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Wanderer wasn't planning to be part of the task force that stormed Dottore's lab - even assuming the Doctor's there, it'd be unbelievably naive to think they'll defeat him on their first try, and Wanderer will likely only get one shot at this. He's currently an unknown quantity to Dottore, but he won’t remain one for long. He may have erased himself from Irminsul, but the man has a mind like a steel trap, and the segments derived from his research on Scaramouche still exist; he's sure Dottore will be able to deduce quite a lot about Wanderer after a single brush with him.
So, no. Wanderer didn't plan to waste the element of surprise on what should have been a scouting mission. But hearing that Sandrone and Arlecchino were headed for the facility gave him pause. With the Traveler and two Harbingers, their chances of success shot up higher than Wanderer was comfortable with. He'd spend the next several hundred years seething if his former colleagues defeated the Doctor without him.
And so the Wanderer is there when Dottore greets the Traveler with his usual brand of obnoxious theatrics. Dottore's gaze seems to pass right over the Wanderer, dismissing him as just another member of the Traveler's party, and even though that's what he's counting on, it puts a flame of sick spurned fury in his chest that the man ruined his life and doesn't even remember him.
When the battle starts, Wanderer leaps into action alongside the Traveler and the Knave. He darts and weaves to avoid Dottore's projectiles, sending out volley after volley of cutting wind blades. Dottore lets out a delighted bark of laughter as Wanderer's Vision lifts him into the air, and Wanderer can't see his eyes under the mask but he can just imagine what they'd look like, glittering with the mania of finding a shiny new toy. He doesn't know if it’s just Dottore’s glee at testing out his own power or if Wanderer has already sparked the madman's interest again, but it makes him grind his teeth either way.
Wanderer puts everything he has into it- they all do- but he can tell almost from the beginning that (again, again, again) it isn't going to be enough.
It's not for nothing that Dottore claimed to nearly be a god. Even the Knave's attacks barely leave a scratch on him. Dottore is entirely unfazed, sharp white teeth gleaming in an exhilarated grin. They'll tire themselves out long before they wear him down; or at least, the others will tire, and loath as he is to admit it Wanderer stands no chance alone against Dottore. Even as he thinks it, his agility finally fails him, and a bolt of energy clips his shoulder with enough force to make him stagger in the air. Snarling, Wanderer wheels around to regain momentum, ignoring the burning pain as he narrowly dodges two more bolts, and then- he hears Arlecchino call a retreat.
It’s the smart decision, but for the barest moment the Wanderer can't tear himself away, held in place by furious despair at the thought this might have been his only chance. He can’t lock eyes with Dottore through the mask; Wanderer's wild, vicious glare is answered only by a slight smirk. Then he spins in the air, dashing away to escape with the others-
-Or tries to.
A cage of blue light closes around him, crushing him to the floor with enough force to knock the air from his artificial lungs. Growling, he tries to lunge forward, but it only squeezes tighter, pinning him flat. He can’t even move enough to summon the wind to try and slice through it. Okay, he thinks, light-headed, Okay, this is happening, I guess I was too interesting after all.
"Wanderer!" Traveler cries, and Wanderer doesn't have enough air to shout Leave me you idiot, but that Moonchanter has some sense, ushering them anxiously forward. Their wide, conflicted golden eyes turning away from him are the last thing the Wanderer sees before the world goes black.
*
Frankly he half-expected to wake up on the operating table, because Dottore has no manners whatsoever and wastes no time when he has a new puzzle to decipher.
Instead Wanderer opens his eyes to a bright, sunny day in Snezhnaya's capitol city, the frigid temperatures making the light seem to fall through frosted glass.
This isn't real, Wanderer deduces, blinking rapidly through his disorientation. The injury to his shoulder is gone, though it throbs with a half-remembered ache, and his surroundings have the fuzzy layer of unreality that he associates with dreams. The average person would struggle to place that faint sense of wrongness, but Wanderer has more experience with these things than most.
It's a striking replica of the capitol, as lively as the Wanderer remembers it being. Children nag their parents for sweets, and civilians haggle over cuts of frozen fish. In the early days he'd slip out for the occasional walk to the markets just to remind himself there was a world beyond Zapolyarny, beyond Dottore.
As if the thought has summoned the man, he hears the tap of a distinctive footstep behind him. Wanderer acts on pure instinct, whirling with a ball of storm in his hand to attack.
Dottore sidesteps effortlessly- No. He doesn't sidestep. He phases out of reality and glitches back in a foot to the left. "There's no need to be rude," he says, frowning.
Wanderer lunges again and again, too angry to think, and Dottore continues to dodge in an almost bored manner, skipping in and out of existence with ease. "Really now," Dottore says, "All this time apart and this is how you greet me, Scaramouche? And in front of all these people. I wouldn't expect you to care what happens to them, but with the company you've been keeping-"
"They're not real," Wanderer snarls, already pulling back his hand for another strike, and then the Doctor’s words process fully and he-
Freezes.
It's like his insides have turned to ice. He stares wide-eyed at Dottore, hand still raised to attack; Dottore just stands there, head tilted patiently.
"What did you just call me," Wanderer demands.
It isn't possible. It's not. Not even Nahida remembered him before the Traveler tipped her off and she found the backup she'd hidden in Irminsul.
"Scaramouche?" Dottore repeats, smirking like the cat that got the cream.
The wind winks out of Wanderer's hand as it drops numbly to his side. "No," he says. "That's not- you can’t know that!"
"And why can't I?" Dottore asks innocently.
