Archive of Our Own ^beta

There’s nowhere to relax in the apocalypse. Granted, it’s not like Jon had many restful nights beforehand. The nightmares were present from the very beginning, with the reaching, grasping arm of the Angler Fish beckoning him forward. Of course, the more time he spent as The Archivist, the more varied those nightmares became.
Sometimes he would still return to those early dreams, now imbued with the other horrors he’d witnessed.
Jon would dream of the Angler Fish, only to see the beaten form of Jurgen Leitner watching him from the alley. When his corpse would ask for a cigarette, the one between Jon’s lips tasted of blood.
Later still Jon dreamt that his old assistant Tim Stoker was suspended there. Parts of Tim’s body would be smouldering from the explosion that killed him but left Jon alive. Tim always laughed in those dreams, though his lips never moved. As though it was funny he was entombed in the nightmares of his wretched boss, who ended the world he sacrificed himself to save.

Maybe it is funny. The idea that his life is some cosmic joke always lingers in the back of Jon’s mind. Though ultimately, whether it’s true or not doesn’t matter to him. It wouldn’t change the fact that he, The Archivist, had brought about Hell on Earth. Sure, he no longer has to sleep, but it doesn’t matter when existence itself is a nightmare. Jon would take his old dreams any day, at least he could always wake up and escape those. There’s no waking up from this hellscape, no calm in the eye of this storm. At every turn, Jon feels the terror of billions, simultaneously feeding him and choking him. If it’s all a joke, he’s not laughing.

Martin, bless his soul, provides what comfort he can. He gives Jon gentle touches and embraces, though his skin is always terribly cold. Jon never brings that up, he knows Martin can’t help it. He tries to enjoy the comfort regardless, the chill doesn’t matter to him. If anything, sometimes the numbness of The Lonely’s fog helps ease his mind. Sometimes he craves it when the constant terror makes his skull ache.
Jon is painfully aware that he could have as much fog as he wants, but he knows what the cost is, and he would never hurt Martin. Yet that curiosity never truly goes away.

Jon considers Martin to be his equal, a truly important part of his life. He loves Martin more than anything else. Yet, there’s a part of Jon that knows how much power being The Archivist gives him. Smiting his enemies is just the beginning. The Eye, ruler of all, loves him dearly and would give him all he desires. He’s the most powerful being alive, save for The Entities themselves, and that knowledge can be deeply isolating. Jon feels that separation in the uneasy way Martin looks at him before a statement. He feels it in the excitement tinged with fear on Martin’s face when he turns The Eye’s gaze. The expression makes him both proud and disgusted. It makes him realize that, as much as he tries to feel human, he can never go back. He’s not even a mere Avatar anymore. There’s no one else like Jon. No one can ever understand him, and he knows it.

Jon also knows that it doesn’t have to stay this way. He can force Martin to gain that same level of power. Wouldn’t it be interesting? He could turn his love into the most powerful Lonely avatar of all. Hell, Jon could bind Martin to a different Entity if he wanted. The Eye would let him do so.
Whenever these thoughts crawl up from the recesses of his mind, Jon wants to scream. How dare he even think of such a thing? Yet… why is it so tempting? Is it really the only way that he’ll ever feel understood? Maybe Elias knows what it’s like to wield The Eye’s power, but Jon would rather die than relate to him, to Jonah. There has to be a third option. Can’t he find someone, somewhere out there, who’s as powerful as he is? Who’s struggling with what that power’s done to them? Can’t he just talk to them for a moment?
This need for connection follows Jon through his journey. Every domain he crosses, every statement he makes, every time he drifts further into his role the Eye’s beloved Archivist, that wish sits deep in his chest, growing all the more desperate.

There’s no place to relax in the apocalypse, but eventually Martin forces him to sit down. It won’t heal them, it won’t soothe their fear, but even so... they can at least take a moment, close their eyes, and hold one another. It’s something, at least. It has to be something. Martin’s gentle voice whispers some half-remembered poetry to Jon as they embrace, trying to rest as if it would ever send them to sleep. They both know there’s no escape, not through unconsciousness, not through death. Jon is very aware that he can never leave the world he tore apart. He is its new god, and unless he hurts the one he loves, he will rule alone forever.
As Jon reflects on this horrible truth, it all becomes too much to bear. He can’t live like this forever, he just can’t. For a moment, he allows himself to hope against hope, against knowledge and reason, that there’s someone out there he can talk to. Someone who will know what he’s going through. Maybe they could even help him. As Jon tries his best to listen to Martin’s heartbeat through his coat, something inside him reaches out, trying to grasp at whoever in the world, the universe, all of creation, could listen to him.

