Chapter Text
“Oh, hello Martin! How are you doing?”
Martin sighed and did his best to muster up something resembling a smile as he looked at the cheery woman seated behind the desk, “Hi Ms. Rosie, I’m doing pretty well, how are you?”
“Well, you know how it is up here, busy, busy, busy! Especially with the way things are in the archives right now, but well, I’m sure you’d know more about that than me.” Rosie turned around for a moment, looking at Elias’ door (likely to make sure it was properly shut) before beckoning Martin closer and leaning in as if sharing a secret, “You know, your father tries to hide it, but I’ve worked for him long enough to know that he is just thrilled to have you working here now. It seemed like as soon as you signed the contract his energy doubled!” she stifled a laugh, “He was prancing around all proud of himself for finally convincing you!”
Martin gave her a bit of a half smile, “Well, I mean, he wasn’t exactly subtle about wanting me to work here.”
“Oh, no he was not.” she shook her head, clearly amused, before waving him off, “Well, go on then. You’ve got a meeting to get to, don’t let me hold you.”
Martin nodded, “That I do.” He gave her a little wave as he walked past, “It’s always nice talking to you.”
He could hear her give a little shuffle in her seat before the clacking of her keyboard started up again. Martin gave himself five seconds to mentally prepare himself (no more, he didn’t want to tip rosie off that something was wrong) before opening the door to see Jon speaking rather animatedly to Elias.
“Frankly, I’m not sure why you’re not more concerned with this as it brings the efficiency of the archives down significantly. If the digitization weren’t an issue, it could’ve completely negated the need for another–”
“Ah, Martin, there you are! You’re late.”
Jon cut himself off, clearly startled as he whipped around to look at Martin. He stared in silence for a beat before awkwardly jerking his head, as though trying to gesture for Martin to come in the room, except instead of using his hands he used his neck.
Jon was a very strange man.
Putting the eccentricities of his boss aside, Martin took another step in, carefully shut the door behind him, and sat in the only empty chair available, directly across from Elias.
“I mean, I wouldn’t say I’m late, if, heh, if you check the clock I’m actually exactly on time, so…”
His father blinked at him, clearly unimpressed, “Martin, please. You are fully aware that 10 minutes early is on time, and on time is late. Perhaps I’d hear that argument out if it came from any of my other employees, but not from you.” he waved his hand in the air, “Besides, you shouldn’t be arguing with me in the first place. When I said, ‘You’re late.’ your line should’ve been, ‘I’m sorry, it won’t happen again.’ easy, polite, and we could’ve been well past your tardiness and started on the actual review, but now we’re actually going to start late . ”
Elias was giving him an utterly flat look and Martin’s face was on fire. He spared a quick glance over at Jon, who was looking at Elias with a wide-eyed, rather startled expression, and Martin sank down in his seat, “...I’m sorry I was late, and I’m sorry for arguing with you, it won’t happen again.”
Elias scoffed, but the ends of his lips were curled up in amusement. He then turned to look at Jon, as if sharing an inside joke (one which the other man clearly didn’t get) before looking back at Martin, “Well, I think we all know that’s a lie. Being argumentative is just in your nature.”
Martin frowned, he didn’t think he’d characterize himself as argumentative, but he didn’t think pointing that out was worth the argument ( see, not arguing) and instead decided to just nod his head and drop his gaze to the desk in front of him.
The room was silent for a moment as nobody said anything. Martin could feel his face get hotter and hotter as his father kept him pinned in place with his stare. Fortunately, this miserable moment was broken with a pointed cough from one Jonathan Sims,
“I think, perhaps, we should move along with this meeting? The archives are still in quite the state of disarray and I’m sure that Martin has work that he should be doing, and Lord knows I do, so…”
“Ah!” Martin felt his father’s gaze move off of him so he chanced a glance up, the man had shifted his attention over to the archivist, and the tension Martin hadn’t known he’d been holding in his shoulders leaked out, “Of course, Jon. I wouldn’t want to keep you any longer than necessary.”
