Chapter Text
Pantalone is nothing, if not a very ambitious man.
He bears many such qualities for which he might be widely known. He is patient, and intelligent; dignified, a near paragon of wealth, political sense honed to a fault. His pride is the kind of sin they banish from cathedrals, his hatred a poison borne from apathy, and yet, none of these traits are so ingrained in his reputation as is his great ego, a monster of vengeance, a self-love so uncharacteristic of a man who was once an impoverished little child.
Ego begets entitlement, and this conviction that he deserves all he is able to accomplish– and the things he has yet to achieve– is what creates his drive to do the impossible. The people of his hometown feared ambition. In their own search for stability, their self-righteous ignorance, they sought only a perfect mundanity, a life of false fulfillment in which they would need not confront their own shortcomings. Thus, they failed to differentiate between ambition and the forced admittance that their lives, ultimately, have been lived meaninglessly.
Pantalone suffered for this, but his mother suffered it first.
His hometown, in their ignorance, exiled his young mother for her petty crimes of murder and medical malpractice. For a long while, he held onto skepticism regarding his mother’s innocence, perhaps out of foolish affection for the poor, degenerate town he’d been born in. If that many people agreed to discard her, then maybe she’d truly done something wrong– committed a crime against the heavens. He nearly believed that, surely, if reputation is decided by public opinion, then so must be morality.
Mostly, though, he maintained that his beloved mother had done no wrong.
It wasn’t until years later, once his mother had long perished, and he had found himself in the care of highly questionable medical operatives, that he got his hands on the accusation documents. The legal papers written and stamped by the town’s clerical office– the only form of court in that dastardly dump. He’d read through the crimes, once, twice; faded ink detailed how she’d extract non-vital organs from her patients with the least possibility of recovery, how she’d split open dead bodies to study their insides, how she’d killed a man who sought to ruin her. All done in pursuit of understanding, of attaining knowledge formerly forbidden.
An ambition like no other, is what had befallen the glorious woman, through no fault of her own. Pantalone only followed the journey set up for him, where his own willingness to wield power opposed those insignificant people. It is in this self-assurance that he achieves all he has– after all, ambition is only as dangerous as the extent of possibility offers. His ego simply promises that anything he is able to take, he both must and should take.
From his hometown, to the facility, to the Fatui ranks, and finally, flitting in between meetings and ballrooms to secure his dominion over the world’s money, ambition is burned into him like a brand on his back. He is bitter at his lack of vision, at the lengths he must go to achieve what others are unwittingly blessed with, but it makes him better. Colder and cunning. Ruthless– perhaps more than can be deemed necessary.
Then, he meets Il Dottore, and a world of possibilities opens.
Zandik is what he is told to call him. Pantalone is, naturally, put off by the brutish nature of the man at first. He is 20 when he first sees him, out of the corner of his eye as he is spared from becoming a medical test subject, courtesy to his silver tongue. A doctor’s lackey treats his wounds, and all the while Feofan can only look at this strangely dressed, slinking man.
He is 26 when they properly meet, freshly ascended as a harbinger, and still drunk off the novelty of exploitative wealth. Zandik is 39, then, a wily, shrewd-looking man propped up all the way down the crystalline meeting table. They are spoken to for the length of dusk to dark, when the sun has gone down, but the sky is still alight with the sun’s reflection. The moon, in its cold, uncaring falseness, casts silver across the doctor’s face, as he dismisses all administrative tasks, outright.
Shameless, he unloads them onto him, the Regrator, as if he has been promoted for the sole purpose of tackling the doctor’s deadweight. Pierro does not acquiesce, instead condemning Dottore to the terrible chore of completing his own paperwork, and that is when Zandik first turns to look at him. Unmasked since the start of the meeting, the doctor’s eyes are red– a dark, rich crimson, like a putrid culling of blood. They stare him down, calculating, trying to discern if Pantalone offers him any worth.
Later, the Regrator studies each of the harbingers carefully, subordinates silently stacking report after report at his deskside, an action he has grown accustomed to. The files are immense, far more than he could have previously accessed. He leaves the doctor’s information for last, which is no easy feat– it seems his existence is intertwined with Zapolyarny, Snezhnaya, and Teyvat itself. He shows up in half of all the files detailing the most essential events of Teyvat’s lifetime, either as an operator, a variable, a control, or the result. His inclusion is perfunctory within history’s archives, as if it is simply where he belongs.
All that said, it is another year before they meet face-to-face again. Much to Pierro’s displeasure, the doctor sends only a hologram, or one of his little copies to the meetings not conducted by the Tsaritsa. Pantalone himself has settled in quite nicely– never free from the business of maintaining mora, but now firmly established as the Harbinger’s banker. A year that, when considering the scope of their partnership, is as insignificant as the lives of those townsfolk.
You dwell so boringly, Feofan. Are you not the sole fool who would condemn me for reminiscing?
Quiet, doctor. Your very existence ‘dwells’.
They meet, this time, in Zandik’s lab. Pantalone has been injured, and Zandik renames his medical file from his subject label, to his full, real name. Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel. When he inquires why, he is met with cryptic words that give him more questions than answers. He has tried to recount the conversation, this encounter that triggered their lifelong partnership, but memory evades him. The elixir of immortality may preserve his body and cognition, but even the doctor’s most prized success cannot preserve that which no longer matters.
