Work Text:
Dull greys painted the sky overshadowing a lonely hill in the sticks of Scotland. The grass still bore witness to rains prior, and the scent in the air foretold of another shower soon to come. Wet footsteps that had previously padded up the wooden front steps of a small house were beginning to dry in the temporary reprieve given by the passing of this storm, the only proof of life currently existing at the house being the occasional movements from within.
While the outside air smelled heavily of petrichor and felt damp to merely exist in, the interior was much more welcoming. The dulled colors of the outside world stood in stark contrast to the warmth within the structure. Small as it was, and despite the little time it’d been actively occupied, the warm feeling only a home with personality could give would wash over anyone crossing it’s threshold. The decorations were unconventional and clearly told stories that the inhabitants couldn’t convey well, instead letting the objects spark ideas in anyone who may view them’s imagination of what may have happened. Was the lack of recollection due to keeping an air of mystery, or due to not wanting to relive certain events? It depended on the object, honestly.
The decor, while meaningful, was sparse. A few photo frames, some shelves with seemingly random knick-knacks, notes that had been tacked onto the wall for future reference and forgotten about once their usefulness had passed were all that could be seen littering the walls of the house. Most of the decor came in the choices of furniture. While it was all very practical, it was also aesthetically pleasing to look at. A soft, brown sofa sat in the middle of a small living room, littered with small tables in the corners that shared a similar shade. Walls the color of pumpkins perfectly reflected the light given off by a few candles scattered on these tables, washing the room in the scent of autumn despite the damp July air outside of its walls.
An old CRT television sat atop a sturdy table, discolored and chipped from decades of use. On the floor next to this table sat a VCR player, with loose tapes strewn atop and around it. Tucked behind the VCR was a tape recorder, covered in a thin layer of dust from it’s lack of usage. Similarly to its video counterpart, it had loose cassettes around and atop it, though they severely lacked in number comparatively.
The sofa usually had a white fleece throwblanket draped over the back of it, giving a bright contrast to the earth tones of the room. However, in the given moment, it was currently draped around the occupants of this house as they sat silently on the sofa. A movie was playing on the television, but the volume was practically turned off, so the plot was inaudible to those watching it for the first time. Luckily for the two occupants, they’d seen it dozens. Also luckily, they weren’t exactly interested in the movie in the given moment.
Martin Blackwood and Jonathan Sims had been free of the Institute for about a month. Though the adjustment was difficult, it was something they were slowly yet surely managing. The Eye still afflicted Jon to an extent, but the urge to feed on the secrets of random people was dwindling the longer he stayed away from society. Instead, he and Martin had found a new way to feed his hunger. Suffice it to say, Martin had gotten very good at selecting nonfiction books that could pique Jon’s interest and satiate his hunger all the same. History, biographies, memoirs… they all had dark secrets hidden within them. Stale as they may be sometimes, it was safe. It was controlled. It was something he could lose himself in for hours and last a few days on. And it worked .
They were in the midst of a peaceful day, without the hunger affecting Jon. Instead of cooping himself up in his makeshift study he’d fashioned from a closet they had no use for, he was curled on the sofa with Martin, his head resting in the crook of Martin’s neck as he lay perched in his lover’s lap. He was breathing steadily, not quite sleeping but not quite awake either. Thin hands lay against Martin’s chest, fingers curled with the telltale signs of relaxation only unconsciousness can bring.
Martin had lowered the volume of the movie a while ago out of consideration for the archivist. Despite his hunger being satiated, his anxiety still sat at the forefront of his mind. Anxiety that lead to memories, to flashbacks, to breakdowns. It had been coming to a boil, almost overflowing before Martin had popped a tape in and sat them on the sofa. Jon always calmed down when sat with Martin, hiding within the ginger’s arms, as if they could save him from everything he’d went through and anything he’d go through in the future. Despite the struggle being from within, it felt safe being held by him. He felt safe.
Of course, this safety came with vulnerability. Vulnerability Jon hadn’t anticipated having this soon, but he wasn’t opposed to working on. And in these quiet moments, Martin found himself looking at the true amount of damage that’d been done to the archivist over the years. The scars littered his skin, scars of all shapes and sizes and causes. The pock-marks from the worms had long since begun to fade, leaving only vaguely discolored indentations in their stead. The other scars, however, shone starkly against his skin. Slashes along his shoulders and arms and neck, some from his scuffles endured during his active archivist days, others inflicted in moments of weakness both during and after. It wasn’t something Jon had ever admitted, not to himself or Martin, but his newfound ability to heal rapidly had lead him down the path of relapsing into old habits from his adolescence.
Absently, Martin found himself intertwining his fingers with one of Jon’s hands, his thumb running over the rough, bumpy texture left by the burn scar covering the majority of it. If it wouldn’t be too much movement for him to sleep through, Martin would have brought the hand up to his mouth and placed gentle kisses along the knuckles. It was something he’d taken to doing back when they’d first settled, when Jon would hide parts of himself he found disgusting or unsightly. It was his way of letting him know that despite these marks of the past, he loved him. In fact, not despite them. Including them. Because they were part of him, his story, his life. And Martin had fallen in love with all of it.
Jon shifted a bit, nuzzling further into Martin’s neck as he got comfortable. Despite drifting off into a shallow sleep, his fingers twitched around Martin’s and tightened their grip ever so slightly. A soft snore escaped him as he found himself falling further and further asleep, the sensation of being protected and safe luring him deeper and deeper into stages of REM. It was a welcome change, being comfortable enough to sleep. Neither he nor Martin found their respective fits of random or deep, long sleep to be bothersome or inconvenient. And when one slept and the other was awake, they almost instinctively kept guard of their respective beloved.
Martin’s thumb grazed over a deeper part of the burn scar as he moved his free arm to support Jon better, his hand resting on his shoulder. Even through the fabric of his t-shirt, Martin could feel where Melanie had stabbed him. Other, smaller scars were able to be felt as well, and despite knowing the story behind most of these, Martin found himself biting back tears. God, the Archive had done a number to them, hadn’t it? He glanced down at his own hand, at the scars that littered it. Personally, he couldn’t recall where some of them had come from. They didn’t stand in such stark contrast as Jon’s did, but they were still visible. In a way, he got out lucky. His scars were mental. He could work through them. In fact, he was! Martin had begun going to therapy. Explaining forced isolation among other things seemed to be easy to do once you figured out how to avoid potentially illegal details, or details that could make a supernaturally disinclined therapist mark you down as not entirely there.
Jon wasn’t that lucky in either regard, which is why Martin had become to fiercely protective of him. And he was fine with this. He knew what he was getting into the minute he left the Lonely with Jon. Even before that. Way before that.
He leaned down, moving his hand from Jon’s shoulder to brush his bangs from his forehead, placing a soft kiss on it as soon as he could. He lingered, feeling the heat radiate from him, letting his hand rest on the side of Jon’s head as he took in the fact that he was finally with the man he’d fallen so hard for years ago. That, despite everything, they were both alive. They were both more or less okay - and when they were less okay, they were on their paths to recovery alongside each other. They had survived things most people couldn’t conceive.
And finally, they could put the Institute behind themselves and begin their new lives. Their actual lives. The lives they deserved, the lives that weren’t tangled in the Institute.
They’d forge the path of their new lives together, intertwining everything they’d become from then on in a structure of support and love and safety, and it certainly didn’t take the Eye to just know that.