Martin sat up a bit straighter, he’d never worked anywhere that had done performance reviews (actually, he’d never even had a boss before now) so he wasn’t sure what this would entail.
“So, Martin.” Jon began, “How do you think–”
“Would you say that Martin has improved the efficiency of the archival team as a whole?” Elias cut Jon off, not sparing Martin a glance.
Jon looked startled as his attention shifted back over to Elias, he looked between Martin and Elias, seemingly hesitant as he began, “... Yes…?” he then shook his head, “Yes. Yes! Martin greatly improved the efficiency in the archives, more so than was anticipated going into this.” he turned his attention back to Martin, “Truly, Martin, you’re an excellent addition to the team. Your work ethic is commendable, and I’ve never met someone so adept at conducting those interviews. Especially given the…disposition of most of the statement givers.”
…
Huh?
Martin didn’t even know how to respond to the…unexpectedly complementary nature of Jon’s assessment. On a good day, Jon would completely ignore his existence. On a bad day, it felt like Jon existed purely to spite Martin. He didn’t think he’d ever gone into Jon’s office without being told, rather pointedly, to get out, or that he was wasting time, or anything of that nature. So the idea that Jon was appreciative of the work that Martin did, that he thought Martin was a diligent worker. Well, he supposed you didn’t have to like someone to appreciate their work ethic, Jon seemed the type to be able to separate his feelings from his work rather well. But still, Martin didn’t know how to respond. So he settled on a blank stare and an,
“...Oh…!”
Jon was no longer looking at him, turning his attention over to the wall which apparently deserved the utmost scrutiny judging by the way the man was staring at it so intently. In contrast, Elias’ gaze remained trained on the archivist, however, any amusement he’d previously held seemed to have been snuffed out as he had a rather annoyed expression on his face. The same one he got when Peter would go on tangents about the Tundra.
Slowly, Elias turned his attention from Jon and over to Martin. A small smile curled across his face as he leaned forward, briefly glancing between the two before addressing Martin, “Well, normally these reviews are more extensive and involve criticism, but since Jon seems to have such a glowing review of your contributions to the archives there’s not much to say in terms of improvements. Really, Martin, a model employee, I’m so proud.”
Martin shifted, uncomfortable. Although his father was smiling, it didn’t even come close to reaching his eyes and it felt like he was being mocked, “Uh…thanks.”
“But it seems a shame to cut this meeting so short. I took you both away from your duties just for Jon to spend ten seconds praising you.”
“Did you want me to be more critical?” Jon cut in, looking confused, “Because I thought–”
“Oh, no Jon. You’re fine, I’m sorry if I implied that your review was inadequate, it wasn’t! I was just thinking…” Elias locked eyes with Martin, and he dreaded what was to come out of his father’s mouth. The man lived to make Martin uncomfortable, so he couldn’t imagine it would be anything less than–
“We should get some critique out of this. So, Martin! How do you feel about working in the archives? Are you enjoying yourself?”
…What…?
Martin frowned, trying to figure out his angle, and why Elias seemed so eager to ask this question, but he was coming up blank. So, cautiously he began to answer, “I mean, I like it well–”
“--Be honest, Martin.”
Martin scowled, “Not really, no.”
Elias didn’t say anything, instead turning to glance at Jon, who was now looking at Martin with an intense expression. Brows furrowed, and lips pursed.
Jon took a deep breath, “Why not?”
Elias cut in with a grin, though Jon didn’t seem to pay him any attention, “Yes, Martin. What is it you don’t like about the archives? Is there an issue with your coworkers? I know that you're used to working freelance, so is it an issue with leadership?”
Jon seemed to tense at that but relaxed when Martin shook his head, “No. It doesn’t have to do with the people I’m working with.” Martin was honestly surprised to find that that was the truth. Sasha and Tim were certainly easy to get along with, and although it was no secret that Martin wasn’t Jon’s biggest fan, the guy wasn’t a terrible boss (he’d certainly gone up in martin’s mental ranking for how he’d dealt with the vittery statement), “It’s just the archives themselves, er well, actually it’s this whole building. I can’t stand this place.”
