Work Text:
No one who worked in the archive still wore heels, so when Jon heard the unmistakable sound of heels clacking across the floor he tensed and needed a moment before he looked up. He recognized the woman approaching, a severe-looking researcher he'd been acquaintances with before coming down to the archives. Sarah? Serena? He couldn't quite remember - he was fairly certain her last name was -
"Ms. Foster. How can I help you?"
"You use these down here, right?" she held out an old cassette recorder. "I found it in one of the cupboards in the break room. Thought one of yours may have left it."
Jon stood and reached out to take it. Maybe it was the proximity of their hands, maybe it was the brief eye contact, but suddenly he Knew. Knew exactly what was expertly hidden behind that impassive expression, marred only with the slightest hint of annoyance at being inconvenienced by having to return equipment to another department all the way in the basement. He pushed the information down and set the recorder on his desk. "Yes, most likely. It's a different brand than the ones we typically use but I think we're the only department that still has these. Did you check the tape?"
Ms. Foster huffed. "No." she answered. The message was clear. She didn't have the time for archival nonsense. Jon almost envied her. "Now if you'll excuse me -"
"Yes, of course." Later, he wouldn't know if it was simple absent mindedness or a petty desire to actually be as creepy as she seemed to think he was that led him to add "and, um, I'm sorry for your loss." but whichever it was Ms. Foster paled suddenly, and her stride as she turned and left was just a bit longer and quicker than it had been when she'd approached.
Jon studied the recorder. It was both larger and flatter than the ones he typically used, with a large square speaker built into it for playback. There was a tape inside that, upon close inspection he realized needed to be rewound. Or at least flipped over. Although, the fact that it was facing this way and needed to be rewound suggested there was something to be heard on this side. So, curiosity building, Jon hit the rewind button.
Found in the break room, she'd said. In one of the cupboards. There was no way to know how it had gotten there. Likely as not it had just appeared but...why this different sort? And what had it overheard? The vague feeling like he'd be prying crept over him - and failed to dissuade him. The curiosity would be overwhelming if he didn't listen. The tape finished rewinding and the recorder snapped off.
Jon hesitated a moment, then scooped up the recorder and walked into the office, shutting the door behind him. He had the vague feeling whatever this was, he wouldn't want to be disturbed while listening to it. It could well be nothing, but Jon didn't know if his sense that it wasn't was something he Knew or just instinct. Settling at his office desk, setting the tape player down in front of him, Jon allowed himself a long breath. Then, finished hesitating, he reached out and hit play.
"I don't know why I'm doing this." Tim's voice caught him completely off guard. It felt rather like being punched square in the chest, all the air rushed out of him as he listened. "First useful thing I learned in Uni, if you're too tired to take notes, you're too tired to study. I just...need to finish this section. I'll take the tape home with me and listen to it over the weekend."
Tim sounded young. So young. How long had Tim been working here? Certainly not that long, was it? This tape couldn't be more than a few years old. Not long enough for Tim to sound so young. But as the young man in the recording cleared his throat and began to read aloud, Jon realized it wasn't youth he was hearing. It was energy. Exhausted as he was professing to be, he still sounded more energetic than Jon had heard him in the last year or so they'd known each other. That'd been the first thing Jon had noticed about him, years ago. Tim just...didn't stop. The scheduled end of a workday was more a suggestion to him than anything to actually be followed - of course that was true of most academics but...looking back, Jon didn't think he'd ever seen Tim so much as slow down the entire time they worked together as researchers. It took Jon a few minutes before he recognized the text Tim was reading from. Jon had never personally read Specimens of Continental Architecture, but he'd heard Tim go on about the work of Robert Smirke enough to recognize it when he heard it.
Tim continued reading for several minutes, and Jon listened until finally, the recording played back a heavy sigh."Nothing." Tim commented, and there was just the barest trace of the bitterness Jon had ultimately come to know well. Then it was gone "I mean it's fascinating. I almost regret not getting into this stuff sooner. Maybe Smirke's work had nothing to do with what happened. That'd be-" he stopped and made a small sound, not quite a huff and certainly not exactly a laugh, but a breath that tried to be one or the other. "Maybe I'll find something when I play this back." The recording clicked off, then back on again.
Tim's voice was big, a bit over the top, the sort of drama he'd played into on occasion. "Guess what?! I'm an idiot! I don't have a tape player at home. Don't know why I thought I did, it's only twenty-THIRTEEN, nobody's owned a tape player in years, not even sure where this one came from. Gertrude from the archives said she didn't need it though so. I'll probably return it."