The Eye watches its dear Archivist as it always does, knowing his deepest desire. Perhaps it could find that someone, as a gift to its favorite vessel. So The Eye turns its gaze outward, far beyond the reaches of space and time, and it invites a guest to come and play.

—————

Imagine John’s surprise when he’s in that room again. Its sky remains locked in that perpetual sunset, every office chair free of dust and organized in tidy rows. The water jug is already there, the game of chest still caught in its final stalemate.

What was he doing before now? John takes a moment to remember, but there’s not much point. He, John, the individual, hadn’t existed for years. He had no reason to. The Hunger, his Hunger, had been left alone, allowed to be its singular, sprawling self. It continued its dance with the Starblaster’s crew, locked in their ongoing battle over The Light of Creation. Time, and time, and time again they fought. John always assumed that he would eventually win. He had to win. And yet… the unthinkable happened.
John remembers it clearly now. His great disappointment.

He lost The Light.

It isn’t his fault, he assures himself, the things he told Merle couldn’t have led to this. Yet, he knows that fault doesn’t matter. He has to find The Light, and surely he will, surely he’s close by now. Yet The Hunger grows... impatient. Though he created it, though he is its beating heart, he knows that it could survive without allowing him his consciousness.
But it’s fine. He will find it. They will find it. The Hunger will have its glorious Ascension, and nothing can stop it.

Yet... here he is. Torn from his quest, thrown back into the damn Parlay Parlour. That dwarf had better have good reason to summon him after so long.

“Merle?” he calls, looking around the room.

Sure enough, there’s someone else in the room. Between the long hair (partially tied in a messy bun), and the fluffy beard, John briefly mistakes him for the dwarf. However, upon closer look, the man seems human. He looks exhausted and heavily scarred, yet something in his eyes makes John’s breath catch. John knows the rules of Parlay. Whoever this man is, he can’t cause any harm. Yet, the look in his eyes momentarily casts that into doubt.

“Elias, you son of a—“ the man growls, before cutting himself off, squinting at John.
“—hm? What did you say?”

John stares in return, before looking away and adjusting his tie.

“Ah, it seems we both thought we were someone else. I don’t know who you thought would be present here, but my name is not Elias.”

The other man watches John with such intensity that it makes him uncomfortable. He never felt threatened with Merle, not after he knew it wasn’t all a trap. Yet, despite the rules, John can feel this man’s power straining against the laws of this space.

“Then who are you,” the man asks, though it’s spoken clear and firm like a command.
John can feel the faintest buzz at his temples for a moment, but it vanishes just as quickly.

“You… are awfully forward considering the position you’ve put yourself in,” John responds, voice calm despite his mild discomfort.

“...” The man seems caught off guard by that. He takes a deep breath, and leans forward over the table, hands gripping the edge.

“Who are you,” he commands again, emphasizing every word.
John can feel the tingling again, and this time he takes a breath of his own, balling a fist by his side. Whatever this man thinks he’s doing, it will not work. No matter what power he may think he wields, one man could never stand against The Hunger’s splendour.

John shakes his head in response, and gives a small smile.

“Do… you even know how this works? I don’t see why you wouldn’t. After all, you’re the one who invited me here.”

This makes the man look very bewildered.
“What...? I didn’t invite you. I don’t know who you are. I don’t even know where I am, I…” and then he pauses, staring down at his hands.

“Wait. I… I don’t know…? How can I not… know…?” he whispers, before his gaze drifts to the window, his face illuminated by the sunset.

“They’re… gone?”
The words are full of disbelief, and beneath that, hope. The man staggers to the window, pressing his hands against it and staring out at the sky. Then he laughs, choked and hysterical, his fingers curling against the glass.

John watches this display in tense silence, for it’s done nothing to ease his discomfort. Did… this man call him in the middle of an attack? Were The Hunger’s many bodies already swarming his world? Is that why the clear sky makes him so happy? Did he come here to stop John somehow? Yet it doesn’t seem like he knows John, even as a piece of The Hunger. Even if he did, it takes too much energy to consume Planes without also consuming The Light. If John can’t find it… there’s not much point in attacking anyone.

Either way, if this man had no reason to summon him, John has better things to do. He extends a hand towards the man, preparing to kill him, but then he stops. He’s… a little curious, though he can’t explain why... perhaps it’s Merle influence. In any case, John hesitates, and in that moment he speaks.

