Chapter Text
The Ninth has been gone fifty-six hours longer than he was meant to be.
It’s not as though Dottore is worried. The fool can no doubt pay someone to handle him, in lieu of having to do it himself. No, he’s not worried.
It’s simply interesting that fifty hours ago, that diver boy from the House of the Hearth surfaced with a critically wounded black seal in his arms, speared through the gut in a channel between Liyue and Fontaine. Interesting that thirty-two hours ago, that critical wound was gone, and the seal was found halfway up the stairs to the basement — with no clues as to how it had undone the very flipper-unfriendly lock on the top of the containment tank. And positively fascinating that when Dottore had claimed custody of it for research purposes, the damn thing had bitten him — and only him — no less than eight fucking times.
He sighs heavily and stares at the tank. The seal, behind its glass-walled prison, stares back at him with something he can only describe as hatred. It’s unscientific and inaccurate to speak in such terms, of course. He’d never write that down. But that doesn’t stop him from thinking it.
Beside him, the centrifuge whirs on. In between all the biting, he’d gotten enough blood to analyze. He’s almost certain the seal has been staring at it — when it’s not attempting to vaporize him with its dewy, sad-eyed glare, that is.
Dottore rolls to his feet and crosses to the tank, regarding the creature in front of him with a closer eye. From nose to tail, it’s a scant few inches shorter than him. Its glossy black fur is slicked down by the water in a way that makes the whole thing resemble a shimmering drop of black oil, even down to the shape — it is determinedly ovoid. Two black eyes peer out from behind a heart-shaped nose, and whiskers sprout delicately on either side of its snout.
It does not swim away from him.
It remains, flapping its seemingly useless flippers to keep itself aligned with him. Staring. Waiting, almost.
He sneers. “Go on, then. You know what I’m after. Stop me, if you’re so frustrated.”
It regards him. He watches it. And then the seal dives down to the bottom of the tank, loops around, and breaches itself against the ceiling of the tank with such force the room shudders.
Dottore sighs, almost disappointed. “Predictable. You do know that tank is inescapable, don’t you? All you’ve done is confirm what you are.”
The centrifuge stops with a click, and he spins on his heel. Finally, some data.
-
The selkies were a northern myth. Nod-Krai and Snezhnaya had their version of it, while Fontaine had developed another. He’d personally always found the Fontainian legend more believable, given the state of the world. The Fontainian selkie, or seal-person, was a cursed reincarnation of a guilty mortal soul, able to shift between human and seal forms utilizing a sealskin. However, they could only remain in one form for seven weeks. If they passed that limit, they would be trapped in that form forever, unable to shapeshift any longer.
It was the changing of forms that interested Dottore, not any of that business with the curses. The Fontainian prophecy of guilt and total destruction was clear enough — it was no huge leap to assume some of those guilty souls might present differently. But if a person could maintain two forms, with the only stipulation being that they had to keep track of a pelt… Well, that was a substantial asset.
The blood cells on the slide are oily. And despite having been drawn from an angry, biting mass of seal flesh, they are — unmistakably — human.
He spins to his feet and stalks for the door. Some subordinate rushes to clean and file his work, while another moves to dispose of the excess, and yet another sprints to open the laboratory door and close it behind him as he walks through. It brings a smile to his face. He’s trained them well.
Dottore yanks the first high-ranking guard he finds into a side hallway of the palace, and does not relinquish his grip on the man’s uniform.
“Where is Regrator?”
“W-We don’t know, sir.”
“What do you mean, you don’t know?”
“He’s— He’s not back yet, sir. There’s been no correspondence.”
“Tch,” Dottore spits, and shoves the guard back out onto his patrol.
As soon as the man is out of sight, his next turn is up the stairs to the southern tower of the Zapolyarny Palace. Pantalone was a priss. He liked being warm, and he liked his views, and naturally that meant living at the very top of the southern spire where all the heat collected. The fact that anyone wishing to bother him had to climb up to twelve flights of stairs was certainly just an added perk; not something the Regrator had planned for and relied on. Dottore rolls his eyes behind his mask, for the benefit of no one.