Elias stared at him, silent, and clearly displeased by the answer. Eventually, he gave a sigh and waved his hand around, “Yes, yes, you’ve made your opinion on my institute perfectly clear over the years, no need to re-hash an old discussion.” He plastered on the polite expression of the man he pretended to be and turned to Jon, “I’m sorry to have kept you here. I understand that this isn’t a normal performance review, and, well,” He rubbed the back of his neck, “I understand my behavior has been less than professional, and I’m sorry about that Jon. It’s a bit difficult to separate work from family,” he smiled, “I’m sure you understand.”
“Ah. Yes. Family.” Jon sighed and turned to Martin, “Alright, well I suppose we should–”
“--Oh, actually, I’m sorry Jon, I didn’t quite make this clear. I need to talk to Martin for just a moment. You’re free to get back to work now though, seeing as there’s just so much to do.”
There was something dangerous in Elias’ tone, something that Jon clearly wasn’t used to if his disconcerted expression was anything to go off of, “Right, well…I’ll just be on my way then.” the archivist looked between the father and son pair, before hesitantly walking over to the door, exiting, and shutting it behind him. Once he was gone, and his footprints had faded off into the distance, Martin gave his father a slight frown.
“You were really rude just now, you know that?”
Elias raised an eyebrow, “Oh? How so?”
“Well,” Martin held up his hand, counting off on his fingers with each point, “You decided to scold me in front of your employee, which is just, so inappropriate. You cut Jon off, like, twice. You tried to goad me into essentially calling Jon a bad boss, to his face. You–”
“So you do take an issue with his leadership.”
“...I didn’t say that.”
“So you like him?”
“I didn’t say that either.” Martin huffed, frustrated, “What are you trying to get at?”
“I just would like to know how you feel about my Archivist. I know you weren’t too much of a fan of the last one, which I can’t blame you for, so I want to know if you think this one is an improvement.”
His father was giving him an innocent look which, although it didn’t quite look unnatural on his face, the glint in his eyes just made the whole expression feel wrong, “Why do you want my opinion on the archivist? You generally don’t take my opinion into consideration for these kinds of things.”
“What? Is it a crime for me to want my only son’s opinion on something so important to me? When your dad takes you to the Tundra doesn’t he ask you for your opinion on the ship?”
“A better comparison to that would be you asking for my opinion on the institute, which–”
“--Yes, Martin. You’ve made your opinion on that quite clear. Now quit being difficult and answer the question. How do you feel about Jon?”
Martin rolled his eyes, “I imagine I feel the same way about him that he does about me.”
“... Oh? ”
“Yes. Vague distaste, but he’s someone I can tolerate.”
Elias looked at him, rather intensely before snorting, “Alright, fair enough. Moving on from Jon, I couldn’t help but notice you getting somewhat friendly with your fellow assistants.”
Martin narrowed his eyes at his father, “Yes. What about it?”
“First, watch the tone. Second, I just find it interesting as I seem to recall you having a, let's just say, less than positive opinion regarding the archival assistants before you began working as one.”
“Well, that’s because you had a habit of hiring sociopaths, I don’t think Tim and Sasha are like that.”
“...No. I suppose they aren’t.” Elias took a pause and looked at Martin, really looked at him, before hesitantly beginning his next sentence, seemingly unsure about something, “...Martin. I think it’s important that you remember the nature of the position of an archival assistant. It’s fine that you’re friendly with your coworkers, but do try to remember the…hazards associated with–”
“Don’t.”
Elias gave him a look filled with false sympathy, “You know full well that archival assistants tend not to have the best…job security and–”
“Stop it. Stop it now. I’m not going to let anything happen to them.”
