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1.
When Pantalone first discovered that every alarm surrounding his room had inexplicably shut off, he was still trying to identify the cause when a chill ran down his spine.
It felt like an instinctive premonition from another world. He stumbled toward the door. Through the peephole, the black silhouette standing in the corridor was unnervingly clear. A pair of crimson eyes glowed without blinking, like a demon that had crawled out of burning purgatory.
Pantalone stood there for who knew how long before staggering back to his bed. He curled beneath the quilt, his shoulders trembling uncontrollably, a twisted expression fixed upon his face.
He swallowed half a handful of sleeping pills. It was only a hallucination. It had to be. Dragged under by the near-comatose sedation, he fell asleep with a splitting headache. When he woke, something was clenched tightly in his hand.
A tab. It was an old model, one of Dottore's possessions. To be precise, the one Segment 8 had always carried with him.
***
He's here again.
Pantalone leaned closer to the cat's eye.
A black humanoid figure stood in the middle of the hallway leading to his bedroom. Red eyes glowed in the darkness. The silhouette flickered unstably, sometimes taller, sometimes shorter, as though it had yet to decide what shape it ought to take.
Dottore seemed able to feel his gaze through the door. He looked at Pantalone exactly as he always had, without any discernible emotion nor fluctuation. He merely watched him in silence, as though carrying out a procedure that had already been predetermined.
Pantalone sank deeper into the mattress, wrapping himself tighter inside the soft quilt. Even through the thick wooden door, he could feel those dull crimson eyes resting on him.
It gave him a twisted sense of security.
2.
When he arrived at the funeral home, he had neither Dottore's remains nor even ashes to hand over. None of the Fatui had assisted with the funeral arrangements. To them, Dottore had become nothing more than a stain to be erased. There wasn’t even a memorial tablet, let alone a portrait.
The funeral home's staff told him they would reserve any burial plot in the area he wished before opening the remaining spaces to others. After all, Pantalone had not become the director of the Northland Bank for nothing. Procedures that ordinarily took weeks for ordinary folks were settled in the blink of an eye.
In the end, he chose a secluded cemetery. A place that could not have been purchased without the influence he possessed. He did not believe a larger cemetery offered any particular comfort to the dead. He simply thought it would become troublesome if anyone noticed how often he came to visit.
The craftsman preparing the custom tombstone asked for the deceased's information so it could be carved into the stone, as was customary.
"What name should I engrave, sir? And what was your relationship to the deceased?"
What should that person be remembered as? He had died over three centuries ago, and everything that continued afterward had merely been living corpses existing in his stead.
Pantalone parted his lips. Nothing came out. After a long silence, the craftsman seemed to understand and asked no further questions.
In the end, only a single line was chosen.
Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel's beloved.
***
Pantalone only began to feel death when he placed the urn with nothing inside it into the grave.
Dottore would no longer exist in this world. Such an ambitious and imposing person ended up with nothing more than this empty tiny box.
He laid a bouquet of Sumeru roses upon the cold stone. Then a small Aranara doll, a fountain pen, a pair of glasses, a stack of piano scores, a winter cloak, and a wooden cane.
With those things arranged around it, the grave looked a little less deserted. No one but Pantalone would ever visit it, so whether the offerings were neatly arranged didn’t matter.
The cigarette between his fingers burned fiercely enough that its smoke seemed to reach the sky, yet the candles before the tombstone refused to catch no matter how many times he tried.
Eventually, he stopped, slipped the lighter back into his pocket, then turned and walked away.
3.
That night, the tab suddenly vibrated.
Out of every possibility I had imagined, you did none of them.
Pantalone stumbled toward the door, nearly tripping by the time he reached it. His hands trembled as he leaned close to the peephole.
On the other side was Segment 8. Instead of the tab he had once carried everywhere, he was holding the little Aranara doll in his arms.
Pantalone looked at the tiny figure through the peephole for a long time, until his vision blurred around the edges.
"But it is to your standard, yes?"
8 lifted the silly little doll, studying it with quiet contemplation, his round cheeks puffed ever so slightly. Pantalone's fingers twitched against the doorknob. Without thinking, he remembered how he used to pinch those soft cheeks until 8 became visibly irritated.
I suppose the quality is adequate enough.
"If you're satisfied with it, then I'm flattered."
8 blinked several times, just as he always did whenever he was thinking. His little face scrunched together in concentration.
How have you been keeping?
Pantalone stared blankly at the sentence glowing across the screen.
Try not to misplace your glasses so often. It wouldn't do if you tripped and broke more than just your nose.
"Are you worried I'd be incapacitated without my glasses?"
You're already careless enough with your health. I wouldn't dismiss that possibility.
"Is that how I look in your eyes?"
Just listen to what your doctor tells you. 8 puffed out his cheeks again. Because I won't be able to patch you up anymore if something happens.
The ornate carvings across the wooden door seemed to warp before Pantalone's eyes. On the other side, 8 stood with his face turned toward the peephole, wearing an expression of complete seriousness. Pantalone suddenly remembered the winters they had spent together over those four hundred years. He used to wrap 8 inside his heavy winter coat until the boy resembled a tiny penguin.
The memory made bile rise into his throat.
You have to take care of yourself. Live until the last of the immortality elixir runs out. And after that, find whatever means you can to continue living.
"...And why should I?"
What meaning remained in continuing to endure a life that had become so impossibly long, and so unbearably exhausting?
You're the only thing our existence left behind. The only remnant of 'Dottore's' legacy still remaining in this world.
"..."
8 rested his forehead against the door.
As long as you're alive… then it means we still have a place here as well.
***
Death is indeed a strange thing. It seems to wash away every sin, leaving behind only the things that were beautiful enough to remember.
Pantalone had once thought he should forget Dottore and spend the rest of his life as nothing more than the director of the Northland Bank. But the moment he saw that familiar figure again, there was no longer room in either his eyes or his heart for anything else.