Well, that answered a few questions. Not quite as many as it raised but that was about the norm. "Or-" Tim commented and Jon blinked. He didn't know why he was surprised, the tape obviously went all the way to the end, of course there was something more on it. "I could just. Use this like...a rubber duck. Just talk out my problems. Hit record so I don't feel stupid talking to myself. Yeah that's a good plan. Well. Time to bury this recorder under a pile of paperwork until I hit a knot in my research."
The recording clicked off. Jon had just enough time to blow out a breath he hadn't noticed he'd started holding before it clicked on again. "Alright -" Tim's voice said "Here's something..." He began detailing a case, one Jon remembered crossing his own desk late summer of 2013. He'd passed on it, noting the outright cliche elements that suggested the incidents in question were manufactured as opposed to genuinely supernatural.
No sooner than he'd remembered that on his own than Tim commented "Jon thinks it's some kind of Scooby Doo crap, apparently. My words, not his, but -" Tim went on to discuss the opinions of other researchers on the case, including Sasha and Martin until finally "But none of that sounds right - so..." and he went through the facts again, and a third time, and when he slowed in recounting them, Jon heard it. "Oh-" Jon groaned in near perfect unison with the recording. "Well then." Tim added. "I guess I'll be trying to get my hands on those construction records." the recording clicked off.
Then back on, and suddenly Tim's voice was all but growling "I'm going to throw my computer across the room. Monitor, tower, I don't care I want rid of it unless it starts acting like a computer again." Jon blinked. Despite the clear rage in his voice, it was still...so much lighter than it had been that Jon felt a lump form in his throat. "I've had IT up here three times - of course, here, IT literally just means Bill - I don't even know his last name, just Bill - who was probably already old when computers were invented, so of course he's got no idea what the problem is. Which means I'm here hand-recording my reports." Tim sighed heavily, then stated "So, if I'm here, after hours, suffering - you're here with me. Do I know who 'you' are? No. Do I care? ...also no. You're in this with me."
The 'this' in question turned out to be a little over five minutes of Tim mumbling and the distant sound of a pen tapping out his rough print on paper. Jon remembered this, after a moment. Not the recording of course, he remembered Tim's problems with Bill, the former Information Technology Director at the Magnus Institute. The old man had worked out of the little windowless room near the back of the ground floor for years before Jon started at the Institute, and only about two years after before he hired on the entirety of the current department and promptly retired. It'd been... November, hadn't it? Still 2013, when Tim had him up to the third floor repeatedly trying to work out some computer trouble. It was odd to hear him so frustrated by the man. Jon remembered Tim being distinctly polite to the man, apologizing for calling him up repeatedly. Of course, Tim had also sat...very nearly on the opposite end of the researcher's bull pen from Jon, so there was really no way to know how the interactions had actually gone. What he did know now was that this recording would not include any answers Tim had found in regard to the case from that summer. As his realization about the building's construction had ignited Jon's interest, he'd have to look into that independently. Assuming he could find the time.Finally, Tim mumbled something about "Wasting Tape" and the recording clicked off.
It clicked back on to Tim discussing the pros and cons of his various options for Christmas Eve plans. Jon quickly lost count of the possibilities he was deciding between, although several options would center on a specific person and in discussing the pros of those options his opinions became...suggestive enough to make Jon uncomfortable. Tim seemed mostly torn between spending the holiday with one of the clerks from the police department - a man Jon knew Tim had carried on something of a long-term, if on-again-off-again affair with - or attending what seemed to be a series of holiday events. By the time the recording clicked off, Tim's decision still unmade, Jon had begun to wonder why Tim didn't just invite the clerk to attend those events with him.
The tape went on like that. Cases Jon remembered, others he didn't. Personal decisions, short rants about some of the more irritating aspects of working as a researcher. Even one rather lengthy recounting of an amorous encounter that included significantly more information than Jon ever wanted to know. Of course, discomfort at the level of detail Tim was comfortable sharing about his...escapades was familiar in a way that, in this new context, became achingly nostalgic.
Jon had absentmindedly grabbed a scrap of paper and was noting the subjects Tim discussed researching on his tape. It was, after all, worth following up on the feeling he should listen to this. There had to be something here, beyond what was beginning to feel more and more like an invasion of privacy. Like reading a journal. Not that Tim was there to demand his privacy anymore. Jon wasn't sure if that made it better or worse. The feeling that Tim wouldn't appreciate Jon of all people listening to this was getting stronger. He couldn't bring himself to stop though. To lift his hand from where it was curled around a pen, waiting for Tim to say something - anything - about the details of his work. Just as he'd finally made the decision to stop, to turn it off, the recording clicked off some rambling Tim had done about how he wasn't sure if the lesbian firefighter he'd spoken with the day before actively hated him or if that was just how everyone talked to people they weren't attracted to - a very tongue-in-cheek, self-deprecating monologue, and over to the next bit. "So Jon's Head Archivist now."