Simply put, it is everything that comes afterwards that is truly important.
That visit blooms into countless visits, meetings in Pantalone’s office, nights in Dottore’s lab working, testing, exploring. In him is awakened a new addition to his ambition– to defeat nature itself. It is a long accepted principle that those with enormous wealth must eventually grow bored, and seek other means of entertainment. Pantalone is no exception. With fingers in every gold pot possible, having overcome chance and achieved delusion, he turns his sight on fate.
And there is no such fate greater, or more universal, than death itself.
Of course, the other workings of fate interest him as well. Is it this intangible law that has dictated that he remain visionless? It must be, for he does not lack ambition. Who chooses who and what receives the blessings of the heavens? Why should he not try and defy all restrictions placed upon him, if he is able? He is no stranger to death. It claims humanity, observes it, wraps them up in a cycle of mediocrity. Humans cannot resist growing obsessed, can they?
Ambition is only as dangerous as possibility. Il Dottore is a very dangerous man, indeed.
So they partner, well and truly. Zandik conducts his experiments, makes his segments, tries to forcibly wrest himself from the ongoing march of time. Pantalone needs not force anything– simply lets the resources flow where he desires. If pursuit fills him with a lust for success, then a shared pursuit ignites the flame between them.
They make a formidable team. They begin when Pantalone is 35, and it takes a decade of experiments before Zandik can prove that his aging has slowed to a stop. He is frozen in time at 45, breathing and moving and bleeding, the most life-like of puppets. He is not like one of the doctor’s segments, not quite as…non-autonomous, in that his memories and personality catapult forwards, evermore greedy, evermore prideful.
Zandik is 58 when he achieves Pantalone’s immortality, but not his own. He–
That’s enough. Feofan. No need to wax dramatics over a failed experiment.
You’re no fun. Fine, if you’re so tired of recounting our history.
Did I say I was? I do not tire of these stories. I never will. It is only that I can see your quill shake from all the way down here, in your excitement to make your needlessly grand declarations. You know, I’m surprised you haven’t left Zapolyarny to become a heretical fanatic!
…Half of you dead, the other half sightless, and still you torment me in conversation.
Soon enough, Pantalone relies on the doctor in their quest to defy the heavenly principles. The elixir’s recipe, though simple in its instructions, calls for a taxing operation that occupies an entire prime segment’s attention for multiple days. It is not something that can be easily replicated. Though Pantalone begins to spend more time with the primes– Omega, in particular– it seems his own talents have never lied with the specificities of scientific experimentation.
In his pursuit of immortality, Pantalone is completely chained to Il Dottore, whichever form he may take.
He had questioned it, in the beginning. What must it feel like, to have one’s own mortality so fatally connected to another’s? As if being laid out and open on an operating table, pale as a lamb, with the doctor’s hands elbow deep in his chest and lung viscera weren’t enough. As if being entrusted with the cataloguing of each piece of Dottore’s soul weren’t enough. As if storing a fragment of the man in his personal Northland Bank chamber weren’t enough. No– Pantalone, already made a servant, is made one of the Doctor’s most cherished belongings– an experiment.
As much as he will plod on about the importance of process, the value in patience and procedure, Pantalone cannot deny his love for results. He is not the scientist; he is only a banker, a slave to each business expenditure that might line his coffers. Dottore is the one in love with the process, addicted to investigating the fibers of the world, if only so that he may surpass them. Successful as an experiment he may be, the doctor’s dedication to him– if it can be called that– is more a dedication to his practice. The endless chase to achieve more, to grasp things not meant for him, to wrench success from whatever might limit them both. It reminds Feofan of his mother, in all their wretchedness and similarity.
It is the purest form of ambition Pantalone has ever seen. He thinks that is the source of his own affection for Dottore, because it can only be that, at this point. Affection. Love, if he may. He is too selfish to place anyone above himself, of course, and maybe his care for the doctor is only a child of his interests, but the emotion remains.
Hands of a surgeon, brain of a heretic, heart of a god.
In the depths of night, over tea and Omega’s efforts to push the budget, Zandik declares the splitting of his soul. Pantalone, the servant, can only follow.
It feels like fate.
He knows it is contradictory. The entire purpose of assisting Zandik is to defy these very chains, the threads determined by the heavenly principles. But, he justifies to himself, is this not simply a redirection? Does this new mission not constitute the same motives?
Why shouldn’t he contribute to Dottore’s descent as Irminsul’s god, if that is his righteous place? Why shouldn't they defy any and all restrictions placed upon them? If they were not meant to claim dominion over the heavens, over the rooted truth of the world, then circumstances could not have allowed it at all, no?
If the rules- the heavenly principles- are so absolute, then to be allowed to brush the notions of surpassing those principles is just evidence of their own exceptionality. Freedom from the laws, and freedom to the laws. Therefore, the principles are what allow their own usurpation. If Pantalone and Dottore–Feofan and Zandik– are able, then that must mean they are ultimately entitled to such powers.
