Chapter Text
The hallway smelled of old stone and snuffed candles. Copia should’ve been used to it by now. The Ministry never changed. And yet today, everything felt... off. The scent clung to the back of his throat in a way it usually didn’t.
His boots clicked along the flagstones in a sharp and rhythmic manner. Each step echoed with more ceremony than comfort. The walls around him were lined with expressionistic paintings of long-dead Papas, half of whom looked like they’d rather be anywhere else. Primo. Secondo. Terzo… Their oil-cracked eyes followed him the way only dead things could: quiet, heavy, and indifferent.
The Ghoul escorting him hadn’t said a word beyond a clipped greeting. The silence left Copia plenty of time to study him.
He didn’t recognize this one. Probably one of V’s. The Ghoul moved like a man trained on marble floors - his posture perfect, black coat moving like water cut with ink. The coattails swept just above the floor, deliberate but effortless, the fabric too fine for anything that had been budgeted for in his reign. The coattails dragged just enough to suggest elegance. Shoulders squared. Spine straight. The mask was silver and flawless. No eyes, and no mouth. Just a smooth void with curling horns like polished bone. As they passed under a torch, the grooves etched into the metal caught the light in a shimmer of unreadable symbols.
They came to a stop in front of a large, ornate wooden door that he recognized as the entrance to his Mother's- no, Sister Imperator's dinner hall. She would invite important members of the Clergy here to discuss equally as important matters. It was the only room in the Ministry that Copia's tricycle had been banned from per Imperator's orders. For that reason, he had only been in here once of twice in his entire life.
Still wordlessly, the Ghoul gestured with a gloved hand to the door. Copia opened his mouth to utter a thank you for bringing him here, but the Ghoul had vanished within a blink, as if afraid the walls might swallow him up. Copia's brows drew together. He shook his head then, murmuring to himself, "Where are their manners these days?"
As he pushed the door open with open palms, he felt the intricate carvings of the door through his gloves. Carvings of the fiery river Phlegethon circling around planet Earth, souls drowning in it, their hands reaching for stars. In the middle of the room, more a crypt than a meeting chamber, sat a single table long enough to seat a dozen. But only two chairs were there. One at each end. As if they were preparing to duel. Around the table stood towering bookcases filled with frayed, dark-tinted spines. Where no books stood, some artefact took up the empty space. He recognized the golden candlesticks that Primo had once dug up from the garden. There was a bronze goat face, and some skulls belonging to some lower ranking individuals of the Clergy. There were no windows - he assumed for privacy - just mirrors and paintings on the walls.
The room was dark and gloomy; simply horrible. But Mr. Psaltarian had insisted on letting the meeting take place here. He'd mentioned tradition.
Copia blinked his eyes once or twice, stepped inside, and promptly shut the doors behind him. He pressed his palms to the wood for a moment longer than necessary and exhaled.
It had been months of seeing this man - this “V”- plastered across media, waltzing around in a violet version of his robes. Using his songs. His moves. His everything. V - or 'Perpetua', as he insisted on being called - had inherited Copia’s stage like a silent understudy who’d never had to suffer through rehearsals. And Copia, under the illusion of a 'promotion,' had been pushed backstage.
Fucking V.
He really should've cancelled last minute.
But Copia felt like cancelling would have been lame. He wasn't lame. So, he dropped into his chair. It creaked beneath him. Of course it did. The room felt too dark, too dead now that Sister Imperator was gone. He could still remember her sitting there, scolding Sister Marika for "failing to watch Copia." Apparently, "a six year old should not be allowed in the Ancient Library by himself." The pages of priceless books had become paper planes without supervision. When he overheard the scolding by the door, he didn't understand the gravity of the situation, but now that he was much older, he did. Indeed, the books had been priceless.
There were few good memories here, but he wasn't here for memories.
Copia stared at the door and tapped his fingers on his thighs. They were supposed to meet at six. It was ten minutes past six now. Of course V was late. He was probably being flown in by some special Papa helicopter or transported through an infernal mirror with custom mood lighting. Meanwhile, Copia had arrived the human way: tired, on foot, and with sore arches.
He was halfway through checking his watch when the footsteps came.