"It isn't possible! Irminsul- You-"
"I am a god now," Dottore says, hands folded behind his back, "with powers beyond the Seven."
"But that's-" Dottore steps toward him and Wanderer takes a stumbling step back, only to knock into someone in the crowd with his shoulder, and his fraying rationality snaps; he shouts hysterically, "Get them OUT of here!"
Dottore's amicable expression flickers briefly at the demand, but his good cheer is back after only a moment. "Oh, very well," he agrees, and with a snap of his fingers transports them to-
-An empty hall of Zapolyarny Palace, well-lit and echoing. Wanderer stumbles several more steps backward, struggling to regain control of his breathing, baleful glare fixed steadily on Dottore. "How," he growls. He wants nothing more than to continue attacking, but he knows it would be foolish. If Dottore has truly regained his memories, Wanderer stands no chance against him. Dottore knows every flaw and weakness of his design - the few times Scaramouche was angry enough to attack the Doctor physically, the fight was over in short order. He has no choice but to stall for time and look out for an opportunity to escape.
"I doubt you're really interested in the details," Dottore says. "But it wasn't exactly difficult. I became aware of discrepancies in my memories, things the World-Tree smoothed over too neatly. You're aware energy is never truly destroyed, aren't you? It only changes forms, and so it is with information recorded in the ley-lines. With the primordial forces at my command, restoring the data was a simple task. I'll admit, it truly was a dirty trick you played with Irminsul," and there's a note of true ire in his voice; to a Sumeran-born scholar like Zandik, his hard-won knowledge being plucked right out of his head would be an insult and violation of the highest order, something the Wanderer has spitefully congratulated himself on before. But it's with an amused lilt that Dottore adds, "Surely you didn't think you could evade me forever, did you, Scaramouche?"
"Eva-" Wanderer's lips lift into a snarl, and what he thinks is Did you miss the part where I came for your head?! Except what comes out of his mouth is, "You're the one who left me in Sumeru!"
...Ah.
He shouldn’t still be angry about that. He should be thankful the madman didn't drag him back to Snezhnaya, knowing what he knows now. It's pathetic to care about in the least, but even now, knowing everything, the abandonment stings.
Dottore seems to agree, if not for the same reasons. Disbelieving, he says, "Are you really still upset with me about that? I hardly could have brought my treasonous colleague back to Snezhnaya with me openly. Who knows what the Tsaritsa would've done to you? I would have come to fetch you eventually if it weren't for that stunt with the World-Tree. If I'd known you were going to be that dramatic about it, perhaps I'd have found a way to warn you."
There's something wrong with the Wanderer. There's something wrong with him for the violent twinge he feels at the idea that Dottore would have come for him if he’d been more patient. He's probably lying anyway- it's what the Doctor does. Wanderer crosses his arms and grits out, “What do you want, Dottore?”
Dottore spreads his hands, a toothy grin on his face. “Is it not obvious? There is no better opportunity to renew our collaboration-”
Wanderer laughs. It’s an ugly sound, high and sharp and mirthless; it goes on long enough to make him double over, leave him gasping for breath, and the arrogant smile slides right off Dottore’s face, replaced by a scowl. The sight is delicious. “Join up with you again?!” Wanderer gets out. “Are you insane?!”
“I fail to see what’s so funny about it,” Dottore says tightly.
“Let me rephrase.” Wanderer bares his teeth. “You’d have to be more insane than I realized to think I’d ever cooperate with you after what you did to me!”
Dottore’s mouth presses into a flat, unhappy line. “Don’t be juvenile, Scaramouche. We’ve covered the unfortunate matter of my leaving you in Sumeru, and other than that, all I’ve ever done is help you achieve your goals. The process may not have always been pleasant, but you were aware from the start that-”
“Don’t play dumb!” Wanderer shouts, one hand reaching up unconsciously to claw at his chest where Escher once placed Niwa’s dripping heart. “I’m talking about Tatarasuna!”
He thought Dottore’s memories were gone for good, so he never expected to get any recognition from the man about the crime. But that was before. Now - now, there should be some reaction. A low, cruel chuckle, an annoyed tsk at being found out, something, anything. Instead, the prolonged silence only ends when Dottore says slowly, “...Tatarasuna. As in, the place you went after Shakkei Pavilion? That pathetic bunch of humans who betrayed you?”
There's nothing more than puzzled annoyance in his voice. Liquid fury lights up every inch of Wanderer's body. Seething, he spits, “Don’t you dare speak of them that way! They never betrayed me. It’s pointless to deny it, Dottore. You were the one who sabotaged the furnace, it was you who tore out Niwa’s heart-”
It's Dottore's turn to interrupt him with laughter, low and indulgent. “Oh, Scaramouche,” he says with a sardonic little smile, “is that what the Dendro Archon told you? And you believed her?”
“Of course I did,” he growls, though something cold spears through him. It's so unlike Dottore not to gloat. “She’s a thousand times more trustworthy than you ever could be!”
“Scaramouche.” Dottore’s head tips to the side like a bird’s, studying him with fascinated pity. “I leave you on your own for a few years, and this is what becomes of you? An archon’s lapdog, lapping up her manipulation?”
Wanderer gnashes his teeth, flinging a finger out in accusation. “Quit trying, Dottore! I saw the truth in Irminsul. She hardly could have faked that!”
Except, as they both well know, Irminsul is not infallible. It can be tampered with. Nahida already displayed the ability to store information of her own making there when she squirreled away a backup to his memory. His faltering must show on his face, because Dottore’s smirk deepens.
