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They meet at a scientific conference, of course. The Sumeru Akademiya hosts them regularly, and welcomes academics from every country to join them. Being that Tighnari and Albedo’s fields, while not precisely the same, do have some overlap, it’s unsurprising that they cross paths.
That they take notice of each other has little to do with the academic presentations. As interesting as a professorial take on Inazuma’s Dendrobium and whether they’ll grow in other nations’ battlefields as well (verdict: results inconclusive, due to needing to account for the presence of Electro as well as blood and soil quality, but isn’t it interesting to discuss what makes Dendrobium grow better within Inazuma too? Perhaps these findings will help with the next stage of this experiment), Albedo’s attention is quickly drawn to the fox-eared forest ranger.
It’s first because of the ears. Albedo’s familiar with many forms of animal-touched people, but he hasn’t seen one quite like Tighnari before. The silhouette worries at his mind, almost but not quite familiar, as he half-listens to the Inazuman presentation, most of his attention on examining the man sitting near the wall a few rows ahead of him. It’s not just the ears and tail; it’s also the fact that he’s not bothered dressing up for the conference. His clothes are simple, practical, and decidedly not formal academic fare.
When the presentation concludes, Albedo plants himself in the path Tighnari will need to take to exit the room.
As Tighnari approaches, Albedo feels something click. “Tighnarian,” he murmurs, an exhale of relief at naming the heritage.
It causes the other man to pause as academics eddy around them, engrossed in their own conversations. “Do I know you?”
“I do not believe so.” Albedo bows slightly. “Albedo, court alchemist of Mondstadt.”
Tighnari studies him, nostrils flaring slightly and a crease between his eyes. “You wanted to talk to me?”
“Yes.” There should be some excuse for this, but Albedo has gotten to where he is despite a disregard for social niceties, not because of them, so he simply says, “I haven’t met one of your people before.”
“I don’t believe I’ve met anyone quite like you either.” Tighnari extends a hand towards the door, where the first few people interested in the next talk scheduled for this space have begun to enter. “Alright. Where would you like to… discuss this?”
Albedo tilts his head at the particular tone in Tighnari’s voice. There’s an offer there. One he isn’t normally interested in, but curiosity begets curiosity. “I’ve been given temporary quarters in the Akademiya, unless you’ve another suggestion.”
He doesn’t expect the way Tighnari’s ears flick back. “Unless they’ve significantly upgraded the beds since I studied here, I’d rather not.” This does confirm that Albedo understood his implication correctly, at least. “But unless you’re willing to travel a good hour or so to my home, it’s likely the best option for now.”
“My apologies, but I have no context for what the rooms were like during your tenure here.” Albedo begins walking, trusting Tighnari will fall into step beside him. “For initial studies, I think the Akademiya will suffice. If further investigations seem prudent, then of course I’m willing to travel further.”
Tighnari snorts. “I can’t tell if that’s a pun or not.”
Albedo blinks at him. “I was stating facts.”
“Clearly I’ve spent too much time with Cyno lately. Apologies.” Tighnari shakes his head decisively. “Is it far to your rooms?”
“Two floors up,” Albedo tells him, increasing his pace. Tighnari easily keeps up with him as they climb the winding stairs, not seeming winded at all. He’s in good shape. That bodes well for the upcoming experiments.
They don’t speak until Albedo closes and locks the door to his room behind them.
“So,” Tighnari says, already lounging on the bed, “what do you have in mind?”
“A complete physical examination.” Albedo laughs at how Tighnari’s face scrunches up. “I… cannot remove the clinical aspect.”
“So long as you’re okay with me returning the favor.” Tighnari’s eyes are roving across Albedo’s body. “You look human, but you smell like… stone? Metal? Do you bleed?”
Albedo’s heart speeds up at the question. “I do. It is… not blood as you know it, but it serves the same purpose.” He unbuckles his belt, unbuttons his tunic, draws it over his head to bare his chest. His nipples are taut in the humid Sumeru air. “I am as like a human as I can be.”
“But you aren’t one.” Tighnari stands in a fluid motion, attention fixed on Albedo. His mouth is cracked open as he leans close and breathes in, centimeters from Albedo’s skin. “Chalk?”
Very few people notice. Albedo wants to take Tighnari apart and study him. He settles for saying, “Taste me.”
Tighnari laughs softly, showing pointed canines, and settles his hands on Albedo’s hips, fingers curling into the hem of his trousers. “How much of you?”
“Preferably just the exterior layer of my form.” It has been a long time since someone matched Albedo’s tone without seeming to find it off-putting or absurd. “Perhaps my mouth.”
