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Scaramouche doesn’t feel cold, ever. He’s never needed a cloak on any of his trips in Dragonspine, and neither does he need a shield to guard his heart against growing attached to the alchemist that never seems to leave this mountain. What use could he possibly have for gloves, what would an armor even have to protect?
In hindsight, maybe he should have planned this a little bit better. Dottore’s a skilled scientist, and for a long while, Scaramouche thought he had succeeded in locking away what he didn’t like about himself and unleashing what he needed. Maybe he shouldn’t have put his trust in the man’s abilities. After all, he’d witnessed how becoming Harbingers turned most of his colleagues into arrogant pricks who thought themselves invincible. Apparently, he was no exception.
Scaramouche never feels cold, but he doesn’t feel hot either. He doesn’t blush when a strange alchemist looks at him like he’s more beautiful than he is dangerous. Nothing starts beating inside his chest the day Albedo kisses him, right before he’s about to return to Snezhnaya. He doesn’t have a heart.
The problem with his design, the fatal flaw in the Raiden Shogun’s first puppet is that nothing about him works like it’s supposed to. He doesn’t have a heart, but he still thought about that kiss for weeks, as he was watching different snowflakes swirl behind the windows of Zapolyarny Palace.
He had assumed that kiss was driven by curiosity just like many of Albedo’s actions, but then he had examined the memory from every angle, remembered how he had gently taken his face between his hands and closed his eyes while Scaramouche’s widened in shock. It had been so warm, for an embrace between two artificial beings. Where did all these flames come from?
That night in Zapolyarny Palace after his return might have been the first time he felt the cold seep into his bones. How was he supposed to know what it felt like before they created their own kind of fire?
He pointedly thinks nothing of it, when he’s the one who kisses Albedo the next time, or when he decides that he does not want him to be his enemy. They’re not human. Whatever is going on between them isn’t human.
“Humans can’t be trusted. And the gods fill me with pure loathing,” he had said, what feels like a lifetime ago.
“I’m glad I’m neither of these things, then.” Albedo had replied, eyes searching for answers he’s probably still looking for today.
Scaramouche knew it. He could feel it the second he laid eyes on the alchemist, but it had felt better than anything he’d heard in decades regardless.
He looked at him differently than he did with anyone else, and he had a feeling the same was true for Albedo. Ironically, feeling anything else than disdain for someone probably should have alarmed him, but it didn’t.
Not even when he started visiting Dragonspine without even thinking of an excuse or when he lied to Pierro about his whereabouts more times than he was able to remember.
But one day, as he’s stepping outside Albedo’s lab, a snowflake lands on his cheek, and it stings. Scaramouche blinks.
He stays there long enough for his hands to feel so cold they start burning. It’s only when Albedo comes looking for him and takes them between his own that he entertains the thought of retreating where it’s warmer. He wishes he could fit his entire body into these two palms.
“What were you doing out there?” Albedo asks.
Was this warmth, this kindness, always present in his voice? When did he ever start asking questions for any other purpose than solving a problem?
Scaramouche’s always someone’s problem to solve, so why can’t he be Albedo’s as well?
He hates that the alchemist still asks, like he hasn’t immediately noticed how cold his hands are and how he could feel something was wrong. His hair isn’t braided. He got up from his bed and he worried.
“This isn’t supposed to happen,” Scaramouche says when they’re back in the cave, where it’s warm and his hands slowly stop hurting like a bitch.
He can perfectly recall the last time he felt something remotely akin to human emotion, and he does not want it back. He’s felt tears burning his eyelids before, and then he did everything in his power to make sure it never happened again.
But Albedo’s not going to leave if it does, is he?
“Are you sure?” the alchemist asks.
“I’m not sure of anything, it’s not like she left me a fucking guide,” Scaramouche sighs. “I want to hear your theory.”
Scaramouche can tell when he has one. Albedo isn’t the only observant person here.
“I may not be right,” the alchemist warns.
“I’ll decide whether I like your answer or not.” Scaramouche snarls.
“Will you believe me, if I tell you what I’m thinking ?”
Scaramouche doesn’t need this hesitation, he needs the smartest man he knows to tell him what the fuck is wrong with him right now.
“If I thought you were a liar, I wouldn’t be there.”
Albedo doesn't avert his eyes.
“Maybe Dottore’s stitches are loosening. Perhaps every time you grow closer to what you were after the Shogun created you, it restores a part of yourself. And it might be why you’re suffering from the cold right now, just like humans do.”
Scaramouche looks at his hands. They feel better, now that they’re next to Albedo’s makeshift fireplace.
He isn’t suffering as much as he thought he would.