It was as though his entire world had narrowed to that single door. Unfortunately, the other could not appear during the day. So he simply endured the long, monotonous hours until night fell again.
Another night, the tab vibrated once more.
If you're going to give someone a fountain pen, you ought to include paper and ink as well.
Pantalone was at the door almost before the message had finished appearing.
On the other side stood Segment 18. He held the fountain pen in one hand, turning it beneath the dim light as he examined every detail.
This is exceptionally well made. Though judging from its appearance alone, I still can't determine which brand produced it.
"It's custom-made."
No wonder. 18 rotated it once between his fingers. The balance is excellent. The grip fits perfectly as well. Writing with something like this would hardly feel like work at all. If I'd owned it back in my Akademiya days, no one would've come close to matching my writing speed.
A brief pause.
Though they were already quite far behind.
A quiet laugh escaped beneath Pantalone's breath. Only then did he realize how long it had been since he had laughed like that.
"Is that so?"
Hmph. You have no idea how many of my classmates astonished me by getting accepted when their abilities left so much to be desired.
Behind his closed eyelids, Pantalone thought he could see it again. 18 sat at his desk, writing one research proposal after another until they formed a stack thick enough to obscure his face. Then he would carry them proudly to Pantalone's office and drop the entire pile onto his desk, asking for funding as though approval were already guaranteed.
How had he responded back then? Ah. He had rejected most of them. Approved a few, and teased 18 over every single one that passed. The other would immediately hiss like a cat whose tail had been stepped on before storming back to the laboratory, determined to produce an even greater mountain of research simply to prove that every one of his ideas deserved approval.
Perhaps that was why, out of every Segment, 18's fingertips had become the roughest. During the routine eye examinations, 18 would carefully settle a new pair of glasses onto Pantalone’s face. Those calloused fingers would brush lightly against his temples as 18 adjusted the frames by fractions of a millimeter, quietly muttering measurements to himself.
Without realizing it, Pantalone raised a hand to touch the side of his own face. Then jerked it away as though burned.
Pantalone? Are you listening?
"Ah, my apologies. I got a little distracted."
Hmph. How have you been keeping? Since 8 has already nagged you about your glasses, I suppose I can skip that lecture. Just remember to have your eyesight checked regularly, and pay attention if you develop an allergy to any new fabrics you wear.
"...You mentioned 8. Is he... with you?"
His throat went dry as a desert. If his suspicion was correct, then every Segment had ended up in the same place after—
Not just him. I'm stuck with all the others, too.
18 let out a soundless sigh.
Hardly anyone's ideal version of an afterlife, really.
Pantalone rested one hand against the door to steady himself. The other slowly dragged across his face.
"...So that's how it is."
Mm-hm. Then this fountain pen suddenly appeared out of nowhere. The others each received something as well. Considering Dottore's reputation, it wasn't exactly difficult to figure out who had sent them.
"Who knows? Perhaps you had a secret admirer."
18 looked utterly unimpressed. Without a word, he raised the pen toward the peephole.
Even if someone that strange really existed, I doubt they'd have enough money to afford even the cap.
The signature businessman smile appeared on Pantalone’s face.
4.
He gradually grew accustomed to the ghosts, or whatever they were, visiting him at night. They remained separated by the front door, like a boundary between life and death lay stretched across the threshold.
He had tried opening it once during 18’s visit, but there had been nothing outside except a bone-deep, biting wind. When he reached toward the place where the other had been standing, guided only by the peephole, the cold that met his fingertips was so sharp it raised goosebumps along his skin. It spread slowly through him. For one fleeting moment, Pantalone could almost believe someone was embracing him in return.
But the other never crossed the threshold. He left the door standing open for a long while, but the cold lingered obediently outside, refusing to move even a single step into the room.
Eventually, he realized how absurd it was to keep waiting like that. So he closed the door and quietly returned to bed.
***
Another night, after changing into his nightclothes, he wrapped the blanket around himself and drifted toward the front door almost automatically.
...It seems I was expected.
Standing outside was Segment 25. He wore the silver-rimmed glasses Pantalone had left at the grave instead of his usual pair.
"Indeed you were. Good evening, 25."
The other inclined his head.
How have you been keeping?
"I'm still taking the immortality elixir at the usual intervals, Doctor."
And your daily cigarette count?
"May I decline to answer that one?"
25's brows knitted together.
I did not return from our supposed 'death' only to receive that answer. Pantalone. Exactly how many cigarettes have you been poisoning your lungs with every day?
"...One and a half packs."
For a moment, 25 looked as though a blood vessel might burst across his forehead. Even with the face mask concealing half his features, the scowl was unmistakable to someone who had spent centuries watching every subtle shift of his expression. It was the same face he always made after reviewing Pantalone's lung scans while muttering beneath his breath as he calculated how much longer those lungs would last before they needed replacing yet again.
"I'll try to cut back tomorrow."
That would be in your best interest. 25 rubbed between his brows. I can't throw away your cigarette cartons myself anymore. Nor can I replace your lungs. So at the very least, try to keep them clean.
Pantalone couldn't help thinking that smoking himself to death might not be the worst ending waiting for someone like him.
"Well, if my doctor insists."
25 had heard that exact tone for centuries, so he did not look convinced in the slightest. For an instant, it felt as though they were standing back inside Dottore's laboratory again. Every conversation with 25 somehow began with Pantalone's lungs before moving on to anything else. It had become an unconditional reflex.
The laboratory had remained sealed ever since Dottore's death. The only reason it had escaped dismantlement was because Pantalone had persuaded Her Majesty that the research preserved within still held value worth exploiting.
A violent impulse seized him. To tear his ruined lungs out with his own hands. To let himself bleed until crimson soaked every inch of him, as though he, too, had burned alongside Dottore in that fire.
Instead, he merely smiled. A tired, flickering smile.
"The glasses. Are they to your liking?"
They fit well.
"I'm glad."
Silence settled over them once again. After a while, he finally voiced the question that had lingered at the back of his mind ever since the Segments first began appearing outside his door.