“Let’s think this through, Scaramouche,” he says, as if speaking to a particularly stupid child. Scaramouche always hated this tone, reserved for when you’d tried his patience enough he wouldn't even pretend to see you as an equal. “You were in Irminsul, the heart of the Dendro Archon’s power. She showed you a vision that would sever all your former allegiances while securing a debt in her favor, and you trusted it?”
“She had no reason to do such a thing,” Wanderer snaps, but the retort sounds weak even to his own ears. He’s begun to feel incongruously chastised and small.
“No reason? Really? We both know that’s a lie.” Dottore clicks his tongue in disapproval. “It’s not like you to undervalue yourself, Scaramouche. No. In one fell swoop, she positioned herself as your debtor and benefactor. She was a young, untested god, recently challenged for her throne - she’d need every advantage she could get, so why not turn an enemy into an ally? I could applaud her for the stroke of genius, really. But you, Scaramouche - after the kind of ambition you used to have, seeing you like this is truly sad.”
“Stop,” snaps the Wanderer, “Stop it!”
He feels blindsided, unmoored. Of course Dottore is not to be trusted, but it's unnerving to hear all the suspicions Scaramouche once held be repeated like this. Nahida was always too good to be true, and for so long he vehemently refused to believe she was what she seemed. He tries to hold on to what he knows to be true about her, but Dottore doesn’t let up, doesn’t give him a moment to think.
"In fact, how is it that you came by your restored memories?" he continues. "Don't tell me - Kusanali was responsible for that, too?"
That's Lord Kusanali to you, Wanderer thinks numbly, but his chest is buzzing too fiercely to speak.
"Who knows what changes she saw fit to make to them? You're acting so unlike yourself. It's entirely possible she rearranged things to make you easier to manage."
"She wouldn't," Wanderer tries to insist. "She'd never-"
He's thought many times that it seems unbelievable how different he is from the person he was only a few short years ago. But it all felt so natural. He's proud of it. Nahida is proud. She wormed so quickly under his defenses despite eons of not trusting anyone-
"The Scaramouche I know would never blindly trust a god," Dottore simpers, voice thick with false sympathy as he steps toward him. "Buer has done a number on you, it seems. You'd better let me take a look. I can set things right-"
Wanderer tries to take a step back and finds he's run out of room to retreat; his back bumps up against the sharp metal edge of an exam table. At some point their surroundings morphed into a replica of one of Dottore's labs. He doesn't know if Dottore did it on purpose, but the familiar sterile scent is making it hard to think, and as that gloved hand reaches toward him, settling on his shoulder-
"Don't TOUCH me!" the puppet screams, batting the hand away. True panic takes hold as it really sinks in just how much danger he's in with Dottore in possession of these new mind-altering abilities. He's already shown he can control Wanderer's perception of their surroundings. He could do anything to him. He could rewrite him. Wanderer is abruptly sick with dread.
Except Dottore doesn't do anything. He pauses, hand hovering in the air. His head turns sharply, as though he's heard something, and then-
Darkness. Silence.
The world around the Wanderer shuts off, gone out like a light. Wanderer stands in the nothing and wrestles his breathing back under control. As the worst of the panic burns away, dread of a very different sort sets in.
"...Dottore?" His voice comes out high and thin, pathetically childlike. Recoiling in self-disgust, he corrects himself by barking out, "Dottore! Oh, real mature of you! I know you're listening! Get back here right now! I know you're..." He falters. "Listening..."
There is no answer. Not even an echo. His breath hitches.
Don't leave me don't leave me don't leave me here alone-
Of course. Of course Dottore would do this. He knows everything about Scaramouche, after all. What better way to punish him than to lock him away like a toy set up on a shelf. Don't let him get to you, Wanderer thinks, chest tight. He'll come back soon enough. He'll want to see you rattled. Don't give him the satisfaction.
*
That resolve lasts for maybe half an hour before Wanderer snaps. He runs in every direction looking for a way to escape, but the space is boundless, or rather- it doesn't contain any space at all. It's pitch-dark; he can't see his hand in front of his face, can't hear his footfalls as they land. Before long he loses his sense of direction altogether. In the completeness of this void, even 'up' and 'down' are meaningless.
He screams, and the sound comes back to him thin and muted, not reflecting off of anything.
"This isn't funny, Dottore! Get out here and face me, you coward!"
He's on his knees, or he thinks he is- it's hard to tell. He rocks forward, clawing at nothing- there's nothing. "Kusanali..." he croaks, desperate. "Kusanali, can you hear me? Please..."
If a tree falls in a forest and there's no one around to hear it, does it make a sound?
Nahida posed this riddle to him once. Of course it does, he scoffed at first, resisting her efforts to draw him into a thought experiment. But he knew better than anyone that for those years in Shakkei Pavilion, he may as well not have existed. It was the same for Nahida in the bubble.
Nahida... Nahida.
He wraps his arms around himself, a facile attempt at an embrace. Shame crawls up his spine; how could he allow Dottore to make him doubt her for even a second?
The Doctor lies. He lies and he manipulates. It’s what he does. He would have to be a very skilled liar indeed to keep up such a flawless facade when confronted about Tatarasuna, but then, he’d have to be an exceptionally skilled liar to be Escher in the first place.
He is also an idiot, giving Wanderer all this time to himself to pick apart the things he said.
The Doctor makes himself so damn easy to believe. It's so, so easy to slip back into old follies, hearing his own thoughts echoed back at him in the self-assured voice he allowed to lull him for centuries. But the Doctor is, as usual, full of nonsense. His accusations unravel with only a moment of concentrated thought.
