Most days, Cassian was almost completely sure that doctor Jizabel Disraeli had absolutely no sense of humour.
For one thing, the doctor would just stare at him whenever he dared to make a quip or try to slip a pun into conversation. Back at the circus, it was humour that had kept them all sane. Well, relatively sane. No wonder why people called Jizabel the Mad Doctor. He barely even smiled.
It wasn't just jokes, either. Even the most basic humour seemed lost on him. For instance a few weeks before, on the operating table, Cassian had fumbled a brain and sent it flying against all odds onto the chair in the corner. It was gruesome, okay, but the image of that fresh human brain sitting there without so much as a by your leave had left Cassian in stitches. And Jizabel had just stared and then reprimanded him for being slow to react.
No humour whatsoever. The doctor was all seriousness and melancholy. After a time Cassian had decided he could accept that. It was predictable, at least.
And then, there were days like this.
They were doing surveillance. Well, Cassian supposed that was what they were doing as he hadn't actually been told anything, as per usual, just commanded to follow. The doctor had led him through the streets of London, deadpan as always, until they had reached the newly opened Blackfriars Bridge. Once they had reached the middle the doctor had stopped and turned his eyes out over the river.
"What now?"
As usual, Cassian's questions fell on deaf ears. This was all well and good, he could entertain himself in silence for a while, but there was one glaring problem. The railings of the bridge were high, of a perfect hight for the doctor to lean on but far too high for Cassian with his small stature to see anything. He stood in silence for a moment, staring at the metal, and then raised questioning eyes to his superior.
"If you wanted me to help then we might need to go somewhere else, doctor."
Jizabel turned, movements slow and graceful as always. When he spoke his voice was blank.
"Would you like a box?"
Moments like this were why Cassian could never be one hundred percent sure. The man wasn't stupid and nor was he prone to casual insults, unlike everyone else at Delilah. So why? What?
"Seriously?"
"Yes?"
"No thanks."
And then, silence. At least his days weren't boring. Minutes passed with nothing happening, Cassian growing more bored by the moment.
It's a nice bridge, he didn't say. I would like to box your ears, he almost muttered. I'm honoured to be doing such important work, he could have said. Silence was easier. As the minutes ticked by he imagined saying all the things he never bothered with, the trouble he could get into hardly being worth the effort of making the doctor understand.
It was windy up there on the bridge. A cold, grey day like any other in the city. Cassian leaned back against the barrier and idly watched the doctor's hair blowing softly in the breeze. He had noticed passing women doing the same thing, their gazes not lustful but rather jealous instead. He snorted as one such woman lingered a little too long, the sudden sound causing her to scurry away. He shook his head, laughing, and looked up at the man beside him.
"You having fun up there?"
Nothing. Right.
It could have only been minutes but it felt like hours. As time passed and Cassian exhausted all of his mental insults he took to playing with one of his throwing knives, daring the passing pedestrians to say a word with his dark eyes.
Presumably, the world passed by under the bridge. Jizabel's hair continued to blow in the wind, catching what slivers of sunlight made it through the clouds. Cassian's knife flipped up and down, up and down.
He hadn't meant to do it. Starved for entertainment as he was, Cassian had been imagining how easy it would be to just catch a lock of Jizabel's hair and cut it free. Imagining was fine. Actually doing it was stupid.
The hair made a fine tearing noise as he cut it free.
"Uh..."
Jizabel turned, still silent, but with his eyes wide in confusion and surprise. They held this tableau for several moments, Cassian gripping the vandalised lock of hair and the rest still blowing in the air between them.
It could have been funny. Instead, the doctor's eyes seemed hurt.
Best to say something. Anything. Cassian gave a sigh and shrugged, feigning nonchalance.
"I thought it might be the source of your strength," he said.
"I'm not Samson," Jizabel said, ice in his tone. Shit.
"And I'm not..."
He had been about to say Delilah when the whole thing struck him as so ridiculous that the word stuck in his throat. Between the suggestion of a box and this charade, Cassian found it impossible to remain serious.
"You know," he finished, dissolving into laughter that was snatched by the wind.
For a moment he thought Jizabel might just cut him back with one of the scalpels that always seemed to be on his person. But it was one of those days after all. Instead, the doctor showed the smallest of smiles.
"Stupid," he decided.
It was. Cassian thought that was wonderful. He continued laughing until he ran out of breath, playing with the lock of hair in his hand. An apology had been beginning to form in the back of his mind when Jizabel spoke again.
