The ancient man peered at his contemporary with blue eyes that even now retained most of their original clarity and intellect. He reached up with gnarled fingers, and struggled to pour some cognac into a short glass. His hand trembled with exertion.

A pair of younger hands took the bottle, and finished the task.

"Ah," the old man said with a reedy chuckle. "Thank you. I daresay they make those bottles heavier every year."

His guest afforded a knowing smile. "That's got to be the case, surely," he replied. He filled both glasses, then recapped the flask with its glass stopper. He took a sip of the strong liquor and held it in his mouth for a second. It wasn't unpleasant, but he could tell from the way it already warmed his lips that it was something he'd have to drink carefully. Very potent, easy to over-indulge.

"I wanted to thank you for inviting me to visit, Monty," he remarked as he set the glass on the small table between them.

"Think nothing of it, Preston," Montgomery Burns replied, giving a weak twirl of his hand. "It's a pleasure to see you again, and looking well after all these years."

Preston looked away and ran a hand through his wavy hair, a brown mop that was rapidly greying at the temples. "Somehow I managed, eh?" He observed.

"You did indeed." Burns took a long sip and stared at the fire in the hearth before them. It was autumn, hardly winter, but with that north wind that promised an early snow. Burns could smell it in the air, feel it in his bones. He sat, gaunt legs propped up on several pillows, and covered with a wool blanket. Though his body was painfully frail, his mind was as sharp as ever. He would've expected to lament this fact, but he found if this was how growing old would be, it was not the worst. Better a crackerjack intellect and feeble form than the other way around.

Ordinarily, his beloved partner Waylon Smithers would've been at his side to assist in such things as pouring a drink, but Burns had sent the grey-haired man out for a bit. He wanted some private time with the young man before him.

Young? Burns chuckled at the thought. He still addressed Preston as "boy." The man was half a century old himself. Still a boy to Burns. And Waylon? Well, he had to be what, seventy now? Eighty? Burns couldn't honestly remember. It had been so many years.

"You still don't have plans to retire?" Burns asked Preston thoughtfully.

Preston shook his head. "Not yet, no. I feel I'm finally hitting my stride," he laughed.

Burns chuckled with him. "Well, you've survived nearly twenty years as a Chief Executive Officer. No one's managed to kill you yet. That's an admirable start, one might say."

Preston sipped his brandy slowly. "That's not for lack of trying," he remarked.

"Eh?" Burns asked, curious.

"For lack of those trying to kill me," Preston clarified, lips on the edge of his glass.

Burns nodded thoughtfully, slowly. "It was a rough several years wasn't it."

Preston smiled. "You don't know the half of it."

Burns raised an eyebrow. "Oh, don't I, Tucci? I'm no spring chicken, not new to this game. You see I always planned to live forever, or be found dead at my desk attempting the immortal feat. But now, I regret nothing. After a commonplace man's lifetime, and in lieu of my own role at the helm I've been fortunate enough to find a worthy successor, I have no regrets about stepping down. Now, perhaps, I can finally indulge myself the life of luxury to which I'm entitled. A polished man of leisure. I daresay I have a few good years left in this old body yet."

"The way Smithers talked, I always figured you'd release the reins only when someone pried them from your cold, dead hands," Preston teased.

Burns laughed. "Ah, quite so, Preston! Fortunately, I had a change of heart. Smithers was most pleased to learn of that. Not that I've completely yielded all authority. I am still the majority shareholder, and occupy a spot on the Board; Waylon at my side, of course."

Preston nodded. "Of course."

"Speaking of men at one's side," Burns continued, "how are things with you and your pilot going?"

Preston felt a familiar redness creep up his cheeks. Fifty years old, and yet questions about his dear Antoine could still make him blush like a schoolboy. Preston quickly took a drink of his cognac, and attempted to act composed.

"We're doing very well, thank you for asking. He's still the same old Antoine he always was, god bless him for it. There were more than a few times I was worried… about him, about us. It wasn't always easy," his voice trailed off. "We had some very rocky years between us…"

"Ah. Is it ever?" Burns asked, recalling the painfully difficult times he and Smithers had endured. He reached out with an arthritic and age-spotted hand, draping it across Preston's arm for a moment. The gesture was oddly kind. "No one ever said it would be easy, but likewise none could deny it was always worth it. You've found yourself a fine companion. I'm glad he's as taken to you as you are to him. That is what will keep you warm come the long winter."

Preston felt himself blushing again as he saw Antoine's face in his mind, creased from years of sun and smiles, blue eyes twinkling with endless good humor. The man might've ultimately surrendered his blue locks as his hair thinned, but he had kept the ponytail and beard. He'd kept the toe shoes too, if only to annoy his partner. Preston shook his head, a faint hint of amusement on his lips. Antoine's irreverent mirth had been both his biggest frustration, and greatest delight in their friendship.

"Antoine still doesn't take anything serious," Preston admitted as he refilled Burns' glass. "He calls himself 'sixty years young.' I suppose if he's not going to grow up by now, he probably never will."