Their capabilities must only represent their birthrights. It is this careful delusion that brings Pantalone to Dottore’s feet- complicit and implicated all at once. It matters not that his duty is simply to fulfill a contractual will. No– that cannot be the source of this gnawing need, this terrible want, this wish to be the most forefront witness to the destruction of the Teyvatian laws that he so despises. Instead, it is Pantalone’s own mortality– what allows Zandik to die.
He is not so arrogant to think that possibility means permission, or that willingness begets desire. Just as they have lived together, sought power together, so will they die together. So he tempers this aspiration, his wanton pride, the quest to cheat heaven and laugh in the face of their lowly, human fates.
It is all so much. So pure, unadulterated by baseless doubt.
Zandik’s descent is glorious. His death, even more so.
–
Goodness, Feofan. I thought you’d never stop.
Hmph. I always have an ending to my writings. I’m sure you wouldn’t understand, though. That’s alright.
Me? A rambler? Certainly not. That title belongs to you alone, dear Regrator.
You would consider me the talkative one? How surprising. Say, when we spoke of those pointless paradoxes, in the dendro archon’s dwelling, did you consider the possibility of continuing this life at all?
Interesting. You would rehash the contents of our last conversation, yet maintain that they are pointless.
Oh Zandik, I only ask.
Hm. I suppose that, at that time, I’d already run through all matter of possibilities in which I live on– and none were more appealing than the original calculations. Death was necessary to control Irminsul. A less radical approach might achieve the destruction of the current rules, but they would not have left ample opportunity to rewrite them for myself. It is unfortunate I was overpowered, but it is what it is. As I’m sure you’re aware, I’m quite satisfied with these results.
Yes, you mentioned that. Your final experiment will serve well as your funeral procession.
Of course, there were other options, but none so foolproof as this one. Being thwarted is simply part of the process, I suppose.
Yes, I suppose.
…
…
…What lingers on your mind, dearest Feofan?
Must anything? Can I not enjoy the silence you have never afforded me? It is the least I can enjoy, since you are dead.
…Are you upset? Hah! My dearest Regrator, always so cruel and cunning in his affairs, has emotions after all!
Oh quit– I could say the same for you! Even your affections are all meticulously calculated, are they not?
Certainly not! I have never made calculations regarding our relationship, banker. In fact, I would say my personal interests in you are entirely unaccounted for, outside the business aspects of our partnership.
You lie, doctor. You lie terribly.
Ahaha! What reason is there for me to deceive you? We are not opposed, nor have we been in life. I could hardly justify lying to you as I exist in this state, the final threads of my consciousness. That would be quite inefficient, and I don’t enjoy inefficiency. As you know.
As I know.
…You are upset.
I am not.
Are too.
Am not. Such baseless accusations.
It is not an accusation, only concern. Come, tell me, Feofan. Whatever could possibly worry you now? You are freed of suspicion, the Tsaritsa will not forsake you, and I, the source of your troubles, am soon to depart. Breathe, Regrator.
I breathe perfectly fine, thank you.
You evade my point. And don’t light another one– I can almost smell it. Is it your impending death, perhaps?
It is not. I have no such attachments to life.
You call me a liar then say these things. It is natural to fear death, Regrator. The only reason I do not is because I am not wholly human.
That is no flaw, doctor.
I’ve realized as much.
…
Feofan.
…
Are we not an amicable pair? Do you believe us not yet adequately devoted? Do not deprive me of your ailments. Come, communicate! Don’t you harp on about this sort of thing?
My fears are not of any concern.
Then telling me will be no burden. Oh banker, won’t you entertain this fading soul in its final moments? Speak with me. Converse in these thoughts as you have thus far.
It is an irrational thought.
Our existences are irrational. So too are our successes and failures. The conquering of Irminsul is, despite endeavoring to do so, irrational as well. We are creatures of ego. Our hubris ensures that nothing we do is purely objective, despite my years attempting to counter that.
Fine, if you insist on prying.
I do not insist, only strongly suggest–
I plan to follow you.
…
Zandik?
I’ve underestimated you. That is, perhaps, a degree of irrationality I did not expect.
Hmph. I told you so.
Yes. Yes you did. Now explain why, Pantalone, when I have exercised so much grief to keep you alive all these years? Your lung is grown from my own, Tsaritsa’s sake. I slaved away for forty days and nights, making enough elixir to sustain you another three years. You would forsake all my hard work?
And now you attempt to convince me otherwise. I shan’t share my concerns with you ever again.
Well, you are rather lacking in options there.
I’ve made my decision, Zandik.
And what a foolish one it will be! Are you some Nezhdanov? …Perhaps this is an experiment of your own, Regrator?
Perhaps. Ah, a correction– if it will soothe your dying soul, then yes. This is simply an experiment of mine.
Do not jest.
How dare I.
Tell you what, then. If you plan to bring forth your own avoidable death, then this part of my soul shall join you. Irminsul still serves passing souls, after all. We shall reunite. Is that your true goal?
If it is, it is a borderline hopeless one.
Is that not the purpose of this final experiment? To test our bounds, as limited as time may be?
Yes, our time is limited. Limited indeed.
