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It’s the most miserable time of the year, the height of freezing winter, and if that wasn't enough reason for Pantalone to be annoyed, he's just been told that the train has broken down in the middle of the Snezhnayan wilderness.
The attendants are, of course, offering their most profuse apologies, and handing out hot drinks and food to tide them over for the night, but the notion of being compensated with low-quality train-car food is far from enough to keep him pacified.
“I have a meeting with one of the most promising young entrepreneurs in Fontaine tomorrow morning,” he hisses to the scientist beside him, raging internally as he pulls his silk scarf tighter over himself in a poor attempt to block out the chill. “How dare they expect me to wait out the night in the freezing cold and have my opportunities squandered like this!”
“Well, Regrator dear,” replies Dottore beside him, with heavy emphasis on the dear. “You would not be freezing right now, had you chosen to wear something more practical. Something less…decorative.”
He tilts the beak of his mask an inch upward to stare pointedly at the Regrator’s skimpy trench coat, thin scarf and heeled boots.
Pantalone is unimpressed by the remark. He buttons his coat up to his neck, refusing to concede.
“I am dressing for an important occasion,” he huffs. “You are dressed like a common peasant.”
And it’s ironic, too, isn’t it, given both of them have roots in poverty and ruin, but Pantalone avoids that topic like the plague, and Dottore has enough tact to not mention it.
“You will be fine,” he insists, changing the topic and reaching over to grab Pantalone’s hand, warming it on command. “No entrepreneur would turn down an audience with the richest man in Snezhnaya. I am sure he will be agreeable if you ask to reschedule.”
“It’s about the impression. You wouldn’t know,” retorts Pantalone, trying to sound peeved.
Still, he doesn’t remove his hand. Through the gloves, he can’t feel the comforting roughness of the scientist’s skin, but the warmth is there, made to be reminiscent of a hearth’s fire.
He lets his hand splay out then, comforted by the sensation. The gems on his rings dig into Dottore’s palms, leaving heresy-shaped imprints.
He won’t admit it, but he is grateful.
He tilts his head back, relaxing against the plush seat. It’ll be a trial going to sleep tonight. By default he is a terrible insomniac, and to fall asleep in a sitting-up position on a cramped train with someone beside him? He’ll count himself lucky if he gets more than an hour between all the tossing and turning and lurching off his seat.
By the window, the snow continues to fall. The scene would be charming, were it not for the blizzard delaying their journey. The fact the view doesn’t shift in front of the window at all makes it feel like time has stopped alongside the halting of the train.
Pantalone’s fingers twitch irritably, itching for something to do. A contract to sign, workers to direct. What misery it is, to be isolated from the world and its goings-on. How many important deals and discussions he must be missing out on right now.
The warmth on his arm grows a smidge sharper, and he turns to find Dottore’s palm holding his fingers down, preventing it from twitching. He makes an attempt to shake him off, but the grip remains firm.
“Stop thinking about work,” insists the man, forcing him to stay still. “There’s hardly anything you can do to fix matters.”
That elicits from Pantalone a hiss of displeasure. The corners of his lip curl downward in the slightest show of impatience. It’s hell, being stuck somewhere with no way out, because in the past whenever he’d been stuck he’d always just wrench his way out no matter what.
Unfortunately, patience is not a virtue he possesses much of.
A sharp-toothed grin spreads across Dottore’s face as he leans in on him, their shoulders brushing, and reinforces his hold on the banker.
“Struggle any longer and I’ll administer you a sleeping drug that’ll knock you out till dawn.”
Well, that seems to do the trick. The twitching dies down in an instant, perhaps fearing the consequences of any further movement. He’s been on the receiving end of Dottore’s extremely potent elixirs more than enough times that he can count, and he has no interest in doing so again, thank you kindly.
His head tilts, angled towards the Doctor’s, and the heavy musk of his perfume carries about him like a cloud. The tranquility is pleasing, much as he won’t deign to say it— nothing like the rush of life back home, always having something to complete on his hands.
It’s nice, he decides.
There’s a sudden rattling behind them, and Pantalone startles, Dottore hastily snatches his hand away, both their heads snapping up at the exact same time to face whatever’s coming in through the carriage entrance.
The glass door of the carriage swings open, and a cart is wheeled through, its badly oiled joints creaking, followed by a young attendant in tow. Pantalone grimaces as the wheels flatten the red plush carpet on the carriage floor.
The attendant comes to a halt in front of them.
“Her Majesty the Tsaritsa’s most honorable Harbingers,” she says breathlessly, bowing deeply to them. “We would like to extend to you our sincerest apologies for the train delay. We understand that your reaching the destination is of utmost importance, and we are afraid we do not have many resources available, but we will try our best— how may we make your stay tonight more pleasant?”
By getting that engine started, thinks Pantalone, but he has enough decorum not to say that out loud.
“Tea for two, please,” he says, in the most controlled, polite voice he can muster. “And—”
Dottore stops him before he can finish. “Actually, I’ll have the hot chocolate.”
So unhealthy, scorns Pantalone in his head, and the scientist ignores his expression, dipping his head to the attendant in thanks as she prepares their drinks. She offers them food, and both of them decline, having already dined prior to boarding.