"Why won't you, or any of the others, come inside?"
We can't.
"And why is that, pray tell?"
Because Dottore has nothing to do with you.
Pantalone stared at the sentence like he wanted to make a hole on the screen. Nothing to do with him? Then why were they here every night? Why did they lurk outside his door until dawn?
"You do realize,” he said, “that the number of my body parts you've repaired or replaced over the years far exceeds the number you've left untouched. If that counts as having nothing to do with me, then what exactly would count as having something to do with me?"
25 adjusted the silver-rimmed glasses along the bridge of his nose.
We're still investigating. For now, all we've been able to determine is that the connection appears to be spiritual rather than physical. If we had to describe it… An invisible tether would probably be the closest approximation.
His tone remained neutral and analytical. Even so, Pantalone could hear the frustration buried beneath it. Apparently, he was not the only one dissatisfied with the distance separating them.
He wanted to laugh. To tell 25 that perhaps none of this would have happened if they hadn't all gone and died so abruptly. Then he would still feel 8 wrapping his arms around his waist, the smallest Segment barely tall enough to reach it. Still feel 18 burying his face against his shoulder while sulking over another rejected research proposal. Still feel 25 pressing a quick kiss to his cheek before immediately turning away, hurriedly pulling his face mask back into place while the tips of his ears flushed a deep crimson.
But they hadn't chosen to leave him. It had been a sacrifice, one made by the man he had failed to stop from walking into death until the very end.
With all of us working together, it's only a matter of time before we succeed.
Pantalone had no idea what expression he was wearing, yet 25 seemed to recognize it before he did. For when he spoke again, his voice seemed gentler than before.
Just wait a little longer, Pantalone.
5.
There had once been a time when he did not know how to treat the Segments.
When Zandik was still alive, he would walk into the laboratory and greet them as though they were regular assistants. He knew they were all Zandik at different stages of his life, yet while the original still stood before his eyes, everyone else seemed to… not matter enough to linger on.
Then Zandik died. How strange the human mind was. Only after he walked into the laboratory and found the Segments surrounding Zandik's corpse like vultures circling carrion did it finally occur to him that, in a sense, they were Zandik as well.
If they had been ordinary humans, or even some other worldly creature, he would have burned every one of their bodies to ash and mixed those ashes into the mortar that sealed Zandik's grave. He would have gouged out their eyes, gilded them in gold, and set them into the tombstone as decoration. But fate had always possessed a cruel sense of humor. The things that had killed his Zandik were the very things Zandik had created from himself. Fragments of his own soul.
So instead of tearing their hearts out with his own hands (like how he felt they'd done to his heart with how they had torn Zandik open upon the operating table), he merely shoved them aside and climbed onto the table himself. Zandik's body was still warm beneath the white sheet. Without saying a word, he gathered the corpse into his arms exactly as he always had while Zandik was alive.
He waited. He waited for familiar arms to return the embrace. Instead, the Segments pulled him away. Hands seized his shoulders and wrists. They stripped away his blood-soaked clothes while he struggled against them like a wounded animal. When he continued trying to break free, someone forced a mild anesthetic into his veins.
Everything slowly disappeared.
***
Zandik. Zandik. Zandik.
If such a thing had been possible, he would have paid any price to drag Zandik's ghost back from death.
When he had been young and penniless, he believed money could solve every misery life placed before him. It could pull him out of poverty. It could buy warmth, food, and dignity. Now he possessed wealth enough to wrap authority itself around his fingers. And yet, standing before death, he found himself just as powerless as he had always been.
He refused to see any of the Segments after he regained consciousness. For a long time afterward, every report, every request for funding, every message from the laboratory arrived through Dottore's soldiers instead. He buried himself in work. He gathered Mora from every corner of the world as though filling his coffers might somehow fill the hollow cavity inside his chest, yet it remained bottomless. He forced food into himself with the same desperation he had once eaten as a starving child; yet soon afterward, he would throw it all back up. Empty cigarette cartons accumulated one after another until they resembled an immovable mountain.
He mourned someone the rest of the world did not even know was gone.
Entirely alone.
***
That limbo continued until his body finally refused to endure it any longer. Returning to Snezhnaya after a lengthy business trip, he collapsed almost the moment his feet touched the ground.
When he opened his eyes again, fever burned through him. Around his bed stood several figures. Every pair of crimson eyes was fixed upon him, as though he were the only thing in the room worth looking at.
The bedsheets beneath him were unbearably soft. They clung to his skin with a weight that made his stomach churn. He buried his face into the pillow, pressing down until breathing itself became difficult, as though he could smother both the sweat and the tears that refused to stop flowing. His limbs felt impossibly heavy. His entire body ached.
It was too much. These false Zandiks. This comfort forced upon him. It smothered him like warm sludge after a summer rain, thick and greasy, coating every inch of his skin until there was no clean air left to breathe.
Perhaps his heart had stopped beating the moment Zandik drew his final breath. What remained afterward was merely decaying flesh continuing to imitate a living body. A corpse that should have been buried long ago. And wasn't that fitting? Whether it was himself, or the Segments, they were all walking corpses refusing the course of nature.
A ragged breath caught in his throat. Then he felt careful fingers brush across his forehead. Someone threaded gentle hands through his hair. Someone else kneaded the stiffness from his aching shoulders. One Segment carefully lifted his face from the pillow and wiped away the tears with a warm, damp cloth. Another cradled the hand pierced by the intravenous needle, lightly massaging around the bruised skin. Quiet voices murmured back and forth. He never managed to understand what they were saying. Sleep claimed him before the words could.
It felt like a betrayal to his Zandik. To be loved by the pieces he had left behind.
6.
One evening, he had nearly fallen asleep over his paperwork when the tab suddenly vibrated.
May I keep you company on this lonely evening?
The words chased the drowsiness from his mind at once. He hurriedly shrugged on his coat and crossed the room to the front door.