I do wonder what prompted this. Have you missed me so dearly, Regrator?
I have.
Ah, rarely do you offer an admittance so vulnerable.
Such is the case when it is for you, Zandik.
I am honored, my dearest banker.
…
Banker?
…
Ah, dearest Regrator?
…
…Feofan?
–
When Pantalone commits suicide, he expects nothing.
He has never thought of himself as a weak man. He still does not. For all his weakness, how terribly field work tires him, he does have a half-decent pain tolerance. It is partly why he settles for Il Dottore’s medical services when he can easily seek out more conventional treatment, like the other Harbingers often do. He doesn’t mind the poking and prodding, and besides, the doctor has only ever been rather gentle with him.
So he is not particularly concerned with pain when he selects his method of suicide. He despises the notions of old age– his body is only 45, yet his muscles and joints have already declined to the point of inconvenience. And yet, he chooses to forgo his daily dose of the elixir, cleanly finalize his affairs, and lie down in the plush, decorated bed he stores at the back of his office. It’s a cozy, albeit gaudy, portion of the room, separated by a silk-screen partition painted by the finest artists Liyue has to offer. Dottore obtained it for him through one of his… less scrupulous ways.
When asked for a reason behind the sudden show of generosity, Zandik had only changed the subject. For a century, Pantalone believed it was to bribe him for further funding. As if he had ever been cheap with the mora allocated to Dottore’s insidious plans, strung along by the promise of bigger, better, more blasphemous results.
It is perhaps the nature of the elderly to reminisce once they realize that their futures grow short. A final breath of nostalgia as death comes creeping forward. Time is heartless in its marching– Pantalone finds that worse, now, with the letters sent, the will completed, the manifesto of his personal ideologies written and sealed.
He awaits the rapid aging, the shriveling of his blood and bone, the drying-out and cracking of his brain. His prized mind. He expects agony– a human simply does not age 400 years over the course of an hour, and feels nothing, of course. Fear does pound at his still-youthful heart, but only a little.
This process– his end– was explained to him by Omega, some 200 years ago. His body will catch up to him, should he ever miss a dose. More than once, Dottore has sacrificed his stately fashion to adorn vials of the immortality elixir, in an effort to curb the inevitable emergency that is Pantalone’s forgetfulness. The vision of Zandik unhooking a vial from his ears, gripping back his head by his hair, and forcefully inserting the vials under his tongue, is a fond one. It is a shame that he can only afford to mull over these memories as he approaches his end.
Pantalone, the dying man, expects nothingness.
His expectations are met, for the most part. His body turns brittle, limbs cold and still, a lifetime of abuse rendering his lungs shaky. His breathing turns hollow, the sound of his thumping heart turning to tin in his ears, like his body is a gilded box, gold and diamond innards rattling away. His sight blurs, because his eyes went crippled years ago, a great darkness engulfing his mind. He feels his faculties crumble. The rush of the ley lines’ elemental power thunders over his soul.
And then, his expectations are cracked. Broken, actually. Smashed against the loom of fate, like glass sets thrown onto Dottore’s lab floors during particularly heated fights.
The world burns.
He is thrown every which way, a mess of disorientation, limbs pulled wide apart then crumpled together. He can feel himself accelerate, impossibly fast, a speed and sensation completely unfamiliar. The world narrows to a pinpoint, an icy chandelier splintering light, a flickering candle flame, the momentary shine of passion under fluorescent lights.
His last thought is his own name from Zandik’s lips.
–
He awakens an indeterminable time later, with no fanfare. He is far more familiar than the typical patient to waking up from operation, clearing the haze of chemical sleep, but this time comes as a sudden jolt instead of a gradual surfacing. Brushing away cobwebs, stretching, feeling the strain in his innards. The slow focus of the doctor’s face in his field of view is starkly absent. It is at this point that he realizes– he has never once endured a medical operation without at least one of the segments by his side. Omega, mostly, but 25 too.
Pantalone finds himself in a frigid, concrete cell, iron bars staked floor to ceiling, entrapping him. There are a few others in here as well; gray, worn things, huddled into their respective corners, heads down. The room is relatively small, four cells lining the walls, and Pantalone estimates about twenty other people in holding.
He, himself, is cold to the point of shivering, dressed in some frayed hay sack, a busted left hand haphazardly handcuffed to the nearest pole. It very quickly brings him back to the days immediately after being sold to medical experimentation, which, naturally, now puts him in a foul mood.
When Dottore said he would try to ‘reunite their souls’, Pantalone imagined something more romantic. Their personhoods dispersing into the ley lines side by side, perhaps. The brief and momentary revival of their key accomplishments. A hallucination of them, intertwined on his bed, Dottore ghosting his latest piano pieces over Pantalone’s ribs. A final hurrah.
Something that is not reviving him into a too-vivid experience of his darkest days.
He tugs at the cuff, loosely. The others in his cell flinch, and he fights the urge to laugh at them. Ridiculous. This entire thing is ridiculous. He feels blood congealing somewhere in his stomach, a pit of unease, pressure rising to his head and too-fast heart. Dirty, uncut fingernails press bloody crescents into his palms. He shakes in sudden anger, breaths coming fast.