Actually, Pantalone had, to be exact; Dottore had inhaled two granola bars in between rounds of paperwork and called it a day. But it’s fine. He doesn’t need food like Pantalone does. It’s no more than an unnecessary indulgence to him. He only eats to satisfy his sweet tooth, when he feels like it.
After pouring them their drinks, the attendant thanks them, apologizes once more, and pushes the cart out of the cabin, leaving the two of them alone in the well-lit space once more.
Pantalone is the first to lift the cup to his lips. The absence of a wispy curl of smoke at its mouth is the first sign he won’t like it, but it would be a waste to leave it untouched, so he drinks it anyway.
Unfortunately for him, his suspicions are correct. The tea is hardly warm, tepid at best, and a shudder runs down Pantalone’s spine as the liquid goes down his throat. The taste isn’t much better, either— he personally thinks he could brew better.
“Not very good, is it?”
Oh, that dratted scientist, he sounds almost smug now. Pantalone would have smacked him if he did not have so much decorum (and if they were not in public). He stubbornly bites the edge of his cup and drains the tea as fast as possible.
“You don’t have to pretend to enjoy it,” Dottore says. He’s having a field day making a show of drinking his hot chocolate.
The banker grits his teeth. “It tastes fine.”
“See, it’s safer to pick chocolate because it’s good at any temperature,” he replies, taking a long sip of his mug. “Pu’erh tastes terrible if it’s anything below boiling.”
Fine. He’s right.
Pantalone concedes and lets out a sigh, putting the cup aside. “I wish you had warned me earlier.”
“And you wouldn’t have listened anyway, so what would be the point?”
And he’s right on that too, but Pantalone refuses to admit it, for fear of feeding his ego further.
The cabin lapses into a brief silence, though not uncomfortable. Pantalone stares at the mug in Dottore’s hands, as if to make a point.
Dottore ignores him. Pantalone continues to stare.
The scientist groans, relents and offers it to him.
“Three sips only,” he orders.
“Mm,” Pantalone replies through a mouthful of chocolate. That is most definitely not three sips, Dottore grouses silently to himself, but he lets it drop.
It’s still not as rich as any of those Fontaine-made delicacies made with homegrown cocoa and fresh cocogoat milk that Pantalone’s grown accustomed to, but beggars can’t be choosers, so he lets it slide. Cheap cocoa will have to do for now.
It’s only when he’s drained half the cup does he finally let go and hand it back to a very unamused Dottore, who deliberately turns it around to the side of the rim that doesn’t have his saliva on it, and bolts down the rest of the mug in seconds so Pantalone won’t be able to make him hand it over again.
Outside of the train, a loud noise abruptly sounds, the thrumming of a frozen engine trying to come back to life, and he perks up a little, peering out the window in the hope the train has restarted, but then there’s a squeak and a bang, followed by the acrid stench of smoke wafting slowly into the room.
“That can’t be good,” Pantalone says, nose wrinkled.
“You think?”
The buzz of conversation that grows gradually louder floats in from next door, followed by more frantic apologizing.
“The economy-class passengers must be displeased,” murmurs Pantalone as he fans away the fumes.
“You would be, too, if you were resting in a crowded train car with a seat measuring ten inches across instead of an empty luxury compartment.”
Well, he’s not exactly wrong. Pantalone allows himself a small chuckle at that. He doesn’t think he could ever go back to sitting in those cramped spaces again.
Dottore sets his mug down. Judging by the current situation, they’re likely going to be here for quite a while more. It’s past eleven now, and the sun is beginning to set outside the window. He reaches past Pantalone and smudges the layer of fog that has formed on it, making room for a beam of light from outside to shine its way through.
“Shut the curtains, won’t you? I’m being blinded,” complains Pantalone, putting a hand up to his face to block out the glare of the sun. Another hand reaches over and yanks it back down, and he reopens his eyes to find the sunset straight in his face.
“Don’t be such a downer, Regrator dearest. Take a look.” He gestures to the window, taking the banker’s shoulders and turning him around to face the glass. “I know you love pretty things.”
In return, Pantalone scowls.
The nerve of this man, giving me orders left and right.
But something in him, some infinitesimally small part of him that wills him to soften at the Doctor’s touch, it wins him over and forces him to comply.
He blinks, adjusting to the light that seeps through the shadows of the pine trees, the glow made even more radiant by the alabaster snow. In between the mountains, an orange light pulses, painting all the surrounding clouds in splashes of gold that fade to pink at the edges of the sky, where dots of white begin to flicker.
There’s sunsets all the time back in the city, but he hasn’t seen ones this quiet in a long time.
He lifts a gloved finger to the window, leaving a quick sketch on the glass. The sunlight going through it stretches into an elongated stripe going all the way across the carriage, illuminating the pale marble.
Out of the corner of his eye, in the reflection of the cabin, he can see a smile behind him. It’s artificial, too-white. Reminiscent of a shark’s.
Somehow he finds himself smiling back.
Dottore nudges him to keep going.