Wanderer's always known Nahida is pragmatic, even a bit manipulative. Everyone has ulterior motives, but Nahida, when confronted, is upfront about them. She's unfailingly honest, for all she sometimes weaves her way there with metaphor; she hands out knowledge freely, and when she speaks in riddles, it's because she doesn't have any better way to say it. She's the polar opposite of Dottore, who hoards any information that gives him an advantage and tries to talk you in circles until you don't know left from right.
Of course she hasn't tampered with his memories; that would be anathema to her very nature. From a certain point of view, he's fallen under her influence, but is that a bad thing? Wanderer’s life has improved in every conceivable way since he started working for her. And he knows by now it's more than just mutual benefit that ties them together, although it's hard to admit it. She was so worried when he set off for Nod-Krai, all but ordering him to come back to her safe, but she didn't try to stop him. He's a person to her, not a tool to be used.
And if the Doctor really expects to get to him by driving a wedge between them... well, he has another thing coming.
*
Wanderer soon loses all track of time.
Every now and then he experiences a bout of panic that shakes him to his core, becoming convinced that he's never getting out of here, that he's been left to rot like his mother intended. He should've played along with Dottore for the time being, he'll think, instead of defying him and bringing this on himself. Then he'll feel a wringing burst of shame and self-loathing, because even now Dottore's ploys are working. And after that comes a black despair because none of that matters anyway if Dottore never returns. And even if he does- what if he intends to leave Wanderer here until he's taken over the world and there's nothing left to fight for anymore? Is the Traveler still alive out there? Has Teyvat fallen? How long has it been?-
...Each time Wanderer comes back to himself eventually and feels exceptionally stupid for the breakdown, and then he has to find something else to think about.
He thinks about a lot of things, in the dark. There’s really nothing to do but think.
Why didn’t Dottore tampered with my mind like he threatened to? he wonders again and again (thinking about this is much better than giving in to the paranoia of wondering if he'd even know if he had).
His mind keeps wandering to his early days in the Fatui. Usually, Wanderer avoids thinking about that time by any means necessary. Even as Scaramouche, he hated to think about it.
There are a lot of reasons for that. The constant, eviscerating agony, the dying throes of Kunikuzushi’s weakness... But right now, it’s thinking back to how Dottore was back then that's bothering him most of all.
Dottore has seen parts of Scaramouche no one else has, but the same is true in reverse... if not quite as literally. When they met, the Doctor wasn't quite grown into himself, not yet the paragon of cold rationality he now tries to present himself as. He was erratic and moody, passionate and intense, approaching his experiments with a child’s eager glee and raging like one too when things went wrong. Of course he was always an arrogant, self-assured, egotistical bastard, but back then-
There were times Dottore looked at Scaramouche with something like reverence.
He was mortal, was the difference.
When Kunikuzushi met him, Zandik was mortal.
As he flayed the secrets from the puppet's body bit by bit, it was a race against time. It took decades for him to develop the segments, and he aged into his role with an almost worshipful focus, making the puppet his life's work.
He’s going to die and leave me too, was Kunikuzushi's first thought when he saw the first wrinkle. Not he’ll never unseal my power like he promised, although that thought followed a moment later, but He’s going to die and leave me too.
The other Harbingers have never seen Dottore like that. Half of them don’t even know the Doctor’s birth name.
“Do you have a name?” the Doctor asked him, long ago.
“No,” the puppet admitted bluntly; though he still sometimes thought of himself as Kunikuzushi, officially he'd discarded the name when he left Inazuma’s shores. He looked the Doctor in the eye and asked, “Do you?”
The Doctor smiled then, a flickering thing, not a trace of mockery to it, though the puppet looked. “Zandik,” he drawled. “It means ‘heretic’.”
“How appropriate,” the puppet said, and wondered what kind of people would name a child that, and then thought: At least they saw fit to name you.
Of course he knows the Doctor’s life story, or his life story as Zandik presented it. Of course Scaramouche told Dottore everything, his failures and betrayals and delusions of grandeur, buoyed up by the man’s assurances he’d help him reach them. After the brutal, annihilating shock of the first decade or so had passed it was easy to fall into an illusion of intimacy on the operating table. He never breathed a word to the Tsaritsa or any of the other Harbingers that he wanted the electro gnosis for himself, but Dottore knew.
“I should’ve been a god,” he gasped out, and Dottore-
Dottore looked at him with those gleaming ruby-red eyes and replied, “You should have been.”
He was the first to ever agree.
(How long has Dottore harbored his own delusions of godhood? Ever since immortality was in his grasp? It would be just like him to cross one impossible boundary and immediately chart out the next three.)
He wants to say he's always hated Dottore. Even when he relied on him, didn't know he'd been Escher, he hated him. His condescension, his casual possessiveness, his playful cruelty, his infinite arrogance. The way he'd praise and degrade in the same breath, the way he'd keep you on tenterhooks for his approval. Scaramouche had always hated him.
But was that really true?
We'll do great things together, you and I, Zandik told the nameless puppet.
No one had ever treated him like that before. Like he had the potential to be more than he was, like he was valuable, like he was important. He'd eaten it up. The agony was a small price to pay. Dottore was the puppet's world back then, and he wasn't so naive as to not realize there was something sick about it, but at the time he didn't care. On some level he always resented the man's erratic moods, always dreaded the cost of his attention even as he craved it, but if Wanderer is being honest with himself-
It wasn't until after that he truly started to hate him.
After Dottore completed the segments. After he unsealed Scaramouche's power.
Suddenly Dottore was immortal, crossing a boundary he never should have crossed, finally approaching the level of the gods and monsters around him. And he turned around and pulled Scaramouche up with him, returning the power that should've always been his.