He’d wanted death. The nothingness that he was promised by the ways of their world! To be consumed by Zandik’s godly domain– that was the only comfort left to him. The only way he could remain close, and now–
“Oh, he’s finally snapped.” Someone whispers. He realizes the maniacal laughing in his head had bubbled out minutes ago, hollow, chopped sounds prickling at his dry throat. It sounds like him, at the very least. The body feels like himself.
Reincarnation. What a horrible, frivolous thought.
What reckless thing have you done this time, Zandik? Unlike the strange, drifting connection he’d had with dead Dottore before, no one answers.
“You. Tell me where we are.” He pinpoints a young boy whose head was slightly less bowed than the rest.
“M-Me? Oh, um, we don’t– we don’t know. Everyone here is for the test subject money…” So this is a rendition of his own life. Maybe.
“Why am I the only one cuffed?”
“Uh… you would… lash out. Badly. Y-You smashed your own hand, so they… yeah.”
“Speak up, boy.” He squeaks, but Pantalone pays him no more mind. He thinks– if Dottore has somehow dropped him into some alternate timeline, then he must have jumped as well, no? He will have to find him, then. And quickly– 400 years of luxurious comfort makes this regression ever more unbearable.
Luckily, it seems, he does not have to wait long. A long strip of light stretches against the floor as the door creaks open. Pantalone has to crane his neck to the right to see past the next cell, and once he gets a good glimpse, he starts to cackle. A clicking, shredded, horrendous thing, made from vocal chords far beyond fried.
Because standing at the door, exuding a strong indifference, head buried in a clipboard, is Omega. Aged nearly identical to 35, Omega raises his head and surveys all the subjects– prisoners– with forlorn eyes.
How interesting, Pantalone remarks. He’s chosen to forgo his usual mask.
Then, he begins to wonder. Is this reincarnation, or a time warp? In the past, it was a nameless Fatui soldier who’d come to extract him from the subject pool. He hadn’t made contact with Dottore at all until a while later, when he’d been fixed up a little. Even then, his examination had been done by underlings, while 25 stood in the back, entrenched in some other work.
“Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel. Raise your hand.” He drawls.
It is at that moment that he realizes– this is not his Dottore. The voice is too dismissive, too uncaring. Even in all his apathy, the doctor had always spared bits and pieces of interest for the banker, varying only in degree, and from segment to segment. Not once had Zandik called his name with such indifference.
This was not the Zandik with which had spent 400 years of devotion.
It hurts. He is loath to admit it, but being forgotten grips at something held deeply inside. It is something close to betrayal, he muses, as he raises his uncuffed hand. The door to the cell is unlocked and swung wide, Dottore stepping in to unlock his wrist. Surprisingly, or maybe not at all, no one moves to leave. Huh. They must still be under the delusion of receiving compensation.
Dottore waits for him to leave the cell behind him, before he locks it back up. Pantalone glances at the boy from earlier– there is a deadness to the boy’s eyes that washes away any concern that might have accumulated in his chest. If his assumptions about his situation are correct, then he is in no position to worry about others.
Come to think of it, he cannot pinpoint the age of his own body. Centuries must have rendered him comfortable with the physicality of a 45 year old, which, compared to that, he feels absolutely sprightly. Thinner, shorter, and weaker too, perhaps, but there exists that hardened core of energy that can only be found in youth.
He looks up and down Dottore’s back. The doctor leads him down a sterile hallway not unlike the abyssal labs in Zapolyarny, save for the blinding fluorescents. In an effort to ignore how cold his bare feet are on the tile, he peeks into the passing doorways. He glimpses simple furniture and equipment, in a style he cannot name. Their screens seem to require physical linkage to their energy sources– wires and blocky pipes strewn about– with boards featuring a language he does not recognize.
Furniture here– wherever here is– bears no gold, no engravings, no embellishments whatsoever. They must be incredibly poor, Pantalone thinks.
Finally, Pantalone turns his attention back to the likely catalyst of the situation. He had briefly wondered if it was Zandik at all, or if another scientist simply had an unfortunate face, but as he observes the doctor’s strides, there is no mistake. No one walks so horribly stiff as his doctor. He is like a soldier wrapped up in splints and tourniquets, knees unbending, arms folded behind his back.
The second issue to address is the way Zandik addressed Pantalone. Back in their partnership’s youth, the issue of Pantalone’s title had quickly arisen. The doctor called him all sorts of things– Regrator, dearest Regrator, dear banker, Pantalone, Feofan– and he hadn’t had the heart to say he preferred the last one. It took a year for them to hammer it out. Pantalone was anything but Feofan in public, and Feofan only in private. Their names soon became precious, like pieces of their souls they could trade back and forth.
Eventually, Dottore had given him an actual piece of his soul.
Pantalone’s thoughts– introspection!– are interrupted as they reach an elevator at the end of the hall. It is, just like everything else he’s seen so far, woefully undecorated. He looks at the doctor, who is dressed simply, but not plainly. The long-sleeve shirt is evidently tailored to his slim build, tucked into crisp gray slacks.
A terrible thought grips him.