Slow. No hurry. Whoever it was, they weren’t nervous. Or maybe they were just good at hiding it.
A shadow spilled under the door. He saw two boots and hems of robes floating around them.
Shit.
Copia quickly adjusted his black jacket and the Grucifix ornament hanging off his necklace. He pushed it right to the middle of his chest. It took two attempts to get it right. At the same time, his heart thudded somewhere behind his ribs in an unfamiliar rhythm. Right, this was it. He was finally meeting his long lost twin brother after last month's failed attempt when the Ministry's front door would not budge for whatever reason that Copia had nothing to do with.
The door creaked.
It opened.
And there he was. Not taller than Copia. But he carried himself like he was; like gravity leaned toward him by choice. His robes shimmered with a deep, glassy violet, not flashy but rich, like old royalty. The mitre was lowered just enough to cast a shadow over his eyes. And that face… It was his own, almost. Same round nose. Same ashen hair. Same uneven eyes, one a pale, wintry white.
“Frater Imperator,” V greeted, voice soft and precise with a nod of his silver painted skin. Their eyes met. V's expression was cold - not in a cruel way. Just... very still. Like pond water right before a storm.
Copia leaned back and folded his hands above the table like a bishop pretending not to curse. “Ah. Hello… V,” The name hit his tongue like vinegar. “Yes. You're V. Well, eh, Your Gloominess, welcome to the Ministry.”
V took the opposite chair. He moved like a shadow that had studied ballet; deliberate and efficient. He placed his mitre gently on the table. His eyes scanned the room briefly before meeting Copia’s. There was something elegant in the way he held himself. Something that reminded him of Primo.
Copia noticed V's eyes move around the absurdly long table, before they landed on him. “Thank you," he said. No pleasantries. No warmth. Just a razor-clean formality. Apparently neither V's Ghouls or V knew how to ask 'how are you?' or something. Copia waited for something more: a smile, a blink, a breath, but V remained perfectly composed. Like a statue that had learned how to blink only when no one was watching.
The silence stretched.
Copia cleared his throat. It sounded embarrassingly loud in the vaulted stillness of the chamber. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a small crumpled piece of paper. It was creased so many times it looked like it had been run over by a cart. On it, he’d scribbled possible conversation starters in red ink the night before, pacing in his office at 2 a.m. with only orange juice and irritation for company. His fingers trembled slightly as he unfolded the paper. He tried not to let it show.
“So…” he began, squinting at the smeared writing. “V. You just finished the tour, didn’t you?”
V nodded. Copia waited for some sort of elaboration. Nothing came again.
He narrowed his eyes. "How was it?"
"It was good."
Copia blinked once, then again. He glanced at the paper, and found the next question. “I heard you also used a cowbell on a track?”
Perpetua’s eyes didn’t shift, but his head tilted slightly in acknowledgment. “Yes. Umbra.”
And that was it. No story about the song. Nothing. Copia felt something twist in his gut. He knew the song. He’d listened to it in private, at night, volume low, when he’d pretended to be reading something else. The cowbell had come in quite unexpectedly, and it was weirdly perfect. It had made him want to throw the record across the room. He wanted to know more about it. Speaking of throwing things, Copia was trying quite hard to make small talk, but the pest across from him was not doing the same. He should have shoved his little note over to V so that the pre-made questions could benefit him, but there was an ugly doodle on there of genitals he didn't want to be seen.
"So the tour was good and you used a cowbell. Okay."
Another nod.
“Yes. Okay then. Of course the tour was good. After all, you used my moves in it,” He hadn’t meant to say it. Not like that. Not so sharp. But it had been sitting in the back of his throat for months, and now that the door was cracked, it came pouring out like smoke.
Across the table, V didn't flinch though. Instead he smiled with his blackened teeth, small and sharp, like a cut healing wrong. He looked off to the side as the smile fell quickly. "Well, yes. From my ehm, studies, I found out that you are adored the most out of all our predecessors. I would've been a fool if I had erased your… 'moves.'"
His 'studies'? Copia opened his mouth to respond, but V spoke again, this time more quietly, like the words were meant to be kept between them and the walls.