“Martin…” Elias sighed, and gave him a little smile, so sad , so compassionate, it made Martin want to throw something at a wall, “I know you’ll certainly try, but things happen in the archives and sometimes the assistants–”
“I won’t let anything happen to them. I’ll keep them safe. I know more about this kind of stuff than they do, if there’s some kind of an emergency I can help them stay alive. ”
Now Elias was no longer smiling, in fact he was giving Martin a frighteningly blank stare, his eyes filled with a sort of intensity that he rarely saw from his father, “Martin, I need to make sure you know that although you are an archival assistant by contract things are not the same for you, you are not the same as your colleagues. You’re much more important than them and I will not let you put yourself in danger for them.”
Martin scoffed, “I thought you said all of your employees are important.”
“They are,” Elias gave him a smile, Martin wasn’t sure if his father had ever given him a smile that reached his eyes but this one almost did, not quite, but almost, “But you are more so. You’re my son, Martin. It’s only natural that I value you more than my employees.”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not going to let anything happen to them, they’re my friends, you can’t stop me from protecting them.”
“I don’t think you have the best track record when it comes to protecting your friends, so I’ll take my chances.”
Martin flinched back as if he’d been struck and tears pricked at his eyes,
A smiling face. A pat on the back. Laughter and teasing. Joy and comfort. A grin and wink. Pounding feet, harsh breaths. A scream and a cry. In surprise and defeat. A whimper and a body that once was a boy.
The calm, protective aura he’d been trying to portray vanished in an instant as he stared at his father in disbelief, “ Don’t talk about–”
“Go back to work, Martin. You have much to get through, don’t you?”
Martin didn’t say anything in response. Simply sitting in the chair across from his father, breathing heavily and trying to will away the tightness in his throat and burning in the back of his eyes. He took a few seconds to try and compose himself, before standing up and walking out of his father’s office. A cheerful, “I’ll see you at dinner!” called after him resulted in Martin slamming the door on the way out.
“Alright, spill it.”
Martin turned confused to see Tim staring down at him with a raised eyebrow, “Spill what?”
“Whatever’s got you sulking over here, obviously! We all know you’re not the cheeriest guy around, but this isn’t normal.” Tim plopped himself onto the corner of Martin’s desk and leaned forward, slightly invading Martin’s space, “Go on, spill it.”
Martin didn’t say anything for a moment, instead opting to stare at Tim. Tim, who was looking down at him with a confident smile on his face, but concern shining through his eyes. Tim, who his father had just told him not to get attached to because he was probably going to die in some horrific fashion.
“I don’t really want to talk about it.”
“Oh, come on Marto!” Tim began prodding at Martin, ignoring the way he swatted at his hands, “You’re sad, and I’m taking the time out of my day to cheer you up!”
“Tim, knock it off!”
“But now you’re smiling!” Damn, he was smiling, Martin quickly rectified that and dropped the expression. Tim frowned at him, and picked up the speed of his prodding, “No, bring the smile back! Martin, come on! You can’t pout when you’ve got the smile!”
Martin raised an eyebrow, “What is ‘ the smile’ ?”
The grin which spread across Tim's face at that question was truly impish, “ Oh, Martin. You don’t even know!” Tim pushed himself off the desk and moved around so that he could crouch and drape an arm around Martin’s shoulders, “You, good sir, have a smile that can light up the room, no, the whole building! That grin of yours is the highlight of my day whenever I’m able to pry one out of you. It has the ability to make men and women alike swoon. ” Tim paused, waited until he caught Martin’s eye, and winked, “You already know the effect you have on me .”
His voice dipped down lower at the end, for a horrific mix of sultry and comical, Martin’s face positively lit on fire and he pushed Tim away with a shriek of, “ Piss off! ” as the other man laughed.
“Hey!” The two men turned at the call of Sasha, who was rolling her swivel chair over to them, “Tim, why are you bullying Martin? Knock it off!”
“I’m not bullying him!” Tim paused, and then waggled his eyebrows, “I’m propositioning him.”
Sasha let out a long-suffering sigh, “Tim…”
“What! He was smiling, Sasha! Smiling! What am I supposed to do? Not shoot my shot?” He paused, and then that mischievous look came back over his face as he smirked at her, “What? Are you jealous?”
