Chapter Text
Louis Pasteur slammed the journal down onto his desk hard enough to rattle the glass vials beside it.
“Impossible,” he muttered.
The sharp scent of chemicals filled the cramped laboratory, mixing with the rain-soaked air drifting in through the open window. Outside, Paris blurred beneath a grey winter storm, but Pasteur hardly noticed. His eyes stayed fixed on the article spread before him, the German words practically burning through the page.
Robert Koch.
Even the name irritated him.
Pasteur snatched the journal again, rereading the lines with growing fury. Koch’s newest publication described experiments proving that microorganisms caused disease — detailed observations about infection, contamination, transmission.
It was everything Pasteur had been arguing for years.
Everything.
“He copied me,” Pasteur hissed.
Across the room, his assistant Émile carefully set down a flask. “Monsieur Pasteur—”
“He takes my theories, rewrites them in that cold little scientific style of his, and suddenly the Germans call him brilliant.”
Émile wisely said nothing.
Pasteur paced the length of the laboratory, boots echoing sharply against the stone floor. His beard twitched with irritation as he ranted under his breath in rapid French. The worst part was that Koch’s experiments were good. Precise. Clean. Irritatingly convincing.
Pasteur hated that most of all.
A knock sounded at the door.
“Not now!”
The door opened anyway. A university courier stepped inside, clutching a sealed envelope. “Message from the Academy, monsieur.”
Pasteur snatched it from him with obvious annoyance. The poor man nearly fled the room afterward.
Émile watched cautiously as Pasteur broke the seal.
At first, he only skimmed the letter.
Then his expression darkened.
Then somehow darkened further.
“Oh, absolutely not.”
Émile looked up. “What is it?”
Pasteur read aloud with the kind of fury usually reserved for public executions.
“‘The International Congress of Medical Sciences proudly invites Monsieur Louis Pasteur and Herr Robert Koch to present their findings jointly at the University of Strasbourg this spring.’”
Silence.
Émile blinked. “Jointly?”
Pasteur looked ready to set the paper on fire.
“They cannot possibly be serious.”
“But Strasbourg is neutral territory,” Émile offered weakly. “Perhaps they believe cooperation between French and German scientists could inspire—”
“Inspire murder, perhaps.”
Émile coughed to hide a laugh.
Pasteur glared at him.
The truth was, everyone knew about the rivalry by now. French newspapers praised Pasteur as a visionary genius. German journals called Koch the future of medicine. Every conference became a battlefield. Every publication sparked another argument. Scientists across Europe watched them the way ordinary people watched boxing matches.
And now some idiotic university board apparently thought forcing them into the same building was a wonderful idea.
Pasteur dropped heavily into his chair, rubbing a hand over his face.
“No,” he decided. “I refuse.”
Émile hesitated. “You cannot refuse.”
“Watch me.”
“The Minister of Education already endorsed the event.”
Pasteur froze.
Slowly, he lowered his hand.
“…What?”
Émile reached for another paper sitting unopened beneath the letter. “This arrived earlier.”
Pasteur grabbed it.
Sure enough, stamped in official ink, was a notice informing him that his attendance would represent not only French science, but France itself.
He stared at the page like it had personally betrayed him.
“This is blackmail.”
“Patriotic blackmail,” Émile corrected.
Pasteur groaned dramatically and leaned back in his chair. Across the room, glassware bubbled softly over blue flames while rain battered the windows harder and harder. Strasbourg. Days trapped at a university conference beside Robert Koch.
Wonderful.
Absolutely wonderful.
—
Several hundred miles away, in Berlin, Robert Koch was having a remarkably similar reaction.
“No.”
His assistant looked up from a microscope. “No?”
“No,” Koch repeated flatly.
Unlike Pasteur’s chaotic laboratory, Koch’s workspace was painfully organized. Every instrument sat perfectly aligned. Every note was stacked in exact order. The only sign of disorder was the letter clenched tightly in Koch’s hand.
“The university board insists,” his assistant said carefully.
Koch adjusted his glasses with visible irritation. “I have no intention of spending a week listening to Pasteur turn science into theatre.”
“He is very respected.”
“He is very dramatic.”
The assistant bit back a smile.
Koch returned his attention to the letter, jaw tightening slightly at the elegant French signature near the bottom. Louis Pasteur. Even written down, the name felt argumentative.
Worse, Koch knew exactly what would happen.
Pasteur would interrupt him constantly.
Pasteur would speak over him.
Pasteur would probably accuse him of stealing ideas before the first lecture even ended.
And somehow, despite all of that, Koch already knew the man would still be the most interesting person in the room.