Standing outside was Segment 45. He wore the winter cloak Pantalone had commissioned from the finest tailor in Snezhnaya. Without the Fatui Harbinger's coat draped over him as usual, he looked less like an executive and more like a young nobleman.
"Good evening to you as well, 45."
Working late again?
"An unexpected issue with the trading market. Nothing that can't wait until tomorrow, though."
Oh? Then that means more time for me.
"Consider yourself fortunate."
45 flashed a grin. The sharp edges of his teeth peeked through, almost shark-like.
Now that I'm here, I have to compliment your taste in clothing, as always. He spread the cloak with exaggerated pride. I daresay this one surpasses even the Fatui uniform.
"Oh my. That comparison is certainly flattering."
And 8 agrees. 45 lifted one side of the cloak, revealing a small space tucked beneath it. He hides under here surprisingly often. Plenty of room for both of us, actually. He likes this cloak much more than the Fatui one. Though, admittedly, that little one has always been rather particular despite his age.
"I'd say all of you are."
45 placed a hand dramatically over his chest.
After all this time apart, and this is how you greet me? My poor heart aches. I have standards. Standards, Pantalone. Not pickiness.
"Keep insisting on that while your wardrobe is several times larger than mine."
There are six of us!
"I also happened to notice 8 wearing a miniature Fatui cloak. I'm fairly certain you made it because he kept stealing yours to sleep in."
…
45 lowered his head in defeat.
Bullied by my one and only beloved. Is there any crueler fate?
Pantalone answered in equally exaggerated concern.
"Have I wounded your feelings? In Her Majesty's name, however shall I make amends?"
I demand a date at the theater! Then dinner by candlelight. And to conclude the evening, we plant explosives around Sandrone's residence beneath the stars.
A quiet laugh escaped Pantalone. None of that could happen anymore (Dottore was dead, dead, dead—). Still, it was pleasant to pretend.
"How are things on your side?"
Not terribly different from when we still had physical bodies. Though thanks to Omega's infinite wisdom, we can't even get close to you now.
45 clicked his tongue soundlessly.
Speaking of Omega, he was jumped almost immediately after arriving.
"He's there with all of you as well?"
Unfortunately for him, yes. 8, 18, and 25 all expressed their dissatisfaction with his decision to... trade us away for information.
"They..."
Pantalone blinked.
"They hit him?"
Correct. I expected as much from 8 and 18. Neither of them has ever had difficulty expressing themselves. 25, however… He surprised me. That quiet one joined their little crusade with remarkable enthusiasm.
Pantalone thought of the composed, mature doctor who had stood outside his door only nights ago. Apparently, 25 excelled at more than medicine.
"Did you join them?"
45 shrugged.
Oh, you know. A kick here, a punch there. The other three had already done most of the work. Besides, Omega can't exactly become any deader than he already is.
Pantalone sighed. Perhaps there was comfort in knowing they were still themselves. He chose not to dwell too deeply on the fact that Dottore had been thoroughly beaten up immediately after dying. Frankly, he had earned that much.
Now then. I've updated you on our side. What about yours? How have you been keeping, love?
"Apart from preventing the laboratory from being dismantled after your death, the same as always."
So no one gave good old Dottore a grand funeral after all. 45 rubbed thoughtfully at his chin. Predictable. Still a shame, though. You would've outshone everyone dressed in mourning. All that black lace, with those eyes of yours, deeper than the hell we're currently inhabiting.
"Are you seriously flirting with me by comparing me to hell?"
I work with the material available to me. Did it work?
"...Somewhat. I'll award you an extra point for the effort."
Excellent.
Then they laughed together at the sheer absurdity of it all. For one fleeting moment, it was as though death had never happened. When Pantalone’s laughter finally subsided, words appeared on the screen again. This time, there was no trace of amusement left in them.
Do remember to eat your meals on time and get enough sleep. If I discover you've lost any more weight, I'll haunt you and nag you until every last bit of it comes back.
"Aren't you already doing that?"
And if the meetings become unbearably dull without me, which they certainly will, then feel free to skip whichever ones you can.
"You’re just blatantly encouraging me to neglect my duties now."
The Fatui won't perish simply because they don't see the Regrator for a day or two.
Then, just as he used to during Harbinger meetings, 45 lifted one hand to conceal the side of his face, leaning toward the peephole as though sharing a confidential secret.
But I certainly would die just to see you.
Pantalone burst into laughter again.
7.
After Pantalone had fully recovered from his illness, the relationship between him and the Segments became… less strained.
It began with the smallest of changes. If they happened to cross paths, he no longer pretended they did not exist. He stopped looking away the moment their eyes met, and no longer hurried to leave whenever they happened to occupy the same room. Eventually, he even gave them the faintest nod in greeting.
It was nothing compared to the way he had once treated Zandik. Yet the Segments seized upon those tiny concessions like starving animals smelling meat.
One day, after Pantalone returned from another lengthy business trip, Segment 8 approached him. In that childish voice, wearing an expression of complete seriousness, the little boy asked whether the Segments might begin delivering paperwork to him themselves instead of sending soldiers in their place. That way paperwork could be exchanged more efficiently than having subordinates run back and forth. That had been more or less how he phrased it.
Pantalone had been expected back around noon. Instead, unforeseen complications delayed him by another two hours. And Snezhnaya was always buried beneath endless snow, so by the time he finally arrived, the little boy's cheeks had turned rosy and swollen from the cold. Even his small body trembled ever so slightly. 8 had apparently been waiting outside his residence the entire time.
Pantalone simply stood there, looking at him. At this child who carried the part of Zandik that had once been a child himself. Snow fell between them, making his already-failing vision blurred. The taste of salt at the back of his throat burned his esophagus, making him want to retch. And strangely he thought of himself, back when he was still a child, dragging his frail body through endless winters with nothing to his name. Alive only because strangers occasionally offered him scraps of food, or old winter clothes they no longer wanted.