With an amused scoff, Sasha rolled her eyes, “In your dreams, Timothy Stoker.”
“Ooh!” he reared back, clutching his chest in faux pain, “The full name? Harsh!”
Martin looked between the two of them, and he couldn’t help the smile that had crept across his face against his will at their antics, “You two are ridiculous. ”
They both turned their attention back to him, Tim began to preen, clearly pleased with himself, but Sasha frowned at him, “Hey, why are your eyes red? Are you okay?”
Tim gave her a smack on the shoulder, “Why did you think I was trying to cheer him up?”
“You didn’t say you were trying to cheer him up, you said you were ‘shooting your shot’, ugh,” she shook her head, “Quit distracting me! Martin, what’s wrong? Are you alright?”
Martin sighed, he could see the sincerity in her big, brown eyes and he did his best to give a reassuring expression as he looked between them, “I’m fine, honest. Someone reminded me of something that happened a few years ago which I…don’t like to think about very much, so I was pretty upset. I promise I’m fine now, I just really don’t want to talk about it.”
Sasha gave him a considering look before she slowly nodded her head, “Alright…But let us know if we can do anything to help. I get that we haven’t really known each other all that long, but despite your best efforts you’re our friend Martin, and we want to help you however we can.”
Martin flushed, feeling a bit sheepish at the acknowledgment of how initially resistant he’d been in becoming friends with the pair, but he still smiled at them nonetheless, “I know, but really, I just want to get my mind off of things, so…” He gestured down to the pile of papers on his desk with a pointed raise of an eyebrow and Sasha rolled her chair back towards her own desk whilst putting her hands in the air in a sign of surrender. Meanwhile, Tim groaned loudly,
“Alright, fine! We’ll let you get back to work, you awful man. But! You said that you wanted to get your mind off of things…So! Sasha and I are going to take you out for drinks tonight!”
Sasha called out from her desk, “Do I get a say in this?”
“No, you do not!” Tim called back with a smile without taking his eyes off of Martin, “You, me, Sasha, and, oh what the hell, Jon can come too!”
Martin gave Tim an incredulous look, “Seriously?”
“Yes, seriously, Martin, you don’t understand. You’ve only ever known ‘Head Archivist, Jonathan Sims’, stuffy, overly serious, grumpy, and somewhat unlikeable. You never got to meet ‘Researcher, Jonathan Sims’, slightly less grumpy, still overly serious but not as much, grumpy, and actually tolerable! Plus, you’ve never seen ‘Drunk, Jonathan Sims’ who is, oh boy, I don’t want to spoil it but the guy can drink .” Martin just stared at him, but Tim cut off whatever he was going to say as he began walking toward Jon’s office,
“Trust me, Marto. Seeing Jon get drunk will definitely cheer you up, I promise!” Tim then threw open the door to Jon’s office with a jubilant call of “Bossman!” and as the door shut behind him he could hear Jon begin to tell him off.
Martin turned to Sasha, a look of confusion plastered across his face, and she just gave him a shrug. “I don’t know, I’ve never gone drinking with Jon before, and Tim has never given me the details about whatever they got up to.”
Martin sighed and resigned himself to waiting until Tim was done, but fortunately, he didn’t have to wait long as not twenty seconds later Tim came out of the office with an incredibly amused look on his face and gave two thumbs up, “Jon is not coming with us tonight! However, don’t think this means he won’t come along ever, I’m going to wear him down and one day we are going to have a required ‘Archival Team Goes Bar-hopping Night’, it’ll be monthly.”
Neither Martin nor Sasha bothered saying anything in response to that and eventually, Tim dropped his thumbs up, and walked over to his desk, grabbed a statement, and began walking towards the stairs, “Whatever, Jon is
up my arse
, so I’ve got to go talk to research about this.” he waved the statement in the air, “We leave at seven, if you two aren’t done with your work by then I will
drag you out.
Don’t underestimate me.”