It should have been triumphant. A mutual resounding success.
And in some ways, it was.
But Scaramouche was no longer the center of Dottore's world.
Of course, in the centuries that followed, Dottore came up with plenty of tests to run on him, plenty of further improvements to make. But it was never quite with the pure, unvarnished obsession of their first decades together. After all, with the segments' completion, Scaramouche was no longer vital to Dottore, a divine boon fallen in his lap. He was only a curiosity. Sometimes, Il Dottore seemed to see him as little more than a chore.
And Scaramouche hated that. It drove him up a wall. Some part of him was always trying to recapture the fervency of those first decades even as another part of him knew even then it wasn't something he should long for, and Dottore knew all that. He was so fucking smug about it, thought himself so far above him despite owing his very continued existence to Scaramouche. The scale of their debts tipped further and further out of balance because there was only so much Dottore could learn from a single subject, even his favorite. Scaramouche knew that, and still racked up his debt with wild abandon just to make sure the man would still look at him. Even as Dottore grew ever colder and more audacious, reserved and controlling in turns.
Egotistical bastard - he'd been mortal.
And it is because of Scaramouche that now he is not.
If Dottore made Scaramouche who he was, so too did Scaramouche make Dottore. Feeding into his delusions of grandeur, indulging his wild ideas, clinging to him like he was a god already, handing him the keys to his success. With every year that passed, Zandik faded further and further into the Doctor, and Kunikuzushi faded further and further into the Balladeer. High on the power they'd gained, on sneering self-importance, forged into mirror images of one another.
Every cruelty since, all of the blood on Dottore's hands - a portion of it is also on the Wanderer's. And if Dottore truly dooms the world, that'll be on Wanderer, too.
Nahida would tell him there's something wrong with that logic, he knows. She'd say each person's sins are their own responsibility. And then something about the manipulation, insidious and starting long before he knew-
It's nauseating to think about. He usually tries not to think about it at all, content to let everything blend into the blinding rage, but there's nothing to distract from it now. The way Dottore had toyed with his emotions - Scaramouche never would have tolerated so much from the man if he had only ever treated him with clinical interest. And it'd make sense to assume that nothing he'd ever seen from him was genuine, wouldn't it? But seriously looking back on it for the first time since learning the truth of Tatarasuna... those assumptions start to smear.
It's more haunting than the alternative, but even a liar as gifted as Il Dottore cannot fake everything.
The surprised delight when Scaramouche agreed with his ideas or surpassed his expectations once again. The buoyant excitement when Scaramouche egged him on in his blasphemy and grandiosity, the way he'd pace around the room and gesture with his hands as he spoke. How he'd gravitate to Scaramouche's side at every Harbinger social function, even centuries later, when Scaramouche was as liable to bite his head off as be pleased by the attention.
After all, Scaramouche felt it too. The giddiness of finding someone willing to pull down the stars with you, who despised fate as much as you did. Someone who'd tell you you were wronged, and I was too. We'll become more than they ever could have dreamed. We'll make them regret throwing us away.
We're the same, you and I, Zandik said once, and the puppet was deluded enough to think it was a compliment.
Alone in the dark, Wanderer buries his head in his knees.
Why hasn't he just rewritten me?
Deep down, the Wanderer already knows.
*
Time drags on. Things begin to disintegrate. Wanderer begins to disintegrate. He claws at his arms just to feel something. Screams himself hoarse just to hear his voice.
"Come on, Dottore, please. Is that what you wanted to hear?! Well you've heard it! You can't just- You can't just!"
You can't just throw me away.
After everything, is this really how it ends?
The puppet laughs until he cries, then cries until he laughs.
He realizes that he's beginning to give up.
His thoughts come slower and slower, interspersed with blank moments of inactivity. The spans of time uncountable, like everything else in here.
He wishes he could shut himself down entirely.
If this is all that's left, he wishes he didn't exist.
*
And then- and then-
*
Light. Noise. A hand on his shoulder. The puppet gasps, blinking rapidly against the searing sting of sensation. Someone is saying something. He knows the voice. The fingers squeeze lightly on his shoulder, painfully overwhelming after all that nothing, and yet his entire body sways toward the touch. It’s grounding, something real, proof that he exists.
The voice says something else. The hand starts to withdraw-
The puppet panics, his own hands shooting out to catch the other person's arm and clutch it as hard as he can. "Don't," he manages, tongue moving clumsily, "don't-"
Don't leave me alone. Please.
The person stops moving. The sounds begin to resolve into meaningful words. "Are you shaking?" the voice asks, mildly incredulous. "Archons, Scaramouche. It was only a month."
Dottore. This is Dottore he's clinging to. He becomes aware that he's crumpled on the ground, legs splayed awkwardly beneath him. Dottore is stooping uncomfortably to accommodate Scaramouche’s grip; he must have bent down to shake him by the shoulder. Scaramouche's forehead drops to press against Dottore's arm, feeling the warmth of it, the blood rushing beneath the skin. A month. "Ffffuck you," he mumbles.
"Scaramouche, did you hear anything I said? It wasn't on purpose," Dottore says, exasperated.
"Liar," the puppet croaks, squeezing tighter.
"I only intended it to be a few moments," Dottore insists. "Minor miscalculations are only to be expected as I master these powers. I needed to keep you contained while I took care of the intruder, and a month isn't so bad, considering. Aren't you glad it wasn't a year? A century?"
The puppet shudders violently. It's entirely involuntary.
