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There was no corner of the sunless sky that could truthfully be considered relaxing to traverse, but if anywhere in the endless void could offer some small relief it was surely Titania. Beneath and around the locomotive the colossal flower squatted, demurely reflecting, or perhaps phosphorescing, its pink and orange glow through every narrow window, cutting through heavy metal mesh without remorse, forcibly brightening the dark corners of the Fifth In Line with violent grids of colour.
It frightened and calmed the crew in equal measure – the newest arrivals, work-worlders freed from their contracts early but not before the corrupting fingers of spun time had run its grey fingers through their hair, stepped gingerly around the invading patches and contorted themselves to carry out their duties with as little exposure to the unfamiliar as possible, while the longer serving members, more comfortable with the traits and moods of the many flavours of dark, took the rare opportunity to bask in light that wasn’t entirely tinged with madness.
The maudlin captain seemed as neutral on the sight of the grand flower as he did on most things. He was technically gazing at it right now, true, standing motionless in front of the porthole in his cabin and profile lit – rather charmingly, the devil thought – by the soft warmth of Titania. But, although the exact quality of his stare wasn’t visible from this angle, the dejected set of his shoulders suggested he was looking at something that cast a shadow far longer than the vivacious petals.
The devil would have sighed if he had lungs. He gave it a moment’s consideration and sighed anyway, pleasing himself with the petty drama of it although the effect was admittedly somewhat lost in the essentially noisy quality of 3am silence aboard a moving train. The captain didn’t so much as flinch, and certainly didn’t tear that lost, sad look away from the stupid overgrown orchid and back to where it belonged: the currently not terribly repentant devil and the rapidly cooling bed he was currently failing to warm. There were goosebumps on his arms, even, the devil noted in exasperation, because of course the bloody fool wouldn’t let putting a shirt on get in the way of a good brood.
What a shame, the devil thought to himself with an unbecoming irritation, that his captain – foolish, troubled, quietly rebellious Allister - couldn’t take a lesson from his crew and allow himself to actually smile at the closest thing to sunset that any of them would ever see again. Or probably had ever seen, in Allister's case, the devil supposed.
The floor was so cold against his bare feet that for one disorientating second the devil thought himself somewhere else entirely, but the moment passed quickly and he felt only corrugated metal where he’d briefly fancied black ice. He padded across the small distance, throwing on his thick dressing gown – which, of course, Allister was welcome to borrow any time he fancied – and wrapped his arms around him.
“You know,” he said, resting his chin on the top of Allister’s head, “I’m going to have to insist you wear a shirt to bed if you insist on getting out of it to maunder like this.”
Allister was stiff beneath his hands and shivering slightly. His expression was as bleak reflected in the window as the devil had suspected it would be. He didn’t move for a long while, and then only to draw one hand up just far enough to rest lightly on top of the devil’s broader one.
“I’ve been colder,” he said eventually. The devil, being a very old devil who knew a great deal about temptation - and also being painfully aware that he, too, was reflected in the window - just barely managed to resist the urge to roll his eyes.
“I know,” he said instead, aiming and very nearly succeeding at sounding comforting, and gave Allister a gentle squeeze, “But that’s no reason to freeze yourself deliberately. One can be quite dashingly tragic in a dressing gown - I should know.”
That got him the shadow of a smile, warped in the uneven glass, and he felt a little of the tension go out of Allister’s narrow shoulders.
“Whatever are you thinking about my dear,” the devil said gently, running his free hand over Allister’s ribs.
“The past,” Allister said, in a way he probably thought was interesting and enigmatic but to the devil’s polished ear was merely petulant. The devil dipped his head to place a kiss just behind his ear and gave him a warning squeeze.
“A terrible place. Not worth visiting,” he said, briskly, “Certainly not at 3am with no shirt. Come brood in bed.”
Allister hummed, but didn’t move.
“I must insist,” the devil said, velvet honey against his ear, and finally got the intended reaction; a lessening of tension, a slight tilt of the head towards him, a quiet sigh, and then Allister was letting himself be led back to the bed.
“Nothing really matters, does it,” Allister said, once he’d been deposited beneath the covers, arranged and rearranged and encouraged to rest his head on the devil’s chest. This time the devil did roll his eyes, secure that it wouldn’t be seen.