“What’s next? Am I going to lose my powers?” he asks, suddenly feeling like he needs to sit down. He’s never needed to do that before.
He does not need to sit down. He’s constantly running around and teleporting continents away without so much as breaking a sweat. He doesn’t need to sleep either, but he does on occasion, a bad habit he’s picked up from Albedo.
“I need my powers,” he says, in the face of Albedo’s silence.
Scaramouche hasn’t made up his mind about which way he wants to end the world, but somehow the only thing he thinks about now is how he can’t destroy anything with Albedo in it. Another problem to add to his ever-growing list.
“Your powers are a part of you too, even if they used to be locked away,” Albedo says, his blue eyes peering far beyond what Scaramouche wants to display.
He goes on.
“Perhaps she unknowingly made you this way because she thought you’d be better suited for the task with both the human emotions and the divine powers.”
“Right,” Scaramouche scoffs. “She had no idea what she was doing, and I’m the one who has to pick up the mess centuries after, that’s what happened.”
“Is that the mess you’re referring to ?” Albedo says, fingers brushing his cheek. “Maybe you need to look up the definition of that word.”
“You –“
Now is not the time to test how much human emotions are left in him. He wants to say something. He leans into Albedo’s touch instead.
“Maybe you weren’t what she expected.” Albedo continues. “But she didn’t make a mistake. No one who didn’t know what they were doing could have made you.”
“How would you know ?” Scaramouche bites back, because he has to say something other than I am feeling something I don’t understand, something that’s more than I’m capable of dealing with right now.
“Do I have to remind you that Rhinedottir left me too, eventually?” Albedo says. “You’re not the only one who failed to live to your creator’s expectations. It doesn’t have to be such a bad thing.”
That’s so easy to say when an entire city loves you. When you’ve found another family. But it’s not what he wants to tell Albedo right now. Because apparently, he cares more about his feelings than winning the argument, which should have set off even more alarm bells by now.
He’s still going to win the argument.
“You’re not human, yet they all love you as if you were. She only took the best in them to make you.”
Scaramouche wants to destroy entire cities when he sees the way the traveler looks at the alchemist. He still can’t comprehend why he’s the one sitting by his fireplace, instead of him. But he is.
“This conversation is running in circles,” Albedo sighs. “Look –
Scaramouche isn’t done.
“Would my human emotions have woken up from where Dottore buried them if you were anything but perfect?”
Albedo’s the one blushing now. That’s a nice change of pace. Perhaps the universe is a little more balanced now. At least Scaramouche’s one is, if he’s any judge.
“How do you stomach it?” Scaramouche asks.
He doesn’t know if he can bear the weight of these emotions for the rest of eternity. But maybe, if Albedo’s right next to him, he’ll get used to them.
“It surprised me, at first. But after all this time, I wouldn’t have it any other way. I can’t imagine seeing Klee and not feeling like I would do anything if it means she’ll smile. Just as I can’t bear the thought of letting you carry your burdens alone.”
“Are you going to leave?” his eyes ask. He’s got the same look as when he wants to lean into Scaramouche and press a soft kiss full of too-human feelings to his lips. He waits for his answer instead.
Would the mountain turn cold for Albedo, if he left?
That would feel like going backward, no matter how he looks at it. He’s not going to fight himself. He has other, more important things to be doing.
His body’s betrayal is the fourth of what seems like a neverending cycle, but he’ll get back on his feet like he always does.
“It’s not my call to make, is it?” he sighs, like he’s giving up.
He’s not.
“You could probably make it stop if you wanted to.”
He’s so, so honest for someone who wants Scaramouche to stay that badly. That’s not very human of him. Scaramouche loves him all the more for it. His human and non-human parts all the same.
“You’re overestimating me.”
Perhaps he doesn’t realize the depth of his – human, so despicably human – feelings for him.
He always knew he wasn’t completely devoid of them. He was cursed with rage from the very beginning, but he liked to think it was different from what humans felt.
Scaramouche sighs, pulling the alchemist closer until he feels the ends of his blonde hair tickle his face.
“Do you happen to have warmer clothes lying around ?”
Before answering, Albedo tugs him in a hug that warms him up more efficiently than any fireplace could. It’s agony when he loosens his hold and goes to fetch something from his drawers.
He returns a few moments later and wraps him in a very soft coat. Scaramouche looks up at him questioningly.
“Why do you even have this thing?” he asks, toying with the fur.
“I need something to fool the other Knights when they visit me.” Albedo replies as he finishes buttoning the coat all the way up.
“Hm.” Scaramouche scoffs.
The coat is comfortable and comforting. Having Albedo is, too.