Dottore sighs. "Oh, there there," he says, and pats the puppet on the head, a poor facsimile of comfort. "Are you about done? This is quite undignified."
Thoughts are still coming together slowly in Scaramouche's mind. "An intruder?" he mumbles. Why does that nag at him?
Dottore tsks. "She got away," he says. "Some other power whisked her off right before I could get to her."
She…
Nefer.
Did... the Traveler send her?
The Traveler.
Wanderer's stomach swoops as he becomes rooted again in time and self and space. He abruptly comprehends that he's clinging to his archnemesis like a sniveling toddler, that the Traveler and Durin and Albedo are still out there fighting for the fate of Nod-Krai. That in objective reality, if Dottore is to be believed, it's been less than a day.
With some difficulty- still fearing the return of the nothingness- he forces his grip to release, peeling himself away from Dottore's arm. The Doctor stands and dusts himself off.
Wanderer doesn't bother following him to his feet. This turn of events should be humiliating, but he feels it only in a distant sort of way. Hopelessness is settling into him, thick as sludge. If the Doctor really has the ability to warp time like that, he will break the Wanderer sooner or later. How pathetic, to be this much of a wreck after only a month- he was awake in Shakkei for years before Katsuragi found him.
"What do you want, Dottore," he asks dully.
"...Would you stand up, to begin with," Dottore answers waspishly. "A tantrum won't solve anything."
And what point is there in defiance at the moment? Wanderer hauls himself to his feet, fists clenched, hating himself nearly as badly as he hates Dottore.
Satisfied, Dottore starts monologuing again. “It should be obvious that you’d fare better coming to my side,” he says. “Those allies of yours can’t hope to defeat me as I am now. And what could you possibly have to gain from helping them maintain the status quo?” He scoffs. “I’d certainly allow you more power than the Dendro Archon does. The gnoses will be nigh obsolete in my new world order, but I wouldn’t be entirely opposed to having a lesser god around. You could reclaim what was always meant to be yours. For good this time.”
Dottore is smirking, gesticulating with his hands as he paces; they’re in Nod-Krai now, a nondescript section of Nasha Town. He really thinks he’s getting somewhere with this. Perhaps he was able to recover the memories Irminsul took from him, but Wanderer doubts he’s got a direct line to the World-Tree, because he’s still extrapolating from his knowledge of Scaramouche as he last knew him. And it doesn't escape him that Dottore’s gone straight to making his pitch, no mention of what he wants in return. It’s possible he’s simply trying to secure his allegiance before revealing the other end of the deal, but somehow, Wanderer doesn’t think so. What could he even have to offer someone as all-powerful as Dottore is claiming to be? He’s certain Dottore would love to open him up and see what’s changed since they parted ways, but that’s hardly enough for what Dottore is offering. And if all he wanted was to satisfy his curiosity, well, right now he could overpower the Wanderer whenever he pleased.
The conclusions Wanderer circled around during that month in the dark resurface in his mind, and the last pieces of the puzzle slot into place. It slips out with an incredulous little half-laugh: “You don’t have any use for me at all, do you.” Once it would’ve been his worst nightmare. Saying it now is oddly freeing.
Dottore pauses mid-sentence, lips a grim line, eyes still hidden by that ridiculous mask. He never used to wear it when he and Scaramouche were alone. “I told you it was unbecoming to undervalue yourself,” he says sternly.
“Oh, I don’t,” Wanderer scoffs. He can’t stop the nasty grin spreading slowly across his face; he feels exhilarated, overtaken by a sudden heady rush. “It’s only that I’ve figured you out, Dottore.”
Dottore folds his hands behind his back as he regards the puppet from an angle. “Oh?” he asks mockingly.
Wanderer says, slow and damning, “You’re lonely.”
And the indulgent look vanishes from Zandik’s face.
Wanderer really shouldn’t be antagonizing him like this, not when he’s at his mercy. It’d be trivial for Dottore to drop him back into that void, and for longer this time. But Wanderer’s too overcome with the darkly ironic satisfaction of knowing that at the end of the day, Dottore has the same fatal weakness he does: he doesn’t want to be alone.
“Don’t be ridiculous,” Dottore says, voice low with warning. “It’s laughable that you’d try to project your flaws onto me-”
“Projecting? Me?” Wanderer cuts him off with a sharp bark of laughter. “Please. You’re the one who’s been projecting all along. That was the real reason you couldn’t leave me be at Tatarasuna, wasn’t it? You couldn’t stand to see me accepted when you weren’t.”
Nahida implied as much, and it made the centuries that followed make so much more sense. Dottore took such care in molding Scaramouche into a reflection of himself. Scaramouche never minded picking up habits from Dottore; he wanted to be as powerful and superior and untouchable as the Doctor made himself out to be. Nothing could hurt him that way, he thought, not if he didn’t let it. But that was a pretty lie, and Dottore- he’s never been as invulnerable as he seemed either.
Of course he wouldn’t rewrite Wanderer to his whims; that would defeat the whole point. It’s the same reason he didn’t simply kidnap the Kabukimono after Tatarasuna, instead waiting until he was ready to join the Fatui of his own accord. Dottore wants someone by his side who genuinely agrees with him, who’ll validate his twisted worldview without being forced to. Who’ll reconfirm for him that he was wronged, that his transactional view of things is correct, that he’s not alone in his deranged ambition. No one stood by his side and did that for him as long as Scaramouche did. And now that Dottore's on the precipice of his new world order, soon to put himself in a category permanently apart from human understanding, he’s grasping for that familiar source of comfort like a scared child.