So he does. He scrapes and wipes off more of the fog, revealing more of the landscape beyond the sun, all the distant valleys and ridges, entirely void of mortal activity.
The snow has stopped now. Beyond that it’s all streaks of violet, a child’s finger painting imprinted into the sky and land. Everything is clear, pure. He can almost smell the crispness of the fresh winter air. It's picturesque in a way that reminds him of mass-produced holiday greeting cards.
But lovely nonetheless. He’d be willing to go out for a short walk around the area, if only he weren’t wearing this impractical little coat.
He frowns. Hm. Maybe Dottore was right about that.
He brushes the thought aside and watches the sun slipping down, as if it’s a droplet of rain that’s hit the wall and is trickling its way to the ground.
Impermanence.
It’s all temporary, breakable. Things that’ll be no more than a fond memory at the back of his mind by the end of the week, kept there for whenever he’s stressed and wants something to reminisce on.
But he finds himself soothed by it, the atmosphere, with no sound in the cabin at all but for soft, slowed breathing and the whistle of the wind, quieted down as it taps against the windows.
“It is pretty,” he agrees, at long last.
“Told you so,” returns Dottore, grinning.
The spill of yellow light swathing the back of Pantalone’s head in a dappled veil is interrupted momentarily as he pauses to look back at Dottore.
“Has anyone ever told you,” he says, “how condescending you sound when you are proven right?”
The words are haughty, judgemental, but the humor in his tone overshadows it, as does his expression.
It takes just that single turn of his head for Dottore’s heart to melt.
It’s his eyes when he smiles, crinkled into little crescents, that Dottore finds so endearing— slits of pale gold that have endless sunsets and sunrises buried in them, starlit by wonder and folded over with the markings of crow’s-feet, gloved hands pressed against the window, the rings on them glinting individually, each a different shape.
He looks back, and his hair is haloed by the sun, droplets of liquid gold spilling onto dark curls and dripping off the ends of each strand. The smile is soft, genuine, not at all like his usual businessman exterior.
Here, in a train carriage in the middle of nowhere, Dottore finds his banker most beautiful.
He wants to take this slice of time and bury it, deep down in his mechanical heart, a world where there’s no war and no Celestia, just two people stuck on a train late at night, savoring the moment.
A hand curls under his arm subconsciously. He lets it stay there.
He’s never cared much for public transport, nor disliked it. It’s just a means of getting from one place to another. For convenience and nothing else.
But as sunlight dims and dissipates into moonlight, the world outside draining to blue and gray, he feels the pulse of a blush rising against the top of his cheeks, equal parts affection and excitement. Finds himself wishing for the delay to last longer.
Sometimes it’s the journey that matters.
He’d dismissed the quote as sappy drivel, once.
Now he thinks he understands.
The sky is almost completely dark now, the light dying where the horizon meets the snow-dusted slopes of the mountains, and the beginnings of a dance swirl at the edge of the firmament, of green and pink intertwined.
“Look,” he murmurs. “The northern lights look even better from here, don’t they?”
And Pantalone would disagree, just to be wilful, to make a complaint for the sake of it, because he’s Pantalone and he’s disagreeable and all they do is bicker over useless things.
But he doesn’t.
“They do,” he finds himself saying.
Really. They do.
It’s so easy to forget, when they’re having these moments, that it’s all a temporary reprieve from what is to come.
Beside him, Dottore sits back and lets out a quiet sigh.
Tomorrow they’ll be in Fontaine. And it’ll be back to work like usual, the monotone of everyday life, signing paperwork and fixing up inventions, sitting through dozens of meetings in order to negotiate terms of a contract to their advantage. The thought curdles his stomach.
But that is something reserved for tomorrow.
Tonight, he can wait.
He lifts his hand to close the velvet curtains, pulling until only a small sliver of moonlight manages to make its way through into the cabin. Right on cue, the artificial lights in the carriage flicker, the swaying miniature chandelier shutting off to give them a good night’s rest.
“You should sleep,” he says. “It won’t do you any good to be half-asleep tomorrow.”
Pantalone huffs gently.
“Don’t nag me, Doctor. I know what I’m doing.”
He says those words in the same way he always does, callous, impatient, the front he puts up all the time.
But Dottore knows better, in the little mannerisms of his that follow, the incline of his head towards him, closer, closer, his eyes kept on him all the while, cushioning himself comfortably in the crook of his neck.
Deliberately, Dottore warms the area he’s resting on for him, hoping it’ll ease him into sleep for the night. He feels the installed mechanics inside him whirr into motion as he does, powering the system that lies just underneath his skin.
Thirty-seven degrees Celsius, like always. Gentle heating, on-and-off for five minutes. Just the way Pantalone likes it.
“Good night,” Dottore whispers, and receives an incoherent mumble in return.
His head is rested peacefully on Pantalone’s shoulder, teal curls spilling onto black laced with silver, and their fingers are quietly, discreetly twined.
Outside, the scene begins to move, and a faint noise whirrs below them as the train finally restarts and the side rods on the wheels begin to chug, a soft rhythm for both of them to fall asleep to.
And it doesn’t matter, Dottore thinks to himself. It doesn’t matter if the train is late.