Perhaps in the past, when Pantalone had not yet ascended as a banker, the doctor had lived in such dire straits as these? If this is meant to be an alternate version of their livelihoods, beginning from the start, then does this mean Zapolyarny had neglected Dottore to the point of– of– this abject poverty?
A chill runs down his spine. His origins may be humble, but truly! Not a speck of gold on this entire palace floor, when even Inazuman peasants carry valuable amulets?
That is, assuming this is the palace after all. There are few windows and even fewer chances to catch a glimpse of the outside world, so Pantalone settles for observing this strange new world. He’s fairly sure it’s reincarnation, but he can’t place what type of region this is. Frankly, he thinks he’s not in Teyvat anymore at all.
“Birthday?” Dottore speaks so suddenly, Pantalone jumps. It’s the second time in this world that their eyes have met. Ruby red greets him, sweeping him up and down. Finally, the banker gets a full look at his front, and notices the name tag– Il Dottore.
“Mine?”
“Yes, your birthday. Verify it.” Dottore gives a long suffering sigh.
“Ah. Well, you see, doctor, I happen to be suffering from a terrible bout of amnesia, and cannot for the life of me recall my–”
“You are Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel, no?”
“I am indeed. As I said, I–”
“Just give me your birthday so we can wire you the compensation. You’re getting excused from the experiment due to inadequate liver function.” Dottore looks back down at his clipboard. His disinterest is evident on his face, but Pantalone can spot irritation on the doctor like stains on a white coat.
“If my liver is inadequate, then perhaps you should grow me a new one, Zandik.” He says it recklessly, without thought. If he’d been more cautious, he’d have properly considered the drawbacks of calling a Zandik who doesn’t recognize Pantalone by his real name.
The doctor raises his head slowly. The elevator hums as it ascends. Lights flicker. His neck itches under the shirt’s rough collar.
Then, very quietly.
“What did you call me?”
Before Pantalone can reply– try to rekindle nonexistent memories, flounder for excuses, beg he won’t be killed– the elevator doors slide open. The sight that greets him makes him want to cry, or scream, or faint, or a combination of all three.
He has seen vast interiors. He’s held balls in the grandest halls in Teyvat, lived in Zapolyarny for centuries, tended to Northland bank’s endless coffers and even higher ceilings. None of that compares to the sight that lies before him.
Glass– a wall, a dome, a fortress made of it. White metal splits it into triangles and trapezoids, like the frozen spray of interference in an elemental barrier’s surface. It arcs over him in an enormous dome, a tower held up by gleaming trusses, sun falling soft and gentle about the pale marble floors, as natural as if there were nothing blocking it at all. A burst of sun-dappled greens and deep emeralds cluster in the center, a planted group of lavish flora flinging tropical leaves outward.
There’s a breeze circling the interior for how large it is. Of course, he has seen glass domes, and plant life vibrant beyond description, but the scale of everything is what takes his breath away.
It seems to be a major business center. People do not linger; they make brisk, sharp strides towards wherever they’re going, briefcases and papers clutched tightly, the clicking of high-quality shoes echoing up into the dome. Pantalone turns around slowly, head tilted upwards, as he attempts to follow Dottore through the intersecting crowds. He is enamored by the architecture– entire sheets of glass and steel, twisting up into each other, all sharp edges and contrasting silvers and concrete roadways. Their height is dizzying– in Teyvat, their first architectural instinct is always to go down– he believes it comes from some deeply-rooted desire to get closer to the leylines.
Here, it seems, their only wish is to reach for the heavens.
“Quit ogling, hurry up!” Zandik’s voice ties him down from floating wonder. Pantalone hurries after.
He is led to an unassuming office tucked along the side of the dome building’s base. There’s a number of offices slotted alongside, glass windows shuttered closed. Dottore opens the door for himself, and lets it slam in Pantalone’s face.
“You…!” Zandik is not one to be rude like this! The doctor is mentally unwell, not an ingrate. He has not been treated like this since…
Ah, well. Since he became a Fatui Harbinger, which, in this world, he is clearly not. Pantalone will just have to correct such behavior once Dottore’s memory catches up.
He opens the door and settles carefully on the chair nearest to the door. His body still twinges– knees knocked cold, skin stretched dry over his feet, bruises down his rib and of course, his smashed hand. He’s surprised it hasn’t caused all that much pain until now, but he chalks it up to the shock of reincarnation.
…That’s what this is, right? He’s been reincarnated in a world with dizzyingly tall skyscrapers, fashion and architecture he doesn’t understand, no memory of how he got to this point, and a Dottore who looks at him like scum on his shoe. Like one of those Inazuman novels, where some girl is dropped into the world of her most recent reading pastime, and must utilize her knowledge of the future to save herself from a terrible fate…
Except, his own life was so convoluted that he’s not sure if anything is applicable.
He stares the doctor down, now. Il Dottore, who would have been the sole consistency from the old life, who is currently typing on his computer, brows furrowed. It’s a cowed, uncharacteristic calm from the man.
“Are you a spy?” Zandik asks. Pantalone blinks.
“What?”
“You must have been sent by the government. Hah! To think they’d send someone over a little legality squabble.” For a moment, Pantalone is washed in a sense of relief– this is the demeanor, the tone, of the Zandik he knows.