The eighth floor of the tower is a servant’s nook, so that someone can warm the Regrator’s food up before it’s served to him. The ninth is the Regrator’s office, a display of falsely tasteful decadence. It is also the last floor that anyone is meant to be able to reach. But someone has to dust his personal filing system on the tenth floor, so it’s easy for Dottore to slip through. Then a secret staircase hidden behind a bookshelf, and he’s in the eleventh floor sitting room, library, and personal study. Another secret staircase, this one activated by a tune on the piano and a floor panel, and he’s in the Regrator’s bedroom.
No one has been here since Pantalone left on his diplomatic excursion, because no one is allowed in here without his permission and presence. Dottore is cautious, yes, but it’s Pantalone that should be getting called paranoid.
He trails his fingers over the bedspread, considering.
It has been seventy-two hours since Pantalone was due to return, and the Tsaritsa is beginning to be bothered in a way that suggests imminent intervention. Which isn’t good for anyone — he is sick of being pulled off his projects in the middle of things just because this operation needs him, not some segment. It’s utterly illogical. But the fact remains that it happens, and between him and Capitano, it’s almost certain the Tsaritsa will order him after Pantalone. So it’s either find him soon, or spend days “searching” for him in Liyue (of all places). He knows exactly where the Ninth is. He’s thirteen floors below them, in a tank, hating Dottore’s guts and attempting to concuss himself with the ceiling.
He can’t exactly just skin the man himself, so that only leaves luring Pantalone out of his own volition. Which is… difficult, to say the least. There is nothing Pantalone loves more than his privacy. The first time Dottore had dropped to his knees to get a grant approved, Pantalone had tied his cravat around his eyes before touching his own belt. The Ninth hates exposure, and he hates doing things himself. Which means that even though Dottore would skin just about any mortal to watch Pantalone shed that seal-skin, there is no way he’s going to get the chance.
He growls. Rumples the bedclothes in a way that will leave wrinkles, then stalks to the wardrobe. He picks out whatever bits of clothing he remembers Pantalone wearing day-to-day, then leaves the doors open and the drawers mussed. He digs out the jewelry boxes and leaves them all open on the bed as he digs through to find all seven of Pantalone’s stupid rings. Then the gloves, which have their own box. He tosses them all on the bed, then steals one of the lush black towels from the bathroom. Wads everything up inside the towel, rolls it up into a tube, and conceals it beneath his cloak. Then it’s back down the stairs to the laboratory, stomping all the way.
Several people approach him on the way. Each one thinks better of it before they utter a single word.
Back down through the lab, with the bowing and the scraping and the doors opened and closed for him, and then he’s finally back in Aquatic Containment Unit #9. He flags down an aid as the door opens.
“Clear the lab. I want this place deserted.”
A bow and an affirmation, and she’s immediately off at a sprint without another question. He smiles to himself as the door shuts.
“It’s funny, isn’t it? I didn’t even realize the coincidence.”
The seal stares at him morosely from where it’s laying on its small platform of dry ground. Dottore produces the towel and unrolls it with a snap.
“Here we are in A.C.U. 9, and who do I have with me?” He retrieves Pantalone’s shirt, holds it up with an appraising eye. “The Ninth himself. What a strange occurrence.”
There’s a splash. The seal has rolled off into the water, and is now flattening its face against the tank wall trying to see the table. Dottore retrieves the handful of rings from the center of the wad of clothing, and crosses the short gap to present them to the seal.
“I imagine you’re a bit peeved with us all, aren’t you?”
The seal backs up, lessening its resemblance to a sat-upon pastry, and then blinks slowly at him.
“Well, that was rather rude of you,” he says, and spins away to deposit Pantalone’s accessories with the rest of his clothing. But he can’t stop himself from returning to the edge of the tank, from looking into those deep black eyes.
“Now, here is how this is going to go. You are going to get back to work, so I don’t have to go pretend to search you out. And in return, I will not speak a word of this to anyone.” He pricks his right thumb on one sharpened canine, and presses the bleeding wound to the glass. “Deal?”