“But I am sorry that you did not enjoy it, Frater Imperator. If it helps your annoyance, most people are not worth copying." The apology was simple, but it hit a little harder than any insult Copia had braced for. V's words came not with sarcasm or smugness that he'd usually get from anyone else, but a weight that felt deeply, unsettlingly sincere. He didn’t know where to put that.
Instead he chuckled, embarassed, and waved a gloved hand as if brushing dust off a memory. “Ah, come on now. Eh, no need to be sorry. It’s showbiz. All of it is borrowed anyway.” He cleared his throat as he glanced at the small piece of paper in his hand. "So, eh, tell me about yourself. I know nothing about you."
The question hung, and something in V's posture shifted. His shoulders didn’t drop, but his spine seemed to stiffen, not in offense, but in defense. His pupils darted as he lowered his eyes slightly. He looked not at Copia, but at the wood grain of the table between them.
"Ehm… I was kept in a Christian monastery in the mountains. The monks… they feared me. I was in the dungeons most of the time. There were books and instruments. A Sister taught me how to read."
Copia blinked hard. "You were feared?"
"Yes."
"Why?"
V nodded, then added, almost as an afterthought: “I was told I was stillborn. A day after my death, the mortician found me crying on the cooling board. A monk took me in until they decided what I was.”
The words lingered.
Not who he was.
But what.
"When I was… five. Lord Satan spoke to me. I- I should not have told them." V's fingers drifted toward his mask. A gesture born not from vanity, but to anchor himself. Copia might’ve questioned why V still wore the thing indoors, but the faint sliver of burned skin peeking from the edges told him enough. Enough to stay quiet and not tell him the black paint on his cheeks had faded a little. Copia shifted forward slightly. His voice, for once, had no edge to it. No, he was curious now.
"Really? And what did He tell you?"
"To have faith in Him."
Copia stared at him - really stared - and for a moment, the irritation that had fueled him for months faltered. Beneath the calm, beneath V's mysterious stillness, there was something he couldn't quite name. Something that was… harmed.
"In Lord Satan? But, the monks were Christians, no?"
For the first time, V smiled. It was not the tight, strange smile from before. A smirk. Like the kind someone might wear after lighting a fire. It vanished as quickly as it came. "Yes,” he said. “From that moment, I slept in the dungeons. They were scared. I heard they fasted. They bled themselves. They spoke scripture until their throats cracked and their teeth turned red.”
A pause.
“But I had faith. I… And one day, they were all gone." The candle nearest to V guttered. Briefly. Just enough for the flame to flicker sideways. Copia swallowed.
“How?"
“One by one, they left. Into the snow. And I was free.” V said simply without looking up.
"What happened after?"
V shrugged. "Nothing much."
The conversation had died again and Copia figured this was a good moment to get tea. The air felt a little too tight for his liking anyway.
He returned to the chamber with two mismatched mugs of mint tea, the steam rising in slow, ghostly tendrils. The scent, sharp and herbal, cut through the heaviness of the room like a clean knife. One mug was sky blue, printed with a smug little rat emoji giving a thumbs-up. The other, slightly chipped at the rim, bore the faded phrase: 'I peed in this mug’ in peeling red letters.
V stood on the other side of the room now, unmoving except for a subtle turn of the head. He was positioned in front of a large oil painting: a younger Sister Imperator in her prime. Blonde, with thick black eyeshadow, imperious, and visibly annoyed to be immortalized. Her expression suggested she was moments away from berating the painter for wasting her time. V’s hands were neatly clasped behind his back, shoulders straight. He studied the painting like it might eventually blink.
“Here you go,” Copia said, stepping in and offering the mug casually.
V turned his head, accepted the tea with both hands, and stared down at the cup as if analyzing the font on the front. He didn't comment on the phrase. He just stood there, holding the mug close, letting the warmth soak into his gloves. The man just kept looking, first at the cup, then at the portrait, then nowhere in particular.
Copia stared at him. He cleared his throat. Loudly.
“Okay, so… just putting this out there.” He gestured between them. “Do you ever... talk?”
V blinked once. “I am speaking now.”
“No, eh, I mean, like… real talking. Conversation. You don’t ask questions. You’re not curious about me at all?”
“Not particularly.”