"You were still planning on taking my place, then?"
Jizabel was looking down again, frowning. Not for the first time, Cassian wondered if the doctor was just playing him. Surely no one was innocent enough to take his stupid joke as a serious expression of intent? But he looked genuinely confused, maybe even a little injured.
"Not really," he shrugged. He'd stopped caring about promotion long ago.
"Then why-"
"It was a joke, doctor," he interrupted, tilting his head to the side. "Okay?"
Again, they fell still. Cassian often pictured his life in a series of stills, moment of silence and incomprehension between him and the man he had been assigned to. Did everyone interact with him like this or was it something special to them, an impassable wall of confusion that they couldn't break? It had made him uncomfortable for a long time. Now he used these silent moments to try and understand just what had happened for his life to end up like this. He had never intended to spend his days as an assistant to a madman who had so many skeletons in his closet the door wouldn't close, but a madman who would throw it all away to save a kitten or a puppy if the chance arose? What sort of a joke was-
In front of his eyes, Jizabel drew one of those scalpels from a pocket and began hacking at his hair. Fistful by fistful the silvery, beautiful strands were torn free and taken by the chill wind, blowing out over the river and away. Cassian could do nothing but stare, wide-eyed and slack-jawed, as Jizabel butchered the tresses that had stopped passers-by with their beauty.
When he was done, Jizabel looked ridiculous. His hair was left in uneven tufts, none reaching must further than his chin, many of them falling into his face and eyes. There were tangles, knots, and bits of loose hair stuck to the pale skin of his cheeks.
This tableau, this was new. And Cassian had no idea how to understand it.
In the same measured voice as before, the madman spoke reproachfully.
"You're supposed to laugh at jokes."
Sweet Jesus give me strength.
"Stupid!"
~x~
Back at headquarters, locked into the operating room, Cassian was indeed standing on a box. Knives away he was now wielding a pair of medical scissors and trying to fix the damage the doctor had caused.
Jizabel sat before him, blank as ever. The walk back had been hurried, Cassian's hands in the small of his back and fear in his eyes. If the master was to find them like this...
If this was Jizabel's idea of a joke he had a dark sense of humour.
Cassian had heard the rumours, every trump card had. The cardmaster liked the doctor to keep his hair long out of some twisted fetish, that was the most popular one. Cassian had always thought there was more truth in those that whispered of a consort, a beautiful woman that Jizabel had been made in the image of. The bravest gossips said that the woman had been his mother. Cassian didn't want to believe it but the things the doctor would say sometimes when he thought no one could hear, the reverence he held for his father...
Cassian never spread such rumours. It felt too much like betrayal.
Snipping away at the ragged ends, Cassian couldn't help but note how different Jizabel looked like this. Younger, somehow. Still pretty, almost ethereal with his pale, soft skin, but boyish too. Distracted, he pulled too hard on on one strand and felt Jizabel jump.
"Sorry."
"What for?"
"Hurting you."
Here, Jizabel chuckled and raised a hand to touch lightly at his own back.
"Don't be ridiculous."
Teeth clenched, Cassian refused to reply. If anyone was ridiculous it was him, this stupid, vulnerable, beautiful man who had no idea how to make a joke. It was upsetting, more than he would admit to.
Minutes passed slowly. Cassian had no idea how to cut hair, not really, but by the time he was finished it actually resembled a style rather than a badly treated broom. He jumped down from the box and set about sweeping the floor, eyes down and head lowered.
"Thank you."
Jizabel's voice was soft. Cassian grunted in response and got on with his work. Only when all the hair was tidied away and he dared look up to see Jizabel watching him did he speak again.
"I don't mind being your Delilah."
Again, it descended. A moment of silence and misunderstanding.
"What?"
His cheeks were burning. Stupid. Why should he even try to understand? Why should he was Jizabel to understand as well? He had cut Death's hair. It was a joke, it had to be. He should be laughing. Instead, he found himself smiling sadly.
"Because even if you're powerless it's fine. I can be that strength for you."
Enough. He forced a laugh and turned to leave, stopped only by a hand landing gently on his shoulder. He brushed it off, didn't dare look up into those eyes that betrayed so much. He closed the door behind him.
Most days, Cassian was almost completely sure that doctor Jizabel Disraeli had no heart.
It was too painful to believe otherwise.