What was it these Segments wanted from him that they did not already possess? Why did this little one look at him the same way Pantalone himself had once looked at the adults in that impoverished neighborhood, as though pleading for the smallest fragment of pity?
He almost walked past 8. Almost disappeared into his residence without another word, locking the door behind him until morning. But then small fingers caught hold of the edge of his cloak.
...I can come back another day. You don't seem well.
8's fingers remained tightly wrapped around the fabric despite his words, as though even while offering Pantalone an escape, he had no intention of letting go. Slowly, Pantalone dragged a hand across his face.
In all the years he had known Zandik, he had never once succeeded in winning against him after the man had truly set his mind on something. It seemed that held true regardless of age. Or death.
"Do whatever you want."
His hand remained over his eyes, concealing whatever expression lay beneath.
***
Afterward, the Segments began coming to him one after another.
They never appeared together. If one of them was within his sight, the others would be nowhere to be found. They would knock on the door to his office, announce who they were, and only after receiving permission would they step across the threshold. Thinking back on it now, those days had been strangely similar to the present. Even after death, they still returned one by one to stand outside his door, waiting for him to acknowledge them.
For a long while, every visit was related to work. But little by little, the conversations drifted elsewhere. Questions about his health, his thoughts, whether he had been sleeping enough, whether he had eaten, whether anything was troubling him. On ordinary days, Pantalone simply closed his eyes and pretended not to notice the subtle way they probed at his life, inch by inch, trying to carve out a place for themselves within it. On the days when living itself felt like more effort than it was worth, he would close the metaphorical door between them. Finished whatever paperwork had brought them there, then sent them back to the laboratory.
He knew they had never intended to become another Zandik. Even though they had been divided from Zandik, each regarded himself as an individual distinct from the original. And yet, perhaps it was a curse. For no matter how separate they believed themselves to be, they could not help feeling for Pantalone in much the same way Zandik once had. They wanted him to look at them, each in their own way, to recognize them as themselves rather than shadows of the original. They wanted a place in his life, wanted to revolve around him like scattered shards of crystal caught forever in a planet's gravity. It was a twisted and simple desire, as natural to them as breathing.
Pantalone believed he had everything under control until the anniversary of Zandik's birth and also his death arrived once again. That evening, he barely managed to finish dinner before his stomach revolted. He vomited until there was nothing left. Afterward, he forced himself to bathe. And somewhere between lowering himself into the hot water and attempting to stand again, exhaustion finally overtook him.
When he opened his eyes, he was lying in the laboratory. Someone was holding his hand. When his blurred vision slowly cleared, there was Zandik.
Why are you so stubborn about refusing to take care of yourself whenever no one's beside you?
Faded blue hair slipped across his face, softening the wrinkles. His brows were drawn together. His crimson eyes dull with the weariness that only old age could bring.
A faint smile touched Pantalone’s lips. It had been so long since he had worn that expression that it felt unfamiliar upon his own face.
"Perhaps if I had someone beside me every day to nag me, I'd eventually learn."
Is that truly what you want?
For the rest of my life. "Yes."
The pain came suddenly. It tore through his skull so violently that he doubled over, clutching his head as a strangled sound escaped his throat. When he forced his eyes open again, the hand holding his no longer belonged to Zandik.
Segment 35’s gaze was intense even through the mask. The other Segments stood silently around the bed, watching him without moving a millimeter.
Very well. 35 said. We'll take turns looking after you every day from now on.
Pantalone laughed. The sound that left him was unbearably bitter.
8.
Pantalone had fallen ill.
He wasn't sure whether he'd caught a cold from the business partner he'd met the previous day, or whether it was because he had stayed in the bath until late a few nights ago. Either way, he found himself incapable of accomplishing much in his current condition. So in the end, he gave up and went to bed earlier than usual.
Around midnight, the vibration of the tab resting on the bedside table jolted him awake.
Are you still awake?
After fumbling his glasses onto his face, those were the first words he saw. He pushed his sore body upright, wrapped the blanket around his shoulders, and slowly made his way toward the front door.
Standing outside was Segment 65. The corridor was dimly lit, but Pantalone immediately recognized that the cane in his hand was not his usual one. It was the one he had left at the grave. Just one look and Pantalone could tell 65 liked his new cane.
"I'm here." he winced at how hoarse his own voice sounded. "I went to bed earlier than usual tonight."
Your voice sounds rough. Are you ill?
"Unfortunately. Nothing serious, though. It should pass in a few days."
Has anyone examined you? Have you taken any medicine?
For a brief moment, he wanted to tell the truth. That ever since the Segments had died, he no longer wanted anyone else to be his doctor. But saying it aloud would solve nothing, so he swallowed the words instead. His throat protested painfully.
"I'll have someone look at it tomorrow."
If you say so. Would you like to talk a while longer, or should I leave so you can rest?
"You can stay."
Very well.
Then they were both silent. 65 had never been particularly talkative, and Pantalone was fine with that. They had always been perfectly capable of sharing the same space while each occupied himself with his own things. This was hardly any different.
Pantalone rested his burning forehead against the door. At almost the same moment, 65 lifted a hand and placed it against the opposite side. If not for the wood separating them, it would have looked as though he were taking Pantalone's temperature.
Dear, how have you been keeping?
"The same as always."
A quiet laugh escaped Pantalone. It held no real amusement.
"I suppose I did eventually learn how to take care of myself after spending several centuries being nagged by all of you every single day."
Then every moment we spent nagging you was worth it.
65 shifted the cane slightly in his grasp, seemingly hesitating for a moment as he considered what should be said next.
We still have antidepressants stored in the laboratory. If you feel you need them…
"No," Pantalone interrupted him gently. "Thank you for your concerns, 65."
We had hoped you would never need to touch them again. But... things are no longer within our control. 65 fell quiet for a moment. If you truly don't need them, then that is the best possible outcome. They're still there, but only as a last resort.
"I never intended to take them again."
Centuries ago, the Segments had done everything they could think of to lessen the side effects. Some, however, simply could not be eliminated. Like the nausea, the strange sensation that his body no longer entirely belonged to him, or the trembling hands that refused to obey.
