A Shrine to Ayaka/Childe
a guide on how not to get into ayaka/childe by jade
the funniest part about this ship is that when i was first coming up with crackships for ayaka, i was like, "okay, none of the cryo women would suit her, so let's find her a man." of course, the first man and also most popular man in genshin has to be childe, but i looked at him and i looked at her and i thought, "no, he's a bit too much for her. she needs a man who can be soft with her." anyway, that's how i got down to diluc/ayaka and developed a giant childhood friends to lovers penpals au, but this shrine isn't about them.
fast forward a couple months, i'm writing my even bigger contracelestiae au with a friend (you can read it here but do note that it's still unfinished). we're writing childe and ayaka interacting and somehow they get along really well. they get along weirdly well. unfortunately, the childe in that au does not have the emotional intelligence to figure out the difference between strictly platonic interactions and weirdly romantic ones. you can see where i'm going with this. people complain that shippers will see people interacting and go "that's romantic!" that's me. i'm shippers.
some time while brainrotting for the au, an offhand comment about childe wanting to see ayaka dyed in the colors of the abyss gets me thinking about a new au. what if ayaka and ajax fell into the abyss at 14 together? would they still be trained by skirk or would they just have each other to rely on? we know that childe canonically is mildly insane because of his experiences in the abyss, so how would that affect those two? my friend, being the shameless childe simp they are, joined me on this brainrot, and before we know it, we have a compelling case for actual childe/ayaka. i would elaborate more on this, however this au got a little too unhinged for our tastes, so we've both agreed to never speak of it again. that didn't stop us from shipping childe/ayaka more.
in my delusional head, they are perfect for each other
one of the main points of ayaka/childe is that they are each other's safe space, the only person with which they can be just a guy and just a girl together. no titles, no emotional baggage, no reputation preceding them, although all of these are inevitably an influence on their initial perceptions of the other, but once they're together, that's it. for childe, ayaka is a light in the darkness, a warmth that he can carry in his heart and in his memories, and for ayaka, childe is an ardently burning sun whose energy seems endless and around which she feels her love revolving around him, yet still too far to reach. childe gets ayaka out of her comfort zone and into the foreign foods and cultures that she has always wanted to see, and ayaka is a steady foundation and an eternal home he can count on to return to.