“Are you… okay?”

It’s a stupid question, and John immediately regrets asking it. Merle really had influenced him; he feels an intense disappointment, partially his own and partially The Hunger’s itself.

The man turns around to look at John, though he keeps a hand on the window.

“I… don’t know. Haha… I really don’t know,” he replies with a shaky grin.

John just frowns in response.

“So, did you really not invite me here? You really don’t know what this place is?” he asks, still confused how that would be possible.

“No,” the man responds, before his gaze intensifies again. “But you seem to. I want you to tell me what you know.”

At this, the third failed attempt to force information out of John, he just smiles, though it's slightly strained.

“Oh yes... you really don’t understand. Listen. Maybe you thought you could charm me, or what have you, but that’s not how this works. If you want information from me, I want the same from you. It’s only fair.”

The man seems to think for a moment, looking out the window again. After a brief silence, he sighs and returns his gaze to John, giving a small nod.

“Right. It’s… only fair.”

John’s smile becomes a little more relaxed, and he nods back.

“Good. Actually, instead of a question, I just need to test something before you ask me your little query.”

Then he lifts a hand and stares at it, concentrating. Effortlessly, black flames flicker up the length of his forearm and burn painlessly in the palm of his hand.

The man suddenly takes a step backwards, looking terrified. John watches him grasp his own hand, and notices the burn scar across his palm and fingers.

Regardless, he concentrates on the man now, waiting for him to show signs of pain, desperation, panic, as the flames build in his chest. Then, the moment he sees that, he closes his hand, snuffing the flames both inside and out. The man doubles over, catching himself on the table and taking heavy, heaving breaths. When he looks up at John it’s an expression of terror… and maybe relief, strangely enough.

“Sorry if that was uncomfortable,” he doesn’t sound all that sorry, “but I needed to know if the rules are as I remember them, so I can answer your question.”

“Then tell me…” the man croaks, still catching his breath.

“Hm. Well I’ll tell you what I know. This room is called the Parlay Parlour, I believe. Parlay being a technique which allows communication with anyone you desire. However, if you’re the one doing the inviting, the host, then you forgo all ability to attack your guest. Your guest, on the other hand, can kill you at any time. It seems like a strange system, but I’ll admit that I never would’ve talked if I knew I couldn’t leave.”

The man slowly stands back up again, looking better, if understandably wary.

“So, in this case I’m the host and you’re the guest,” he responds.

“That would be correct.”

The man takes a moment to think again. He keeps staring out the window, as if that view’s the most beautiful thing there is.

“Is this… real?”

“If you’re asking if we’re really here, then yes. It’s not a dream, and we should remember the meeting afterwards.” John answers. “However, if you’re asking if the space is real… not really. It’s not a physical location, but more like a temporary container, made just for us to converse in.”

The man frowns, exhaling a long, trembling breath.

“I… see. That’s a shame,” he whispers, before forcing his gaze away from the window and back to John.

“Now, who are you?” he asks again, though it sounds more like a genuine question. Regardless, John holds up a finger.

“You’ve asked a lot of questions. I’d like to know who you are first.”

The man shifts uncomfortably for a moment, before nodding.
“I am The Ar—“ he begins, before cutting himself off with one more glance out the window.

“Jonathan. My name… my name is Jonathan. People tend to call me… Jon,” he explains, though it almost sounds like he’s reminding himself.

At this… John can’t help but chuckle. Jon stares at him, tensing up slightly.

“What. What? Is that funny? Am I not allowed to have a-“

“No, it’s not that,” John responds with a wave of his hand. “It’s just that… my name is John. Just John, not short for anything.”

“Oh,” Jon responds, before he laughs too. The noise seems to surprise him, like he hadn’t made it in awhile. After all, this laugh, unlike his earlier hysterical cackling, sounds genuine. John knows the feeling, and he can’t help but smile.

“Ah… hm. Okay. Well met, John,” Jon responds, before an awkward silence washes over the room.

John’s smile falls as he realizes that, during this little conversation, he’s been distracted from finding The Light yet again. He can feel a pressure building, both figurative and literal. His eyes stare down at his hand as a crack runs along its surface, and in a tiny chip in his skin, John can see the inky blackness of The Hunger just below the surface.

He’s wasting time.

“So what was that fire ab—“ Jon begins, before John cuts him off.

“No. No more questions. I’m guessing, since you didn’t know what Parlay is, that you don’t know how to leave?”