The seal regards him. Then his thumb. Then the clothes on the table. Then him again.
And then it starts to change.
It’s so much faster than he imagined. The sudden rearranging of the seal’s soft features into the familiar pale face of Pantalone, complete with its soft lavender eyes; and the receding of the fur back into long black hair and an accompanying black fur pelt. In less than a second, the black seal has been replaced with Pantalone — stark naked and floating behind the tank wall, silhouetted against the pelt behind him.
Delicately, without breaking eye contact, Pantalone pricks his finger on a still-sharp tooth. The blood leaves a misty trail in the water as he reaches out and presses it against the glass. Dottore… observes. Scientifically.
Pantalone’s body is somewhat slim, but his skin is padded with a layer of softness that has served him well in the freezing cold of Snezhnaya. His thighs and hips in particular — but Dottore knew that already. He’s dug his nails in enough to feel it before, holding those beautiful hips steady while he swallows Pantalone all the way down. He knew that. What he didn’t know about was the markings across Pantalone’s skin. Black, mottled rings that litter the whole of his body from the neck down. His nails, though perfectly manicured, are undeniably claw-like. And his eyes — now that he’s seen the other form, Dottore knows what’s always been so striking about Pantalone’s eyes. It’s not their color. It’s their perpetual dilation, the way it makes him look so open, so vulnerable.
He has never understood the way people seem to fall over themselves about the other Harbingers. La Signora used to be inoffensive to look at, he supposed, and Childe is alright… but the real beauty of the Harbingers, in his opinion, has always been Pantalone and his wavy black hair, his delicate smile. Now, even more so. He’s not just beautiful. He’s inhuman… and that is so much better.
Dottore clears his throat and jerks his head upwards. “The exit’s on the top. I’ll unseal it.”
Pantalone pulls his hand away, grabs the pelt from the water behind him, and kicks barefoot off the floor of the tank with a grace that rivals Columbina’s. Dottore watches him — the undulating muscles of his thighs, the curve of his ass — and then, true to his word, unlocks the hatch.
He keeps watching as Pantalone slings the pelt onto the dry part of the tank, then hoists himself up out of the water in one powerful thrust. The trapdoor opens with a hiss. Pantalone, pelt in one hand, scrambles out with considerably less grace than he’d just been exhibiting, and Dottore averts his eyes. There’s no practical value to watching Pantalone climb down a metal ladder while completely naked.
He can’t help but glance over when he hears the pelt hit the table, though. And sure enough, his instinct was correct: Pantalone’s black fur coat, the exquisitely soft one he wears almost constantly, is a coat in more ways than one.
“You’re being surprisingly civil,” Pantalone murmurs, accompanied by the clicking of his belt buckle.
Under the mask, Dottore quirks half a smile at him. “You can’t see where I’m looking.”
Pantalone sneers at him, his face a mask of disgust. “Pervert.”
“No one said you had to change then.” Dottore shrugs one shoulder. “I was planning on giving you a bit of privacy, but—”
“—That is such a load of horseshit,” Pantalone cuts in, and Dottore scoffs.
“You know, I’m beginning to think I like you better when you can’t speak.”
“No speaking, no signing, no mora.” Pantalone, somehow already fully dressed, squeezes Dottore’s shoulder in a grip that barely masquerades as friendly. “That’s all you want me for anyway, Doctor. I know you.”
He can’t stop himself. It’s so easy to cover Pantalone’s hand with his own, to tighten his own grip until Pantalone can’t let go.
“Do you?” he asks, quietly.
Pantalone’s eyes flicker. His eyelashes are still wet, clumped together in a way that accentuates their length. He really is an exceptionally beautiful man — in spite of his attitude problem. Or perhaps, because of it. People that just rolled over and gave up were boring.
“Let me go,” Pantalone says, deadly quiet.
Dottore lets go with a smile. Pantalone stalks to the door, then spins around with his hand on the handle.
“Not a word, Dottore.”
He raises his hands placatingly. “Not a word.”
The door opens and shuts. Dottore smiles to himself.
This was going to be fun.