Copia raised his chin, brows furrowing. “Really? I’m your long-lost twin brother, and you don’t want to know anything about me?"
V looked down at the tea. Steam curled off it in gentle spirals, ghosting toward the ceiling. He stared like it held the answer he was looking for. “I don’t know what to say, Frater Imperator.”
Copia winced. “Oh, please don’t call me that anymore. Call me Copia. The ‘Frater’ thing… I have hated that from the beginning.”
“As you wish. Copia.” He said it precisely, like following a script he was trying to stick to word for word. Copia sipped from his mug and narrowed his eyes.
“You could at least ask me something. Come on. Throw a question out there. Anything.”
V went very still, mug balanced in both hands. He stared into the tea again, eyes narrowing slightly. It was the most expressive he’d looked all evening. He was thinking. Hard. And after a long, silent moment, he finally asked: "What is… your favorite book?
Finally, something.
"Hm? The Codex Gigas, of course."
"Besides that."
"You are not tricking me, no? A test of faith?"
"No."
"Eh… I liked The Little Prince," Copia admitted.
"I don't know it."
"Ah, yes, well… it’s about this little guy, this little prince, and he travels from planet to planet. Don’t ask how, he just does. And he meets these very strange adults who are all, like, obsessed with nonsense. One only cares about numbers, another wants to be admired all the time. They’re ridiculous. But the prince, he’s… honest. Curious. Sad sometimes, but in a very quiet way," he began to explain.
"He comes from this tiny planet with a rose on it. He loves her, the rose, but she’s difficult and he doesn’t know how to care for her until he’s far away. The rose isn’t perfect, but she’s his. And then there’s this fox - oh, the fox is wonderful. The fox teaches him … I dunno, but I liked the fox." He chuckled, before continuing, not bothering to check whether V was listening or not.
"It’s not really a children’s story, you know? People think it is. But it’s more about... feeling small. And quiet. And trying to understand the world when everything in it feels too loud and stupid." He’d kept his eyes on the painted face of Sister Imperator as he spoke, tracing the lines of her expression while recounting the story. His voice had been casual at first, but the words had gathered weight the longer he spoke, until even he had forgotten he was trying to be nonchalant towards V.
His twin was still holding his mug, unmoving, but his gaze had shifted. Focused. Something in it had changed, just slightly, like a curtain drawn half an inch to let light through. His expression hadn’t warmed, exactly, but there was an attentiveness there that hadn’t been present before.
"I'd like to read it," V said, to his surprise.
"Really… ? Oh, well, you can borrow my copy."
"Thank you."
Copia gave a nod, "No problem." He reached for his mug and took a long, quiet sip of the cooled tea, unsure why the air suddenly felt lighter.
They had left the chamber behind; the cold, dark room with too much memory packed into the walls, and had stepped out into the garden. The air was sharp with the scent of soil, still damp from last night’s rain. Long-limbed vines clung lazily to trellises overhead, and in the distance, the faint burble of a a goat-statued fountain played like background music. This had once been Primo’s space. The garden still bore his touch. Everything was symmetrical, ordered, too proud to be wild. Stone planters lined the path like judgmental guards. The hedges were still neatly shaped into sacred geometry: circles, squares, and even some mare. Long after Primo was gone, the old groundskeeper made sure to keep the place just like the first - well, technically second - Papa had left it.
Copia shoved his hands into his coat pockets as they walked side by side, not quite in sync.
“Do you prefer V or Perpetua?” he asked, glancing sidelong.
“Perpetua,” came the quiet reply, almost before the question finished. The soft wind brushed past them.
He nodded and let the name settle. He didn’t like the way it felt in his mouth. Too many syllables. Too much weight, or something. But it was his name. He glanced at his brother - still strange to think the word - and added, more to himself than anything, “I mean, I guess it fits. You do have a... doom-y energy about you.”
“I do?”
“Yes. In... in a not-so-bad way.” Copia shook his head. His jokes really weren't landing with this guy. “Eh, forget it.”
They walked a little further. Somewhere overhead, a crow let out a single, hollow caw, then flapped away like it regretted being involved. Copia slowed to a stop near a lavender bush, reaching out absently to run his fingers along the small, silvery purple leaves. The familiar scent hit him immediately. It was medicinal and sharp. “You know, I used to play here,” he said, tone light. “Back when I was small. Well. Smaller.”
