Chapter Text
Sasha did her best to just keep her head down and stay focused on her work after that. She knew she'd crossed a line with Martin, even if she wasn't quite sure what the boundaries of that line were in the first place, and besides, there were plenty of files waiting there for them, plenty of mostly-false accounts of the supernatural for them to sort through.
The Hodgson file didn't take long to dispose of, not when she'd already been most of the way done with it before the weekend arrived and everything changed.
(Jon gave Sasha a weak smile and a nod as he passed off the next file on the list to her.)
The Lehmann file... Sasha could remember that one, dimly, from the memories that were not her own, and that made going through it much easier. It was little more than a creative writing exercise, really, one with overly-detailed and too-pat supernatural encounters lined up one after the other, though the parts about the author's family difficulties were true to life enough. That boy needed a hug and a place of his own, but Sasha couldn't help with that, just pass along what she'd learned from a combination of new research and old knowledge.
(Jon's smile seemed a bit wider this time, his eyes gleaming as he thanked her for doing her work so efficiently.)
The Cahill file... wasn't very memorable, to the Jon that had been or the Sasha that now was, but the truth of it was easy enough to find just the same. City kid moves out to the country and thinks every vaguely-weird bit of wildlife must be something spooky and supernatural; an old story, really, and not hard to research or dismiss. That deer they came across might have been seriously ill, but it definitely wasn't haunted, no matter what the file report said; a wildlife biologist might have wanted the details, but Sasha certainly didn't need them.
(As Jon passed Sasha the next file, he made some inane comment about making sure to double-check her work every time, that quality was more important to them than quantity. Sasha rolled her eyes and said nothing. She knew well enough what she was doing here.)
The Howell case... was memorable enough, thankfully, because untangling the layers of this one anew might have taken quite some time. As it was, Sasha still wasn't quite sure what to make of it, except that there definitely wasn't anything truly supernatural going on there. A family history of mental illness and magical thinking, perhaps, could explain the long, rambling stories that had been passed on to the Magnus Institute because they were at least willing to listen. Something was strange about that family, certainly, but strange didn't automatically mean supernatural.
(Jon cleared his throat and looked up at Sasha as though he was going to ask her a question, eyes dark and mouth hanging slightly open, but then he just shook his head and started rummaging through the files instead.)
The Blake file... well, that one really was supernatural, wasn't it?
It was supernatural, and Sasha hadn't been the one to research it the first time around. She didn't need to look at the statement to hear Jon's voice reading it out, a story of dreams that hit too close to home, one that wasn't even technically allowed in the Institute's files and yet belonged there more than anywhere else. She remembered his conclusions, too, and how he'd only believed that it wasn't a practical joke hidden away in the Archives for him because Tim had done the legwork for him to prove otherwise.
And while the name and all the details associated with it on the Institute forms were false, the true identity of "Antonio Blake" was known to her, as was the address of the magic shop where he now worked and had briefly interacted with one Jane Prentiss.
Would Jon trust her any more now than he had then, without this strange knowledge that had gone from his past self to her? If she let him know "Blake's" identity, would Jon go after him? How would the two of them meeting go, with them both awake and alive, in a normal London rather than an apocalypse-ravaged landscape?
Did he even know that that eccentric woman he'd sold crystals to was the same Jane Prentiss that now haunted all the dark and grimy spots of London?
Well. As Jon had mentioned once upon a time, the Eye didn't do hypotheticals, and Sasha wasn't great at them herself. There was only one way to find out for sure.
Before Sasha turned in the file, she noted that this one appeared to be genuine despite the faux contact information, but also that if Jon wanted to pursue things further, she advised him to look into one Oliver Banks, accountant turned tarot shop cashier.
Then there was little to do but wait.