“I am no spy. In fact, I have no memory of how I ended up here at all. I believe I’ve been reincarnated in a body very similar to my previous one.”
Having been a connoisseur of these novels, (field work for Harbingers, with the exception of the brutish eleventh, can get very boring after all,) the one thing stopping him from becoming an avid reader was the frustration that’d arise every time a character tried too hard to pass off as the original soul. In his own case, this might work, but why would he do that when there is no long-term benefit to deceiving the man in front of him? The truth will come out eventually, whether by force or his own unfamiliarity with this universe’s workings.
Dottore looks at him like he’s insane. He’s sure it seems so.
“Does the government have enough resources to spare me a sleeper agent? What stupidity. Here, just verify your goddamned birthday and you can leave. Wasn’t that what you were trying to do, anyway?” He nods to Pantalone’s hand. Ah. Had the previous him been so truly distressed? A rather reckless thing to try, even for his self-proclaimed ‘adventure capitalist’ tendencies.
“As I’ve stated. My memories extend back to the death of my old self. I have no recollection of this body’s circumstances, so I would greatly appreciate it if you explained them to me.” He smiles. “Right, Zandik?”
The doctor’s left eye twitches.
“Alright alright, whatever the hell, I’ll wire it anyway. Tell your government superiors they need a fucking warrant before trying to confiscate my assets. God, these imbeciles.” Pantalone waits patiently as Dottore loudly smashes something or another into the monitor– a computer, his brain supplies. Finally, the doctor shoots to a stand and walks back out to the door, vaguely gesturing for Pantalone to follow.
This time, the door is not slammed in his face. Only left to close before he gets there.
He exits, watching Dottore disappear into another nameless hallway. He has half a mind to follow him, but if there is no spark of recognition at all, it would be useless to push further. At this stage, anyway.
He takes stock of his own body. He needs to get his wounds checked, and it would be nice to change out of the itchy clothing. He is used to… finer living, you see. Very few of his garments are anything less than a hundred percent Liyuen silk or fine linen, and all his outerwear is lined with soft, fluffy alpaca wool.
In his pocket, he finds a small device, a quarter the size of a standard Fatui screen tablet. He thumbs along the edges and clicks a button to turn it on. His thumb moves with muscle memory, and the tablet– phone– opens with a click. The screen is succinct in its function, but thick and clunky compared to the sheet-thin holographs he is used to.
Regardless, it is imperative he finds his bearings within this body. The world rushes around him, too-loud and too-bright, and he is not one to stand around like a dithering idiot. A residential location, personal information, financial circumstances– he must grasp the conditions of this new life as quickly as possible.
Both Zandik’s death and his own are still fresh in his mind, painful, weeds growing in the cracks of uncertainty, but there will be time to address them later. There will be time to find his Zandik, later.
He meanders out the dome building, past the roaming pack of head-down pedestrians, and promptly walks straight into the road.
–
He does not get hit. He does not get scammed either, and he has reached the destination procured from the phone’s contents relatively unharmed, so Pantalone figures that it is a job well done. This world is not terribly foreign. In fact, it is the same in far too many aspects, with the exception of no elemental powers, industry on a much greater scale, and a lack of any higher power. Powers that can be proven, anyhow.
His apartment is modest, though bare-boned in its lack of furniture, tucked on the edge of a Port Ormos that is distinctly not the Port Ormos he has visited in the past. The pieces of knowledge this body’s memories provide him are helpful, but confusing all the same. These places bear the same names, and vague wisps of the same aesthetics, but that is where the similarities end.
Dust sifts around when he enters. Beyond the entryway, there is a kitchenette and a subpar living space. The floor turns from hardwood to concrete, walls switching between pale drywall and exposed brick. There’s a fake-leather couch, sagging and plasticky, next to a shelf and a tiny square table. There’s only a stool and the minimal household items strewn about.
He peeks into the bedroom, which is right across from a cramped little bathroom. The bed is but a cot on the ground, plain clothing hanging exposed on a rack, computer propped up on a stack of thick books– Human anatomy volume I, Teyvat Encyclopedia XX34, and one more with the spine violently scribbled out. There’s a closet, and nothing else.
He cleans and dresses himself, first and foremost, and gathers if his hand isn’t actively hurting anymore, he can make do to ignore it. He cracks open the vent window, bits and sounds of the city’s nightlife floating through the apartment. For the first time in forever, he takes up the task of cleaning his own space– dusting, wiping, vacuuming.
It’s strange, though– the more he cleans, the less he believes anything here has been touched. He doesn’t know how long ‘he’ has been gone, but surely there’d be some mess in the kitchen, and in his bedroom? Even the dismal bedding lies perfectly flat, a layer of dust resting peacefully upon the undisturbed quilt, as if no one has laid down in ages.
To the untrained eye, it’s simply evidence of a busy, oft absent life. To Pantalone, though, the bareness of the space reminds him of how they’d find the dwellings of their once-loyal customers. Light, not many belongings, a couch or large seat more used than the bed. Sparse furnishings, probably left by the previous tenant, a room with limited exposure to the outside– the vent window is tiny– all tinged in anxiety. An air of temporariness. A home of someone flighty, just like the valued clients who couldn’t pay back their loans to the Northland Bank.