Jon's hand froze. Had he really just listened to four years of notes, personal documentation and reflection? How long was the tape? It certainly couldn't have been that long. Maybe Tim just recorded less often than it seemed listening to them all together like this. Tim continued. "He's actually requested I transfer down there with him - as his assistant. I said I'd think about it because - I'd been here over a year when Jon was hired, and he just..." Tim sighed heavily. Jon could almost see him shaking his head in that way he did when he was giving something he was displeased by its due consideration and not coming to any better conclusion. "Probably for the best. Neither of us know a damn thing about library science and if one of us is gonna fall on their face I'd rather it be him."
He paused a moment, then added "I'm not sure about joining him though. Archival Assistant. I tried to get ahold of the former head archivist to ask about the difference in duties - turns out there's an open Missing Persons file on her. A file with quite a 'presumed dead' air about it, even if it's not officially on there, you know? You know the type when you've seen enough of them." He paused, then added "I don't... want to know why that bothers me so much. But I do. I really do, don't I?" Tim sighed heavily. "This is probably going to be good for me. Good for...my real work. I've gotten lazy, haven't I? Comfortable. A switch down to the archives... I'll have access to the older statements. Older evidence. Things from...before I started here. From then." He paused, and silence stretched for a long moment.
Finally, voice cheerful, Tim said "Well, I guess this is so long, old friend. I'd hate to drag you down to the basement where you might get mixed up with all the other tape recorders." He paused, then laughed "God, can you imagine? Jonathan "Computer Files organized a dozen layers deep but gets a paper cut whenever he opens the filing cabinet" Sims using a Tape Recorder? That's going to be fun. I'm not even sure what they use them for down there. Guess I'll find out."
Another pause, this one not as long. Then "Oh look, nearly out of tape. I guess this is perfect timing. ...I'll come back. If I find something. When I get an answer I'll come back and tell you. You've been a good rubber duck." The tape clicked off, and Jon expected that to be it. He let out a long breath and reached for the recorder.
It clicked back on before he could touch it. It was Tim's voice again, but now it was slightly muffled. What's worse though, it was hard. "-don't mean if you can afford it or have another job lined up I mean if you Physically Can. Do it. For your own - for MY sake, Diane. Please."
"Tim, we didn't even actually date." The woman sounded slightly clearer, but still muffled, as if she were closer. "...I cared about you though, yeah? You weren't like a lot of the other jerks. I mean, you were. A jerk. But I still thought of you as a friend. And that's why I'm going to say it again. Get. Help."
Tim laughed. A dark, unhinged sound that, blessedly, only lasted a moment. "Oh, I have all the help I can stomach. Me and the other Hostages have a plan. I just...I don't want you Here if it goes wrong. I've given up convincing anyone else, Diane -"
"No, Tim." The woman replied. "I'm not quitting my job because an old hookup is delusional. I'm sorry." Footsteps. Heels, an awful lot like Ms. Foster's. There was a stretch of quiet, Tim muttering in the background.
Then he stopped and, after a beat just long enough to be painful - "Oh No." and the resigned rage in his voice very nearly broke Jon's heart all over again. There was a slight squeak, then. "Well then. You too?" he huffed. "You know, I'd half convinced myself you were different. But no. Same. Damn thing. Following me from Day One. At least you use to have the courtesy to wait for me to press record." Silence. Then the resounding slam of a cabinet door loud enough that Jon jumped. There were footsteps from the tape as Jon caught his breath. Then the recording came to an end, and the tape clicked off entirely.
The button snapped back up on its own and Jon jumped a second time, still not quite recovered from the first startle that he really ought to have been expecting. The involuntary fear response seemed to unlock something for Jon, and suddenly he was pressing the heels of his hands into his eyes and trying desperately to breathe. Trying desperately not to cry. And why not? It'd be perfectly normal to cry. Maybe even acceptable. Some part of him still instinctively refused though. He just sat there, leaning in so he could rest his elbows on the desk and let the weight of his head be supported by the pressure on his eyes.
I don’t forgive you, Jon remembered But thank you for this. Was that what Tim had said? It felt slightly twisted to hope it was. He should long for Tim to have forgiven him, shouldn’t he? Yet it was all he could do to keep hope that he just remembered the last words of the man who’d never quite been his friend correctly. His back and shoulders jolted slightly with what might have been a sob, and there was some damp under his hands. So much for not crying. But then, it wasn’t like there was much he could do for Tim but cry for him. Not anymore.