He chuckled softly. “Sister Imperator caught me trying to pick the lavender once. Told me I had no sense of sacredness.”
Beside him, Perpetua tilted his head. “Why did you pick it?”
Copia shrugged, still brushing the leaves. “I dunno. I probably just didn’t like the smell.”
He didn’t mention the rats. They hated it, too.
There was a pause.
“You could’ve just burned the bush,” Perpetua offered. Copia turned slowly to look at him.
“...What?”
“Destruction is faster than decay.”
Copia stared at him for a second longer than polite. “Okay. Wow.” He straightened up. “That’s a perfectly normal thing to say."
“You said you disliked it. I suggested a solution.”
“You do realize the entire garden would’ve gone up with it, no?”
Perpetua looked at the bush, then at the wider courtyard. “Yes. It would have.” He said it like it was just a fact. Like remarking on the weather, and yet Copia felt uneasy upon hearing it. Violet robes waved as Perpetua moved to the plants across from the lavender bush. Copia watched as his brother crouched beside a stone planter holding Henbane, fingers ghosting over the moss growing along its base. He studied it as if it were a puzzle, or a story he hadn’t yet learned to read. There was something strangely boyish about the gesture, despite the fancy robe and the posture and the stillness that seemed bred into his bones.
Copia rubbed his temple.
“You’re really not good at this, huh?”
“At what?”
“Talking. Bonding. Not sounding like you were raised in a castle by, I dunno, Darth Vader or something.”
Perpetua stood and brushed the dirt off his gloved palms. “It was a monastery.”
“Yeah, yeah.”
The wind shifted. The trees rustled overhead. Copia tilted his head back, watching how the light shifted through the canopy. He blew out a long, thin sigh through his nose. “Do you ever think about it?” he asked. “What it would’ve been like... if we’d grown up together?”
“Yes.”
Copia waited, unsure if more was coming. He didn’t press this time. By now, he could tell Perpetua didn’t speak unless he had peeled the words apart first, checked their weight, and lined them up. And indeed, after a pause long enough to start feeling permanent, Perpetua added, “I would’ve liked to have someone.”
It hit in a strange place. Not the heart. Lower, maybe. Stomach, lungs, somewhere he didn’t have words for.
He glanced at his brother, who was still standing straight, hands folded loosely in front of him, eyes forward like he hadn't just said something that left a mark. Copia’s fingers twitched like they wanted to do something with themselves. A hand on the shoulder? A nudge? But he didn’t know if Perpetua would flinch, or freeze, or say nothing at all.
Ah, fuck it. He awkwardly patted Perpetua's shoulder, once, twice.
"Hey, uh, come on now. I... You got me now. Better late than never. Right?"
Perpetua didn’t react at first. Not to the words. Not to the hand on his shoulder. He just stood there, spine straight, face unreadable. For a second, Copia worried he’d crossed some invisible line, that the touch had registered as foreign or wrong or too much.
But then Perpetua turned his head, just slightly. Not all the way toward him, just enough to let him know he’d heard.
"Yes, you're… you're right." The sentence landed awkwardly, like it hadn’t been rehearsed. He tilted his head then, gaze drifting back toward the stained glass windows of the Ministry. The sunlight caught the edge of his black-painted jaw as he stared.
“Who is that?”
Copia followed his gaze.
For a second, he didn’t see it. Then… yes. There, behind the mosaic of fractured blue and red: a faint blue tinted silhouette. Almost transparent. A figure, arms crossed neatly in front of her. Pale, watchful. Her features were half-distorted by the glasswork, but even through the smear of color, there was a face. And it was looking straight at them from afar. He wondered for how long she had been standing there.
“Eh,” Copia said, straightening his shoulders. “I’ll introduce you later.” He turned back to the path, voice shifting deliberately as he gestured his brother over. “Let’s talk hobbies.”
With that, he started walking again. Perpetua, however, lingered a second longer, squinted eyes still on the window. The figure hadn’t moved. But just as he turned to follow Copia, he could’ve sworn - just barely, for a second - he saw her smile.