Is he… on the run?
He decides to continue investigating the area later. Knowing this type of person, there must be hidden documents or objects that would hint as to what kind of trouble they’ve gotten embroiled in. For now, though, his stomach writhes in hunger.
The fridge is unstocked, so he boils some ramen and moves the computer to the little square table. He figures out this world’s technology with ease, and muscle memory provides him the necessary credentials.
Multiple accounts. Some email inboxes empty, others overflowing with bank statements, ads, and the occasional personal correspondence. Excel sheets of finances stretched thin. Medical records putting him at a sweet 24, and detailing his extensive liver and eyesight issues. And finally, burner apps. Servers providing anonymity. A locked file that, try as his fingers might, he can’t quite decipher.
Clearly, money is a touchy subject for this new-Teyvat Pantalone.
He huffs in amusement. He’d always had economic sense, so he had never been rendered a victim of poverty, per say. But the wealth of his early, mortal days is insignificant in the face of what he accumulated after joining the Fatui. Thin, crinkly button-ups were replaced by cashmere turtlenecks, patchwork suits traded in for thick, luxuriously padded coats. His gloves were tailored and lined, imbued with one of Dottore’s clever little heating devices, installed after the doctor complained in earnest about Pantalone’s frozen fingers. Rings, watches, bracelets, earrings, necklaces, chains, wrist cuffs– he once swore he would never again go without the jewelry he so gladly collected.
A product of his narcissism? Perhaps. A form of validation, the tangible manifestation of his achievements? Undeniably.
By the time he feels satisfactorily situated, the sun has dipped, washing the apartment in a brazen orange hue. He lowers his eyes, feels the heat of the golden sunset, and can almost smell the crisp burn of a fallen Irminsul.
The slopes of Sumeru had been awash in the same colors. From the sun, of course. Once the tree went up in flames, it was all red and black, unnatural fire churning and twisting on the surface of an otherworldly bark. He had tried to deny his own reaction, when he realized Dottore’s plans might not come to full fruition, despite his resolve in death. Now, in a stranger’s apartment, an impossible distance from everything that’d occurred…
Pantalone allows himself the hurt. To think that after so much sacrifice– 8’s face flashes through his head– and deliberation, so much unbridled passion, so much meticulous caution; to think it might’ve not been enough is what hurts. He knows he has no regrets. He never will. He lived nearly half a millennia pursuing the pinnacle of humanity, in complete and utter loyalty to the man he called by name.
It is just painful that they, two partners, would give so much, but that Feofan is the one that must continue sacrificing. That he is now the one left to bear the burden of their shared memories.
He was supposed to die. He’d wanted it badly. He lies on the couch now, plasticky leather pressed up against brick, brain whittling towards sleep. Mortality is so exhausting– how long has it been since he let himself drift away like this? As a harbinger, there’d been weeks where the only sleep he’d get were hour-long catnaps between late-night deals, and early morning duties. Accounting and negotiations and meetings would corner him for every last minute of his time and energy, leaving him frayed from anxiety, distraught off meds, and delirious.
Pantalone’s memories of Dottore flood in, more vivid than ever before. More painful, too, a permanent stake in his heart, clogging his lungs far worse than his smoking habits ever did. In the past, each interaction seemed to be covered in a haze– perhaps an effect of the pipe he’d nurse near constantly, his office often smoked to hell whenever the doctor dropped by.
Zandik’s nose would wrinkle, disdainful glare piercing Pantalone even through the mask. He’d make a long-suffering remark or two– How is it that inventing your immortality is easier than getting you to quit wrecking your lungs?– and he’d quip back– then grow me a new pair, if you are so concerned!
He’d really gone and done it, the buffoon. Taken some fibers from his own lungs, cultivated it in Pantalone’s blood, grew it out until it became his new breath. Zandik did the same with his liver, much later in life, and again with a section of stomach. In proper Zandik fashion, he’d excused it all on the basis of convenience. It was easier to grow a compatible organ for themselves, than try and find a decent donor.
He is an Eve.
Pantalone presses his good palm to his chest, fingers digging into his sternum, breath coming out in puffs of air. He fights it. He will not cry for someone who has forgotten him. The full force of this realization knocks at his sanity. Zandik– his Zandik– must have done something, warped reality, transported him to another dimension, given him more time. But in doing so, he has sent Feofan there alone. An isolated journey, devoid of an entire livelihood.
Why? He wants to ask. Why set him up for misery, for something he neither wants nor can control, in a place where he is all but abandoned? He can acknowledge how foolish it is– suicide– but more foolish is Dottore’s faith in Pantalone’s will to live. He is still undeniably human, for he feels too much and all at once. It almost makes him want to give up again– achieve true peace.
He has achieved all he desired in Teyvat. Nothing remains– no unfinished business, no reconcilable regrets, no attachments.
But Pantalone is nothing if not an ambitious man. Even in his astute misery, this holds true. The stained roof tiles dance in his terrible vision, and a hilarious thought comes to mind.
Perhaps, in this experiment, Zandik wants to see if I will do the chasing?