He had hated every moment of it. So once he had been deemed stable enough to stop the medication, he had thought to himself he would never return to it if he could help it.
"I wasn't particularly eager to relive all of that."
I know.
"..."
If I still possessed the ability, I would have been the one to feed you your medicine. I would have wiped the sweat from your skin myself. Watching you fall ill while I can do nothing except stand here… In all my centuries of living, I never imagined I could feel so frustrated.
"..."
I'm sorry, dear.
"What exactly are you apologizing for?"
65 removed his hat. Holding it against his chest, he bowed his head.
Omega is the most selfish among us. But he is, undeniably, Zandik. Had any of us remained frozen at thirty-five years old, we would have made the same choice he did.
He lifted his head again.
So I wanted to apologize. Because his decision led to this. To you being left alone, when we were supposed to stay beside you, and look after you every day until the end of time.
Pantalone's breath caught. The next instant, violent coughing tore through him. It wracked his entire body until it felt as though his lungs might force their way out through his throat. Tears sprang instinctively to his eyes. He braced one hand against the door to keep himself from collapsing.
Love—
"I'm..."
He coughed again.
"...Give me a second—"
Another fit seized him before he could finish. He struck his chest with a clenched fist, trying desperately to force the coughing to stop. Eventually, it subsided enough for him to breathe again.
His voice emerged even rougher than before.
"...What's the point of saying all this now? It's all in the past."
His hands curled tighter and tighter until his nails bit into his palms. Veins stood sharply beneath his pale skin like venomous snakes. His long hair slipped forward, concealing whatever expression lay beneath.
"What's done cannot be undone."
He had believed those words then, and he still believed them now. If he had never accepted that Zandik would never return, he would never have been able to accept the Segments as people in their own right instead of mere shadows cast by the original.
The earth had opened beneath his feet on the day Zandik died, swallowing him whole. Yet he had crawled back out again, simply because there had never been any direction left to walk except forward.
I understand. But... please allow me to say it. If only for my own sake.
He drew in a slow breath, then took off his glasses, dragging one hand across his face and wiping away the dampness there.
"...Do whatever you want."
Thank you, dear.
He blinked several times. An exhaustion deeper than the fever settled over him. After a long silence, he spoke again.
"...Tell me. What have you and the others been doing over there?"
Of course.
65 paused, seemingly sorting through his memories.
Let's start with the time 45 kicked Omega hard enough to send him flying straight into the hole 8 and 18 had dug beforehand...
9.
Kept true to those words, from that day onward, if circumstances allowed it, there would always be one Segment by his side.
It felt strange at first, to have someone constantly hovering around him. Well… hovering was perhaps too generous a word for someone as small as 8. But for a few hours each day, one of them would remain nearby to keep an eye on his health.
Humans were adaptable creatures. Eventually, Pantalone grew accustomed to this new state. And for reasons he preferred not to examine too closely, they had also developed an… antidepressant. So his daily routine now included taking the appropriate dose beneath their watchful eyes. He could not tell whether the medication accomplished anything. According to them, however, his neurotransmitter levels had improved considerably. That, apparently, was sufficient evidence.
Life continued in that peculiar state shared between himself and the Segments. They settled into his life one step at a time, and in exchange, he found himself making room for each of them as well.
8 brought books and climbed onto Pantalone's bed as though it belonged to him, asking to be read to until he inevitably fell asleep halfway through the story. 18 arrived carrying flowers he casually claimed to have found on the way to the office, even though Pantalone could immediately tell they had come from somewhere far warmer than Snezhnaya. 25 didn’t speak much, but every morning, the correct dosage of immortality elixir appeared on Pantalone's desk.
45 would wait until after particularly dreadful meetings to pull ridiculous faces in an attempt to make him laugh before solemnly producing a vial of the immortality elixir and insisting Pantalone drink it because he was "concerned you'd die of boredom before old age." 65 would sit beside him. Sometimes they spoke, but more often they did not. When headache overtook him, Pantalone would simply lean against his shoulder. And 35… 35 played the piano for him for no particular reason at all.
Pantalone, unfortunately, had always been the sort of person who expressed his feelings only by taking the longest route imaginable. So he sat patiently through 8's presentation on his newest Aranara project before offering detailed suggestions as though the matter carried national importance. He learned which brands of pens and paper 18 preferred and made certain only the finest reached his desk. He replaced the laboratory equipment with better instruments so 25’s research could proceed more efficiently.
He commissioned warm winter clothing for 45, since 45 was usually the one sent outside to attend meetings on everyone else's behalf. He accompanied 65 on long walks through the snow and discussed books over afternoon tea. And for 35, he purchased the finest grand piano in all of Snezhnaya.
The years continued to pass after Zandik's death. Whether he noticed them passing was another matter entirely. Snow fell over Snezhnaya through nearly every season, yet no two days felt exactly alike with the Segments around. Little by little, he stopped seeing them as pages torn from someone else's life. Instead, he saw people. People chasing convictions of their own while forever remaining the ages at which they had been created. And in return, they saw him. Healthy. Ill. Bitter. Gentle. No matter the day, they remained exactly beside him like they had promised to be.
One day, without realizing precisely when it had happened, Pantalone noticed he could now remain in a room with more than one Segment, or even all of them together, without instinctively wanting to leave. Only then did he understand, somewhere along the way, they had become people who mattered to him.
The realization settled into his mind with startling clarity. Then, quite suddenly, he began to laugh. He laughed until tears gathered at the corners of his eyes.
For so long, he had believed his heart had died alongside Zandik. That nothing remained inside his chest except a rotting mass of flesh dutifully pumping blood through a body that had forgotten how to live. Yet apparently, it still knew how to care for someone. The sensation was grotesque, like maggots writhing beneath his skin. Repulsive, yet exhilarating.
In the end, he was still nothing more than a pitiful human being.