Burns graciously accepted the refill. "Would you even want him to?"

Preston shook his head. "No. I need the balance. I'd be positively neurotic if it weren't for him grounding me."

Burns tented his fingers as much as his crooked bones would allow. The meeting of his clawed paws in an awkward knot, nothing like the steepled digits of the past. "Madness so often is the result of isolation, my boy. Genius, initially perhaps leads one to hermitic lifestyle, and insanity rides the coattails not long thereafter. No, you are far better off for having him at your side." Burns thought back to his grandfather's plantation over a century ago. "You'll stave off the ravages of derangement far better with a trusted partner at your arm. Radson-Tucci, yes, that has an aristocratic ring to it indeed."

The ancient man fell silent for a moment, staring into the fire.

Preston waited.

"The most elementary fact, Preston, though I've denied this far too long, I daresay it's the companionship of one young Waylon Smithers that has saved me more often than I deserve. Verily, he's preserved me from the product of my own machinations no less. I'm glad to finally have found some modicum of peace in these final years. I'd planned to live forever, you see. But I buried Crippler shortly after I took Waylon as my own; and I knew death would not be long in waiting for me. And yet, I was given a reasonable amount of time, more than I deserve one might argue. I regret nothing."

Preston wrinkled his brow. He didn't know who Crippler was, and didn't feel like asking. Clearly, there was more of a story than Burns cared to reveal. In their many years of business together as 'atom barons' of America, Preston had learned asking questions was moot, the old man even now played his cards close to his chest. It wasn't even worth trying to pry. Burns would never let slip more than he wanted to.

The younger man, Preston, debated refilling his glass and thought better of it. Burns seemed weary. He was glancing at the mantle clock as if perplexed.

"Is it only five o'clock?" Burns finally asked, wondering. "Or is that blasted thing run down again?"

Preston glanced at his watch. "No, Monty, your clock's correct."

Burns bared his teeth, halfway between a smile and a grimace. "In my youth, it seemed that I could function with nary four hours of sleep most nights. Now, alas, the condition has reversed itself. I am always tired these days. So tired. Five o'clock, and I'm long considering retiring for the night." He drained his glass and slid it over for a refill. Preston obliged.

"In all these years," Burns continued, "I suppose I am now making up for lost time?" He snickered at his own joke. "No, but seriously my boy, I must ask you to take your leave of me. Go and find my contemporary who runs the plant. He's been about lately, and I'd set my watch to it he's still on the grounds. As I recall, you've met before." Burns closed his eyes and took a deep, rattling breath. "I am… so tired my boy. Meet with him. He's as much your own legacy as anyone else's. Discuss what you two lads plan to do for the future. I hope I live long enough to see a business partnership form."

Burns hadn't touched his refilled glass.

"Go now," Burns instructed, head lowered to his chest, eyes flickering in the firelight. "Send for my dear Smithers. And keep your Antoine fellow close. The older you get, my boy, the more you'll cherish those who knew you when you were young."

Preston rose to leave, glancing at the untouched cognac beside Burns' skeletal hand.

Burns' eyes followed his. "Don't worry about that. Even if I don't finish it tonight, it shall still be life for the crops tomorrow, eh?" He reached up, and took Preston's hand in his. "It was a pleasure to see you again. And even if we never meet beyond this, at least I had the pleasure of watching you grow into success. Good night, Preston Radson-Tucci. I wish you well." Burns closed his eyes, hand falling from Preston's grasp. "Now, please, set Smithers to me. I've been too long without his company."

Preston slipped through the doors of the study, and raised his eyes to Waylon Smithers who had been waiting patiently in the hallway, sitting just outside the door.

Smithers raised his brown eyes to Preston's.

"He's tired," Preston said softly.

Smithers nodded.

"Do you think he's…" Preston couldn't find words to finish his question.

Smithers understood nonetheless. "Dying, Preston?" Smithers shook his head. "Perhaps, but not tonight. Believe me when I say he has many more years left yet." Smithers stood, and took Preston's hands in his. "Thank you for coming though. He'd been asking for you as of late."

Preston rested his palms on Smithers' once muscular shoulders. "Of course I'd come, Waylon. It was good to see you again."

The two men embraced formally, a gesture that concluded in a warm handshake. "I'd best let you get to him, Waylon. And I need to go find Antoine. I'm sure he's around here somewhere."

Smithers smiled, hand poised above the doorknob. "I last saw him out back, tormenting the peafowl… or maybe it was the other way around."

Preston laughed. "That man. He may get older, but I don't think inside he'll ever grow old."

Smithers returned Preston's smile. "Sometimes consistency is good. I'm happy for you, Preston." With that, he turned on his heel, and let himself into Burns' darkened study.

Preston stood in the hallway a moment later, thinking to himself. Then, with an oddly uncharacteristic bounce to his step, he set out down the now familiar (once-strange) hallways of Burns Manor to retrieve his friend, Antoine; his companion who was probably well and cornered at the hedge maze by a flock of angry peafowl by now.