“Whatever do you mean my dear?” he said with false patience, amusing himself by tracing profane symbols against his lover’s naive skin with one casual finger.
“Do you ever feel like it all just happens over?” Allister said after a moment’s silence, “Or not quite…but that nothing really changes? Except for when it does?”
The devil considered this nonsense for longer than it warranted.
“I’m much older than you,” he said eventually, with unusual frankness, “But there’s a certain truth to that, I suppose. I can confirm that history is prone to repeating its mistakes.”
“Mmm,” Allister said noncommittally, tucking his cold hand around the devil’s ribs, “I suppose. I meant more…no, never mind.”
“Tell me,” the devil said, gently stern, tangling their fingers together to underscore his command and definitely not to distract the blasted man from sneakily attempting to warm his icy fingers under his armpit.
“You’ll just tell me it’s déjà vu,” Allister said, accepting the consolation prize of having his fingers kissed, one knuckle at a time, as he spoke, “But sometimes I feel like this has happened before. The same tasks, the same people…yet at the same time, I know it’s always the first time for me. That can’t be true, can it? I'm only one man, and the years keep moving…” he trailed off, then ducked his head a little, “I’m probably just going mad.”
He said it in the same tone one might say ‘I’m getting old.’ The devil thought about this for a while, still holding Allister’s hand to his lips.
“You may be right,” he said, “Or perhaps not. Time, my dear, is most intimately connected to space after all. Perhaps you’ve felt an echo, once or twice.”
“You think?” said Allister, hopefully.
“I’m sure,” the devil said. He wasn’t.
There was another silence, which the devil filled by rolling them over so he could trap Allister’s face between his hands and smooth his thumbs over his jaw. For warmth, of course. Wouldn’t do to let his own captain's face freeze off.
“You’ve had a lot of human lovers,” Allister said quietly. It wasn’t a question, but the devil could see one rising in his throat and decided to cut it off before things could get even more maudlin.
“Yes,” he said, pressing a kiss to the rise of a cheekbone, “Definitely before you, almost certainly after. No two the same, before you ask.”
“I must seem foolish to you,” Allister sighed, baring his neck obediently.
“Sometimes,” the devil said agreeably, kissing the soft skin beneath his ear, “Most humans do.”
“Is that why you like us?” Allister said. It really was a damnable habit of his to choose the most inopportune times to get talkative.
"Absolutely," the devil bit down, which successfully put an end to the conversation for a short time, but Allister was apparently not to be forestalled in his moping because before too long;
"Is it strange that I miss it? The Zee…"
"Yes, extremely strange," the devil let a touch of displeasure leak into his tone. It was after all just a little insulting that Allister could think of anything at such a moment, let alone the bloody Zee, "One might even say deranged."
"Ah but you were never a Zailor-"
"Thank all that's below. Do you long for death that much, darling? Because one could make arrangements-"
"I fell in once you know," Allister went on as though he hadn't heard him, "The crew pulled me out quickly-"
"Yes, you've mentioned it once or twice," the devil muttered.
"Of course I was glad to be saved, only…it was so much darker under the water, darker than sleep even, and sometimes-"
"More than twice, in fact."
Allister looked at him properly then and smiled in a rueful kind of way.
"I'm sorry, I'm boring you, aren't I?"
("No, no, never," but even a devil can only lie so well.)
"It's this awful light, you know, it feels like it gets inside me somehow, and I…well, never mind, I won't go on about it. I'm sure there’ll be another monster along to distract me soon enough.”
“You do have a bad habit of inviting the monsters on board,” the devil said drily. Allister finally laughed at that, a proper laugh too - not the loudest or the longest, but involuntary and without reserve.
“I suppose I do,” he said, smiling, something uncharacteristically knowing in his expression, “On board, and into my bed.”
“I was talking about the ghost,” said the devil as severely as he could, just to hear his poor little stupid human laugh again and pin the fragile, fluttering sound to memory like a butterfly to a board, “And I should hope you haven’t invited him to your bed or I shall have to insist on a change of cabin. I cannot abide frost beneath the counterpane.”
“Don’t worry, I’m not a fan of moustaches,” Allister said, giving him a coy look from beneath his lashes, and the devil grinned back, teeth catching the light.
“Come, my dear,” he purred, the unspoken and the unspeakable a buzzing promise in his false and hollow throat, “Let me warm you up properly.”
And so he did.