Zandik. Dottore. Zandik. Dottore.
From this day onward, until either he or the Segments finally reached the end waiting for them, they would remain tangled together in this hell.
***
"Feofan, do you know your eyes look like roses?"
"...I thought roses only came in red."
It was a night when winter bore down especially heavily upon Snezhnaya. Zandik was somewhere in his seventies by then. The lines time had carved into his face had become impossible to ignore years ago. His tolerance for the cold had diminished considerably as well. Not that it had ever been particularly impressive to begin with.
"Snezhnaya is absurdly cold,” he tugged his coat tighter around himself, teeth faintly chattering. "In Sumeru, people don't have to wear this many layers just to survive."
He muttered under his breath something, probably profanities, until he noticed Feofan was still waiting for him to finish what he had started.
"Oh, right. In Sumeru, there's a species of rose that blooms violet. It’s the exact same shade as your eyes, not even a little different."
Feofan had never once set foot in Sumeru. Naturally, he had never seen the flower Zandik was describing. Almost his entire life had been spent in Snezhnaya, and he had also never particularly wished to leave.
Zandik rarely spoke about his homeland, either. Perhaps the night simply had a way of making people nostalgic, or perhaps the biting cold reminded him of the warmth Sumeru had once offered. Whatever the reason, the memory had escaped him almost absentmindedly.
"Then perhaps we should go and see them ourselves. We can verify whether your words are true."
Feofan smiled. Then, in that gentle voice that could probably persuade someone to surrender their entire inheritance:
"If they aren't, I'll be deducting your research funding for the next three months."
"Hey—"
***
Pantalone woke up with a start.
The remnants of the dream still clung to him like frost that refused to melt. His chest rose and fell unevenly. He buried his face into the pillow, making it damp with sweat, each muffled breath dissolving into the silence of his room.
The first time he ever saw the roses of Sumeru with his own eyes, was when he laid them upon his beloved's grave. Only then did he finally understand. Zandik had been right all along.
They were exactly the color of his eyes. Not even the slightest shade apart.
10.
For a long while after 65 visited him, none of the Segments appeared.
The tab never vibrated again. His days remained as full of work as ever: the flattery of businessmen, the coquettishness of women, and the greedy hands forever reaching to strip the Northland Bank of its wealth.
Some nights, he would be seized by a sudden longing to return to the time when he could hear the chattering between familiar voices and the sound of a piano drifting through the air. He turned the tab over and over in his hands, searching for some way to send a message back to the Segments as they had done to him. But the tab was only a recording device, like a book. He could write down words, yet no one would ever answer them.
The documents kept piling up, day after day, like a punishment that would never end. Unfortunately, the utopia where he had once been allowed to dwell had long since burned to ashes in the fire, along with Dottore.
Dottore was dead.
If they had never appeared at his door after their death, he would have accepted it, just as he had accepted Zandik's, and found a way to move forward, even if he had to tear out his own heart to do it. But they had promised they would find a way to come back to him, and he refused to believe those words had been spoken in jest.
So he waited.
Every night, he waited, believing all he needed to do was trust their words. Yet only his patience wore thinner with each passing day. No silhouette ever appeared before his door. He wrote document after document, until one day the pen snapped in half in his grip. His eyes were as cold as Snezhnaya's coldest night.
If Dottore would not come back to him, then he would drag Dottore back from hell himself.
***
“Il Dottore, get out here right this instant. Especially you, 35. You haven't shown your face to me even once. Did 8 and 18 beat you until your face swelled up like you'd been stung by bees? Are you so ugly now that you can't face the world?”
Choosing a large, private cemetery had indeed been a good decision; otherwise, Pantalone would have been mistaken for a madman long ago, standing in the middle of a cemetery at night and talking to a tombstone.
Everything he had left on the grave had long since been stripped of its color, leaving only grey shells behind. The bouquet of roses had withered. Looking at them, he became even more certain that the nights he had seen the Segments had not merely been hallucinations.
He raised what he held in his hand. It was the bottle of antidepressants he had scavenged the laboratory to find after swearing he would never touch them again.
“If you keep hiding in whatever hellhole you're in, I'll swallow this entire bottle in one go and come catch you myself. Not before tearing your grave apart with my own hands.”
The tab in his hand finally vibrated for the first time in a month, right in the middle of his threats.
Do you hate me?
One look at the words, and he knew this was 35. None of the other Segments would have spoken to him like this after those nights they had spent together.
He wanted to say, I hate you to death. Because 35 had been the one to leave Zandik to die without helping him, when perhaps Zandik could have lived a little longer. Because he had sacrificed every other part of himself, only to die afterward as well, leaving nothing behind like the selfish prick he was.
But hate was far too simple a word for what he had felt throughout those four hundred years with 35 at his side, and during the days after 35 died, when he could only sit alone with his tea and stare at the grand piano that no one would ever touch again.
He collapsed onto his knees before the tombstone, the scalding tears blurring the screen of the tab in his hands until even the word hate dissolved into an unreadable smear.
A black shadow appeared. A familiar chill enveloped him from behind, and he heard the voice that had haunted his dreams, the voice he had longed to hear for so long.
Feofan.
Pantalone reached for his hand, but his own passed straight through the shadow.
I have nothing to do with you anymore. I can only accept that this time, I will truly die.
The voice was light and airy, as though it might vanish at any moment. Pantalone realized this death might truly be the end: a soul burned into oblivion by hellfire, or fading away like cigarette smoke.
The tab lying on the grass beside his leg suddenly vibrated wildly. Several messages appeared all at once.
Finally! I was this close to jumping into the fire just to see whether I could return to the mortal world through reincarnation and go look for Pantalone myself.
Are you sure we'd even qualify for reincarnation instead of simply turning to ashes?
Pantalone, we couldn't come see you for a while because things became complicated. Only now that Omega finally decided to drag his stubborn self over here as the only one who hadn't already visited you did we get the chance to tag along and speak with you too.
