her to it laughing " Who could have guessed the great Mona Megistus was almost killed by a Ruin Grader." His smirk got more annoying by the second and something about how he said her name angered her to no end " You." She said aggressively as she could muster in her current frozen state "You." He said while his eyes gave her a crazed look. "Why are you here Scaramouche." she said firmly while getting into a fighting position. It looked like he was trying to hold back a smile as her legs kept buckling underneath her eventually he couldn't hold it and started laughing. His laughter scared Mona, it wasn't joyful it sounded crazy, hysterical, like he was laughing at her for weak. That just made her more angry cause that's probably exactly what he's doing. Scaramouche suddenly stopped laughing but a smirk still ghosted the corners of his face. He leaned in slightly closer to her and said " You took something that belongs to me Megistus." There was a slight pause as his smile disappeared and he looked at her with a intimidating stare. Mona was scared not that she'll ever show it as she looked at him with disgust and said " I have no clue what you are talking about Balladeer." She thought this would make him even more mad but it seemed he was entertained " Okay then Megistus, resist. See how long you live." Scaramouche said his smile coming back to his face. Mona knew he wanted the device she had been given to protect but she was not giving it up without a fight. Getting back into her fighting position he looked at her curiously with one eyebrow raised in judgement. As she summoned her weapon he looked her up and down. "Don't look at me like that you prevert!" Mona said angrily. Scaramouche looked very confused for a second before he realized what she meant "Why I would look at you with any sort of attraction you perverted witch." He looked mildly offended at the notion that he even found her attractive. Which would have offended her had her plan not worked out as she was able to distract him so she could teleport away. She had teleported into a domain close by as she had been weakened by the cold. She breathed a sigh of relief but her momentary bliss was gone the minute she heard Scaramouches annoying voice from behind her "interesting." He said teasingly "So you just showed a Fauti Harbinger how surprisingly useful you can be. That's very stupid of you." He laughed as she slowly turned around shocked that he had made it into her portal "did you really think I didn't have time to grab you." His voice getting more and more smug by the minute. All she wanted to do was shut him up but her body was extremely weak at the moment and teleporting here took a lot out of her. He must have realized this and crouched next to her on the ground his eyes boring into hers. They were taunting her. "Are we done playing now? I'd like to have my prize for winning Megistus." He said innocently as his smile showed sharp looking teeth she had never been close enough to see before. "Over my dead body." Mona said with venom laced words she didn't realize how dumb she was for saying that till he got closer and whispered
" That can be arranged." As a crazy look graced his face. 'Is this really how I'm gonna die? To him? Why must the stars be so cruel.' Mona thought as she stared at him in disgust. She heard crackling and thought he must be about to attack her and closed her eyes to brace for impact when- she felt his arms on her body and started panicking and thrashing around her legs. When he saw this he rolled his eyes and sat on her lap to make her legs stop. She panicked even more now and looked at him horrified while he had an annoyed expression on his face. He wasn't even looking her in the eyes but more so searching her body. She was freaking out after realizing he was looking for the device and once he grabbed it so did she, basically playing tug of war with a relic from 500 years ago " Let go witch!" Scaramouche yelled, silently wondering how her strength came back so fast. "You first Balladeer!" Mona screamed her strength returning with her newfound anger. When suddenly a loud snap had echoed through the domain. They both stopped yelling at each other and slowly looked down to where they had been tugging on the device in shock and saw it split in two. Scaramouche suddenly looked angrier than she had every seen and had his weapon out to hit her "look what you did witc-" the angry look on his face had suddenly melted completely into a look of shock. When suddenly he was levitating in the air and engulfed almost entirely in a flash of white light. The light was so bright she had to shield her eyes as to not get blinded. When the light finally subsided she looked at Scaramouche her eyes widened in shock as she saw him laying almost peacefully on his back in an entirely new outfit. As confused and horrified as she was she still decided to crawl closer to him to get a good look and her breath was suddenly stuck in her throat. His eyes were closed in such a peaceful expression she briefly wondered if this even was Scaramouche. She had only really seen his taunting and violent expressions it was almost impossible for her to imagine he could look like this. She looked at his outfit and found he almost looked ethereal with a beautiful purple veil sitting effortlessly on his head and a almost completely white outfit with purple accents. Then she saw his necklace, a golden feather attached to red string. She was so mystified by him she almost didn't notice him open his eyes. "Scaramouche..?" Mona said cautiously still not believing completely It was him. He slowly sat up and she leaned away from him. He seemed to look only at her with big eyes and a expression of curiosity. Mona didn't quite know how to feel about this as he usually looked at her with teasing and intimidating expressions like she was only there for his entertainment. Seeing him look at her like this made something in her stomach clench. "H-Hello?" Mona said confused as he wasn't answering her. He usually would be insulting her by now and the fact he wasn't scared her more than it should have. When he finally looked away she breathed a sigh of relief before watching as he got up and looked around the domain. Usually she would have left by now but she was extremely curious at what happened to him to make him so quiet and tame. He stopped looking around the domain and turned around again to look at Mona. Mona's thinking briefly halted as he looked at her again with a new expression on his face. Was it...pity? She wondered, his weird expression he wore didn't last long as he held his hand out gracefully to the sitting Mona who was clearly weakened. Mona who was extremely alarmed at all of this looked at him with wide eyes, first he's about to kill her then he gets engulfed in light next he is acting completely different and looking completely different? I mean Scaramouche showing her pity? What happened to him? This is when Mona realized that the device had done this but why hadn't something happened to her? Why only Scaramouche? Scaramouche had still been holding his hand out and Mona decided to take it. Once she grabbed it he gently tugged her up so she was standing. Her weak knees started to buckle but this time instead of laughing he grabbed her to pick her up bridal style his face showing a calm expression. Mona didn't know what to do and just stood still in fear. As he was bringing her out the entrance of the domain Mona suddenly realized they couldn't leave the broken device there. So she lightly tapped Scaramouche on the shoulder in an almost cautious way. He paused his walking to look at her "Scaramouche we can't leave the device here you idiot!" She said annoyed. She mostly added in the calling him a idiot to check if he really did change or if this was just an act. She was surprised when his face was still almost completely blank with only a sliver of an expression it seemed he was confused at what she meant as he tilted his head slightly to the side. She pointed towards the device and he put her back on the ground before he surprisingly went and grabbed it for her. He handed it to her with that same curiosity in his eyes as earlier. Mona mumbled a thank you and she yelped as she was suddenly pulled back up into the balladeers arms gracefully. When they left the domain she finally had strength to teleport herself home and for some reason she couldn't leave him here in the cold by himself even though he seemed to have almost no physical reaction to it. He only really seemed to look at the snow curiously. Mona tugged on Scaramouches shoulders to get him to look away from the snow and he stared at her blankly like he was waiting for something..'wait is he waiting for instructions?' Mona thought and she looked at him in amazement before pointing to the ground to try to get him to put her down. Scaramouche obediently put her down gently as if he was afraid he'll break her somehow. Scaramouche turned away from her again to look at the snow coating the ground. He crouched down to grab some snow and a small genuine smile graced his face as he played with it between his fingers. It was then that Mona stopped getting ready to teleport them and decided just to stare at him in amazement.
'Is this really the balladeer?..'