The Doctor’s expression is stormy. “This again?” he growls. “They should be nothing to you by now, Scaramouche!”
Wanderer’s mouth splits wider, a rictus grin. His eyes are wide, his hands curved into claws; he must look at least as deranged as Scaramouche ever did. “Oh really?” he retorts. “Like the Akademiya means nothing to you?”
Dottore twitches, taking a threatening step toward him. “Don’t test me,” he warns.
“Oh, I’m sorry; that’s your job, isn’t it?” Wanderer says insincerely. He doesn’t retreat, even as a sense of danger settles low in his gut. Dottore knew everything about Scaramouche, but Scaramouche knew everything about Dottore, too. They’re similar, even now, even with how far the Wanderer has come. Perhaps they always will be. And that’s why he knows exactly how to make this hurt. “Maybe I misspoke earlier,” he goes on. “You do need me. But Dottore, I sure as hell don’t need you. I have things now you'd never be capable of offering me. And what you do have… let’s just say I’m not interested.”
Perhaps Dottore was just as afraid that Scaramouche wouldn’t need him after unsealing his power. And so he did everything he could to keep him by his side the only way he knew how, making sure he stayed isolated and dependent on him in the centuries that followed. What Wanderer has now is infinitely more valuable. Actual friendship. People who value him for who he is, not for what he represents or what he can give them. Stable relationships in which he doesn’t have to scrape and claw for scraps. Peace of mind, the space to grow. He’s hardly going to enumerate, but the Doctor’s intelligent enough.
Dottore bares his teeth. “You really expect me to believe that you have no interest in power-?”
“I don’t expect you to believe anything,” Wanderer replies harshly. “You couldn’t see past your own nose if it contradicts your preconceived notions.” A dire insult for a scholar- it's one of the many complaints Dottore would make in his ravings against the Akademiya.
“This is farcical,” Dottore snaps. “You’re speaking of your allies? Your friends? Perhaps they like you now, but we both know it can never last. You’re not capable of that sort of change. You’re a pale shadow of yourself, sanded down into palatability, and it won’t even work! Someday they’ll see you for who you really are!”
He really is losing his composure, Wanderer thinks, darkly thrilled. The Doctor has always been larger-than-life, omnipresent and suffocating. No matter how caustic the Balladeer could be, Scaramouche spent so long making sure never to cross certain lines, not wanting to make the Doctor truly angry, convinced he’d be nothing without Dottore. It’s a kind of revenge Wanderer could never have anticipated to realize that in some ways Dottore is just as pathetic.
“Maybe so,” Wanderer says easily, having no interest in explaining that the most important people in his life know about his past and accept him already. “But even then, I’d take eternity alone to eternity with you.”
Dottore’s lip curls. “We both know that isn’t true,” he says darkly.
Wanderer can't exactly deny that just ten minutes ago he was clinging to Dottore for dear life. “Sure,” he says, letting spiteful boldness drown out his fear. “Throw me back in there for a year, a century- maybe you’ll get something easier to work with. But you won’t get me. You won’t get Scaramouche. Nothing you can do will give you that, because I killed him. You should try dying sometime, Dottore; it can really give you a sense of clarity.”
“You’re making a mistake,” Dottore seethes. “No one can understand you like I do!”
“Maybe that used to be true,” Wanderer says. “But now? You just can’t accept the truth.” He leans forward, enunciating clearly: “I’ve outgrown you, Zandik.”
And oh, it’s intoxicating to have all the power for once. Even if Dottore breaks him- and Wanderer doesn’t doubt that he can- Wanderer still wins. Nothing Dottore could possibly do would bring back the relationship they had. The pair of them snickering behind their hands at the naivety and inferiority of everyone else, so noxious and perfectly suited for one another that even the rest of the Harbingers couldn’t stand them- that’s gone forever. And what's really funny is, if only he hadn’t left Scaramouche in Sumeru, Dottore would probably still have it. It couldn't have been that hard to string Scaramouche along with the promise of another shot at godhood down the line. Or he could've let him in on this madcap plan of usurping the moons he's had for who knows how long; Scaramouche was desperate enough he’d have latched onto anything.
But with that one decision, he sealed their fate. A moment of casual, lazy arrogance, Dottore certain he could always get what he wanted later. It was the single best thing that could’ve happened to Scaramouche, and it can never be taken back.
Dottore is realizing this in real-time, an ugly snarl curling onto his face; you’d think a grown-up like him would deal better with his toys being taken away. “I could bring those so-called ‘friends’ of yours before you and kill them one-by-one,” he growls. “I could take them apart slowly and make you watch.”
The threat chills Wanderer to the bone, and his hands clench into shaking fists as he says, “I’d kill myself first.” Steely and flat, not a threat but a promise.
Dottore sneers. “You think I would let you?”
Wanderer tries to swallow back his terrified, helpless rage. He clings to his bravado by the skin of his teeth, lifting his chin and using the same condescending phrase the Doctor did earlier: “Let’s think this through. Would that get you what you want?”
He can see a muscle tic in Dottore’s jaw, a sign that he’ll imminently lose control, and as gratifying as that would be, Scaramouche knows to strike first, viciously and without hesitation. Wanderer lunges, aiming right for Dottore’s mask with a swift, vicious uppercut backed by Anemo. As it shatters Dottore reels back, swearing. Wanderer lifts into the air, catching only a flash of the Doctor's furious red eyes as he summons his myriad machines.