Tighnari nods, presses his lips to Albedo’s chest, and draws his tongue across the peak of Albedo’s nipple. He hums, then does it again, more quickly this time, eyes closed in what must be concentration, since he’s closing in on Albedo’s preferred frequency with surprising speed.
Albedo shivers and grabs Tighnari’s hair. He should ask if it’s okay. He can’t summon the words when his breath is coming so quickly.
Fortunately, Tighnari leans into his grip and takes his mouth off Albedo’s skin for long enough to say, “You can touch my ears too. I know you want to.”
It would be embarrassing to be read so easily if Tighnari didn’t distract him by dropping to his knees and pressing his face against Albedo’s crotch. “May I?” he asks, looking up with dark eyes. “You smell like…” That same expression, mouth cracked and nostrils flaring, like a beast on the hunt. “Salt. Oil. Mushrooms? Might be my academic discipline leading me there. Something earthy. It’s…” His eyes drift close and his tongue peeks out of his lips briefly. “Good.”
“Are you saying I smell like something you want to eat?” Albedo has not heard himself described that way before. People are more prone to calling him cold and hard than describing him in mouthwatering terms. He wraps his fingers around the base of Tighnari’s ear. It twitches against his hand, the muscles surprisingly strong, and Tighnari lets out a hard breath as Albedo slides his hand from root to tip before releasing him. “Undress for me. Then, yes. I did say you could taste any part of my outside layer.”
“Some people distinguish between skin generally and genitalia in specific.” Tighnari stands and begins disrobing with quick and efficient movements. He’s still smiling. “Am I undressing you as well? Or shall you peel yourself such that your outermost layer is not cloth?”
Albedo laughs and strips himself. It’s automatic to make sure his clothes are in a neat pile, which means Tighnari is waiting for him to finish putting them away. He doesn’t seem impatient or annoyed by Albedo’s habit, which is better than some sexual partners Albedo has had, and so Albedo takes a moment to observe Tighnari properly.
Tighnari is, as Albedo had expected, exquisite. Lithe muscle, taut nipples, dark hair scattered over his chest and trailing down to a thicker patch at his navel, where Albedo can see that it’s the same shade as the fur on Tighnari’s tail and ears. He wonders, immediately, how different the texture is.
Then he looks at Tighnari’s cock, which is slender and sharply pointed and covered in what looks like soft fuzz. It is also distinctly erect, the tip red where it peeks out of Tighnari’s foreskin.
“Which do you want first?” Tighnari asks, seeing the direction of Albedo’s gaze. “My mouth? Or giving me that thorough examination?”
“Your mouth,” Albedo says, because his thighs are slick with his own arousal. He sits on his bed, spreads his legs, and says, “If you’d like?”
“I would.” Tighnari kneels between Albedo’s legs, gaze avid, still smelling the air. Albedo doesn’t consider his own scent very often; he keeps himself clean, of course, and thinks nothing of it. Tighnari is very focused on it, especially as he lowers his face to Albedo’s navel.
There is no hair there. His lack of body hair is not particularly noticeable at a casual glance, especially since Albedo keeps most of his skin covered except during encounters of this nature. With Tighnari’s attention so firmly on him, Albedo knows he cannot miss this sign of Albedo’s lack of natural humanity. He waits for a comment, but Tighnari simply hums and kisses the join of Albedo’s hip.
“What am I going to be tasting?” Tighnari asks as he slides down the last few inches. “Tell me what I should call your bits.”
“My cunt.” Albedo bites his lip and leans back so he can see Tighnari’s face more clearly. “My cock.”
Tighnari’s tongue passes between Albedo’s folds, soft and exploratory, before pressing against Albedo’s tumescent organ. Albedo shudders. He has never been able to recreate this sensation. It doesn’t matter how many experiments he runs or how many toys he tries or what elemental energy he infuses where; the touch of another person is exquisite and unique.
“You taste good,” Tighnari informs him, eyes half-closed in pleasure, before licking Albedo again.
Long soft strokes alternate with quicker flutters against Albedo’s cock, a pattern which begins at the resonant frequency Tighnari had discovered Albedo appreciated on his nipples and then evolves. Albedo’s breath comes faster with every minute. His muscles are taut from trying to keep still, but his hips still rock into Tighnari’s face, something which Tighnari seems quite pleased about.
“Can you come like this?” Tighnari asks, face covered in Albedo’s arousal. His mouth is open wide enough, this time, for the sharp points of his canines to be visible.
“Suck me,” Albedo demands, dizzy. “Bite me.”
Tighnari grins at him and drags his fangs along Albedo’s inner thigh. “Like this?” he asks. “Or on your cock?”