Exactly as he said. We tried to identify the cause, and it seems we were only able to come see you because you came to us first. It was like establishing a bridge, though it nearly disappeared after we crossed it that one time.
Now that I've seen the grave you made for us... our theory was correct. The grave is the gate, and the offerings are the one-time ticket that lets us cross over into the mortal world.
Pantalone's mind immediately began running calculations.
“So you mean... you need a connection to me to be able to come over to this side.”
Correct. But physical offerings can only do so much. The problem lies in how long our existence can endure against time.
We're fading away with every passing second. Our souls were never complete to begin with, so the process may be even faster than it would be for an ordinary person.
There needs to be a permanent connection. One directly tied to our souls.
“How do I establish that connection?”
The tab fell silent. In the darkness of the cemetery, he thought he could almost feel 35's arms wrapped around him from behind.
Have you ever noticed that tombstones usually only have two names engraved upon them?
Pantalone stared at the tombstone he had made for Dottore for a long while. Then he burst into laughter. He laughed until tears welled in his eyes, just as they had on the day he realized he had fallen in love with the Segments.
“You bastard. Are you asking me to marry you?”
Yes.
“...”
We figured out the solution shortly after 45 returned from his turn to see you.
“And why, pray tell, did you only decide to tell me now when I was one second away from smashing your tombstone apart, and all of you are on the verge of oblivion?”
The tab vibrated again.
Because Omega is the one at fault! So he had to come and beg you himself!
Which he delayed until the worst possible moment. All we could do afterward was find a way to drag him directly to your door.
We tried thinking of other solutions, but none seemed as plausible.
Well, I'd certainly take the chance to be bound to my beloved through marriage over any other option.
...Dear, if you would, please consider it.
Pantalone read the words appearing across the screen, his heart hammering against his ribs.
"...Do you have nothing to say for yourself?"
The silhouette behind him tightened its embrace around him.
I know the consequences of my actions. That you would be left all alone because of them.
"..."
But until now, besides living the way I have for those four hundred years, I could not think of anything else.
The thirty-five-year-old Segment.
The prime of Zandik's life, yet more like a curse, considering how he had forfeited everything in pursuit of his ambitions. He had known his plan would never succeed, and still he carried it through, even if it meant leaving behind the one and only person who had ever cared about him.
The most selfish Segment.
At thirty-five, his ambitions outweighed his feelings, and so he lived that way until the very end, never wavering even once. Even now, reduced to nothing more than a wavering shadow, that fundamental truth had not changed. That was why he had never appeared before Pantalone until now. He was still the same man who had abandoned Pantalone in pursuit of his plan, only to meet his own death. Nothing had changed.
He deserved neither pity nor forgiveness, nor did he wish to receive either. He had given everything to his ideals until the very end, so there had never been any what if. But if Pantalone looked at him simply as a man incapable of changing, someone forever trapped in the year he was thirty-five, remaining that way for four hundred years, and who would have remained so for countless more had he not already died… then perhaps it was futile to resent him for the choices he had made.
"Then don't think about it anymore. For all these years, we've never been apart. What difference does it make now that you're a ghost?"
He was tired. Tired of circling one another, of suffering beneath the weight of these twisted feelings. He had long since accepted that 35 was incapable of changing, from the day they met until the moment he abandoned him to die for his ambitions.
Death changed very little. In the end, he simply needed him as he was. In all his incomplete existence, both in life and in death.
35 remained silent for a long moment.
What do you want to do after we... establish a new connection?
"Nothing. Just live the way we've always lived during these four hundred years. The piano has gathered dust already."
Pantalone felt something cold brush against the curve of his neck, as though someone had buried their face there.
...Very well. The sheet music you gave me, I received it. Let me play for you once again.
This time, it will be a permanent performance. Until the end of time.
"Tell me, how exactly am I supposed to do this whole marriage thing when all of you are ghosts now?"
Look inside the antidepressant bottle.
Pantalone needed a moment to process the words. Then he uncapped the bottle and poured out everything inside. The white pills scattered across the grass, and then something else fell out with them. A square of red silk, folded neatly into itself. There seemed to be something wrapped inside.
He unfolded it carefully. Resting upon the cloth was a white-gold ring. An amethyst was set at its center, encircled by six small blue sapphires.
35's translucent arms slowly loosened from around him. He stepped around to Pantalone's front before lowering himself onto one knee as well. One ghostly hand reached out to cup the hand holding the ring, and Pantalone felt the familiar chill as it drew near.
35 removed his mask. The face of the Zandik Pantalone had first met in his youth was laid bare before him. Crimson eyes, brighter than hellfire itself, gazed into his as though they wished to drag him down into that inferno forever.
Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel, would you be willing to take me as your husband?
To call this merely love was too superficial. To call it hatred was too simple. The bitterness of being wounded, the reluctant affection, the resentment of being abandoned before an irreversible death… they had twisted together until none could be separated from the others.
The Segments had forged the ring centuries ago, yet they had never allowed it to see the light of day. Only now, when they stood on the brink of losing him forever, had their greed finally surfaced. They had gambled that one day, after their deaths, he might touch that bottle again, if only in a fleeting moment of weakness. They had been right all along.
Pantalone laughed. His expression was helplessly full of exasperation and fondness. After all, he had never truly won against Zandik once he had set his mind on something.
He slipped the ring onto his own finger. At that very moment, the candles before Dottore's grave, which had never once accepted a flame, suddenly ignited. Their wicks burned brightly, casting warm light across the black silhouettes with blood-red eyes now gathered around the tombstone, surrounding the place where he knelt.
"You dare leave me alone again, and I'll make sure you don't even get a proper tombstone."
He rested one hand against the stone as though prepared to tear it down that very instant.
I won't.
A chill brushed across his forehead, then the corner of his eye. His cheek. His lips.
After a long while, he lifted his palm from the stone. One more inscription had appeared beneath the original name.
Feofan Sergeyevich Veksel's beloved
Zandik
From this moment onward, for all eternity, there would be no more separation.