Then they’re off, Wanderer zipping through the air to avoid the crackling energy beams and piercing projectiles Dottore sends out after him, agile as a hummingbird. He knows this isn’t a fight he can win, and he looks in vain for any way to break free from this illusion as he sends out slash after slash of concentrated Anemo energy. Most of them are dissipated in the air by Dottore’s return volleys or neatly avoided as he phases in and out of reality on a whim.
“You have no idea how much you need me!” Dottore roars. “That pint-sized Archon has you dancing on her strings!”
“So long as I’m not dancing on yours,” Wanderer spits, deftly evading a series of blinding white beams, before suddenly realizing that Dottore has vanished from his field of vision entirely. He pivots on his heel, head whipping around to search for him, only to stagger in the air with a choked cry as something sharp strikes him from behind, spearing precisely through the joint of his right shoulder and lodging there. The limb now dangles uselessly, and he reaches immediately with his left hand to rip the device out, knowing all too well how it functions-
But he isn’t fast enough, and finds himself yanked savagely backwards until he collides with Dottore. Snarling, he spins to face him and tries to launch an attack with his left hand, only for Dottore to catch his wrist and shatter it unceremoniously in a single clean motion. Hissing in pain, Wanderer kicks out, attempting to gather enough elemental energy for a burst with his feet, but two more beams of plasma shoot out and cut cleanly through the joints of his knees, and his lower legs go limp as well. In just a few moments, Dottore has rendered him defenseless. It’d be more humiliating if Dottore wasn’t capable of this even before becoming a god, though it'd taken him longer when he couldn't fucking teleport. His joints were always a weak point; strike them at just the right spot, and the connection will sever. It wasn’t usually an issue for him, because he’s durable enough that most attacks wouldn't pierce through, and you'd have to know exactly where to aim... which is, of course, not a problem for Dottore.
With unyielding strength, Dottore wrangles the Wanderer’s broken body to the ground and slams him down on his back. The air rushes out of the Wanderer’s lungs, and when he gets his breath back he laughs, the sound burbling dark and ugly from his throat. Dottore is crouched over him like a vulture, loose strands of blue hair falling into his face, one hand pinning Wanderer’s broken wrist above his head. His crimson eyes glitter with frustration and anger. He looks fallible. He looks human.
Wanderer lifts his head and smiles savagely in challenge. “Well? That all you got?” he pants. His limbs burn with a fizzling sort of agony, but it’s far from the worst he’s had. This is practically Dottore handling him with kid gloves.
“It didn’t have to be this way,” Dottore spits roughly, ruby-red eyes turbulent, ever-so-expressive beneath the mask. There’s a note almost of pleading in his tone, and oh. Oh, this is what passes for the Doctor begging, isn’t it?
“Go to hell, Dottore,” Wanderer says with grim satisfaction. The grip around his broken wrist tightens until he has to grit his teeth, but there’s an undeniable thrill to making Dottore resort to violence like this, violence that can’t be justified as necessary for any sort of experiment. Raw and honest, peeling back the varnish over the idea that any of the Doctor’s violence was ever justified. How far will Dottore go, he wonders? Will he tear the Wanderer open just like this? Get at his inner workings like he’s surely been dying to do? Never before has he operated on Scaramouche without the excuse that it was somehow required for one or the other of their agendas, under the pretext that Scaramouche had given blanket permission for it all. None of that exists anymore. If Dottore does it now, it’ll be explicitly a violation, and with a sick sort of anticipation Wanderer almost wants it, wants Dottore to prove that he’s not above it, that Scaramouche was never really so different from all of his other experiments the way the Doctor so badly wanted him to believe. The way Scaramouche let himself believe.
But the Doctor is hesitating. It’s so entirely unlike him Wanderer almost doubts what he sees. There’s a conflict there, a fiery storm of frustration, an inability to accept defeat. Because even with the Wanderer pinned like a butterfly, helpless to stop him, that’s what this is: the Doctor’s defeat.
Wanderer tilts his chin and lilts softly: “Well?”
At last, there’s a hardening of resolve in the Doctor’s eyes. But whatever it means, the Wanderer will never find out.
Because in that moment the dome of the illusionary space splinters, light arcing in as something breaks in from outside. Dottore whips around, startled, as a purple shape hurtles through the gap, shouting, “Hat Guy!”
Durin. It’s Durin. Dottore is caught so utterly off-guard that he fails to react until Durin has streaked by like a bullet, snatching Wanderer right from underneath him. With an inarticulate noise of rage, the Doctor leaps to his feet and fires off a dozen projectiles after them, but Durin banks and weaves expertly on his wide purple wings, aiming for the gap that’ll take them back to reality.
“Shoulder,” Wanderer gasps, “my shoulder-”
Thankfully Durin seems to get what he means and yanks the device out before Dottore can use it to pull them right back to him. Wanderer lets out a laugh that's almost a cackle; for all he obliquely taunted Dottore with the bonds he has, he somehow never thought to expect his allies would mount a rescue.
“Hat Guy,” Durin says, “I was so worried-”
“Focus on flying,” Wanderer pants, but then he laughs again, bright and full of relief, feeling himself go limp in Durin’s arms. Durin was too fast, too unexpected. They’re going to make it. He lets his head loll back against Durin’s chest, getting one last good look at Dottore as they hurtle through the exit.
Dottore is staring after the Wanderer, his gaze piercing, wild, desperate. From here, the Doctor’s existence looks pitiful and insignificant. The thought tears through him, cataclysmically cathartic, bizarrely bittersweet. This is the man who was everything to Scaramouche, for the longest time. He’d made sure he was everything.
Goodbye, Zandik, he thinks, and it feels final.
Reality unfolds around them in all its messy splendor. Behind them, the rift seals itself shut.