Albedo groans, the loudest noise he’s made this whole time, and Tighnari takes that as the permission it is.
Tighnari’s lips wrap around his cock. He swallows, closing his mouth, and Albedo thrusts against the scrape of Tighnari’s teeth, chasing sensation, fighting past the part of his body screaming that this is too much until he finds—
Exaltation. Overwhelming sensation. A primal reset as he falls backwards, chest heaving, muscles slack, cunt squeezing around nothing. Maybe he should have accepted Tighnari’s cock. Maybe he can ask for that next time.
Next time.
Albedo raises himself on shaking arms to find Tighnari sitting back on his heels, watching him, a smile still on his face. His cock, as Albedo sits up properly, is still hard. Tighnari hasn’t touched himself.
“My turn?” Tighnari asks. “Or do you need more recovery time?”
It’s still hard to think. Albedo swallows. Tighnari keeps watching him, patient as a hunter. A predator. He is both, Albedo understands, as well as an academic scholar. “Come here,” Albedo says, and allows himself to collapse back to the bed.
Tighnari climbs over him.
This wasn’t what Albedo expected, but—
Tighnari hovering above him, half a silhouette, waiting but clearly ready, is something Albedo would not have asked for. It is, however, something Albedo can appreciate.
He thinks about what he wants to learn and how much energy he wants to expend, then says, “I’d like to return the favor.”
Tighnari hesitates. “My cock has a knot.”
Albedo eyes it. “Does it.” The organ isn’t visible. Yet.
“When I come, it will lock in place.” Tighnari’s hips are rutting against the air. He doesn’t seem aware of the motion. “In a cunt this is rarely an issue. In your mouth—”
“I will be alright.” There are advantages to a non-human physique. “I will not experience ill effects.”
“If you’re certain—”
“I am,” Albedo says, and then he opens his mouth and waits.
Tighnari growls, which makes Albedo’s skin prickle with goosebumps, and grabs Albedo’s hair. “Tap my thigh twice if you need me to stop,” he says crisply. “You won’t be able to talk.”
Albedo nods once.
It is the last motion he makes under his own control before Tighnari begins fucking his face.
The part of Albedo’s mind that cannot avoid collecting data thinks about animals, heats, and rut. It wonders if Tighnari would be like this about fucking his cunt, or if Tighnari is losing control due to being allowed to fuck an orifice he rarely has the opportunity to lose himself in. It contemplates the shape of Tighnari’s cock, the texture of the soft fuzz at its base, the way Tighnari’s foreskin slides against his lips.
The rest of him catalogues only arousal. Tighnari’s noises: the grunting exhales and high whines of his breathing; the pop of his cock in and out of Albedo’s mouth. Tighnari’s muscles: the tension of his hands in Albedo’s hair, the flex of his abs, the controlled strength he uses to shove Albedo into the position he desires. Tighnari’s taste: hot skin, the musk of his sweat, the salt of his pre-come.
“Last chance to change your mind,” Tighnari gasps, and there’s a pause.
Albedo groans and sucks the tip of Tighnari’s cock back into his mouth. He’s not backing out of this experiment.
Tighnari curses and thrusts into him, Albedo’s face flush against his navel. He cries out a moment later and his cock twitches, spills, and swells behind Albedo’s teeth.
Ah, Albedo thinks as he swallows Tighnari’s come and opens his jaw. The knot is bigger than anticipated. He won’t be able to free himself.
No matter. Albedo closes his eyes and lets Tighnari control the way they fall onto the bed, his head pillowed on Tighnari’s thigh. His mouth can remain in this position for quite some time, and he doesn’t truly need to breathe, though he prefers to.
“Fuck,” Tighnari says a minute later, when his cock stops twitching in Albedo’s mouth and begins softening against his tongue. The knot remains firm and taut against his teeth. His grip on Albedo’s hair relaxes and he starts stroking it instead of clutching it in the aftershocks of his orgasm. “I’d forgotten how good that feels. Are you okay?”
Albedo gives him a thumbs-up. It’s horribly colloquial. It’s also the only unambiguously positive response he can give right now.
“Good.” Tighnari keeps petting him. “Might take up to half an hour. I might fall asleep. Wake me up if you need to.”
Albedo nods slightly and Tighnari lets out a breath. “It’ll take longer if you move.”
With instructions like that—
Albedo lets himself drift into deep thought, absently aware of his body and the growing stretch of his jaw, but mostly thinking about how interesting Tighnari’s body is, and how curious Tighnari seems about Albedo's own form.
Next time, Albedo expects, will be even better.