Jon stares around at the doorless room, before turning back to John and shaking his head. John can only sigh. He shouldn’t have said anything, he should’ve killed Jon immediately and been done with it. He can’t keep getting attached.

“Well, sorry about this. I just… have more important things to deal with. I can’t afford to waste valuable time figuring out how you contacted me on accident. I’m not going to risk everything on a mistake.”

Jon takes a step forward, hands raised, his burn scar clear to see.

“Wait. Wait. Come on- I can figure out how to leave. You don’t have to-”

John just shakes his head. He can’t spend any more time listening to this man. The Light is waiting. The Hunger is waiting. He won’t let anyone stand in the way of his glorious upheaval. So he raises a hand, the black fire curling around his fingers. Jon seems to resist for a moment, concentrating as he stares at John with that same horrible intensity. It takes half a minute of silent struggle, both parties trying hard to overpower the other, before Jon finally drops to one knee. He doubles over for a moment, before his spine jerks backwards. Those striking eyes are filled with fire all at once, burning through his skull in great gouts of flame, black and tinged with green. Then he is gone, not even ashes remain.

John will not allow himself the slightest bit of mourning. The Hunger is already engulfing the walls of this room, reaching towards him in its black opalescent splendour. He falls backwards into the suffocating comfort of its embrace, losing himself in its impossible existence.

They would not be beholden to anyone. Not a god. Not the laws of the universe. Especially not any poor fool wishing to talk.

No, John would never be understood by anyone outside of The Hunger. Those who understood, they joined him. Merle tried, but in the end he turned away, and that’s fine. John is happy to be The Hunger. He doesn’t need human connection. He isn’t human. Its absence doesn’t leave him wanting. It doesn’t. It can’t.

Yet, within the infinite sprawl of The Hunger, the piece that is John can’t stop thinking about Merle, about the sadness he felt when his friend left. The Hunger is formed from bonds, it wasn’t like John needed another one. Yet, Merle was different, his bond wasn’t part of The Hunger’s tangled mass, it felt like he just… enjoyed John’s company. Indeed, Merle made John feel like an individual outside of The Hunger. It was nice, for a moment, to be seen as human, to have a friend. The feeling is far too small, and too dangerous to his quest, but deep down John misses it. Yet, when he was given the chance to form that connection with someone new, he ruined it, destroyed it before it could flourish. Perhaps John just can’t form those friendships anymore. That’s a small price to pay for ascension, isn’t it?

Still, part of John can't help but hope for another chance. Merle came back, didn’t he? Maybe this ‘Jonathan’ can come back too.

Unbeknownst to him, when Jon reached out to him, John reached back. His bond anchored itself into Jon’s being, tying them together. The Eye and The Hunger, both reaching out to the only being in all of creation that could truly be their equal.

Their conversation was far from over.

—————

Jon wakes to Martin kneeling over him, desperately shaking his shoulders. The forest they laid down in is choked with fog as far as Jon can see, so opaque it obscures the ground. All that’s visible are the dark forms of tree trunks, like blackened pillars in the white expanse.
Martin himself is exhaling more fog with each laboured breath, curling around his panicked expression. His glasses dance with static like a broken tv, eyes hidden behind the glare. That same static rolls down his cheeks in flickering tears, which stain whatever they touch.

“Jon- Jon, Jon, Jon. Jon, please wake up Jon. Jon- you can’t leave me. Please, please, please Jon, Jon…. Jon?” Martin mutters frantically, before realizing that Jon’s eyes are open.

“Martin?” Jon responds. His voice is quiet, his throat feels parched and raw. His insides feel like they’re reassembling themselves from ashen heaps. All in all, he feels like shit.

Martin stares at Jon with a look of shock, before his expression melts into pure relief. A fresh wave of tears roll down his face, but this time they’re made of water, washing the static residue away.

“I thought… I thought you died. You can’t keep doing this Jon.”

“I know,” Jon responds, gently placing a hand on Martin’s cheek. His skin feels like ice. Jon quietly hopes the touch provides some warmth.

“You were worried about me, hm? I’m sorry, Martin. I didn’t mean to. I’d never leave you on purpose.”

Jon’s eyes drift to the fog, his eyebrows knit with concern. He’d only ever seen Martin like this within The Lonely itself. It’s… troubling to see that the Entity’s grip on his boyfriend is still there. It’s more troubling to think he had caused this loneliness, even by accident.

Martin just nods, leaning gently into Jon’s touch. The fog starts to roll back, the chill receding, though without it Jon’s pain gets that much sharper.

“What did it look like?” he asks Martin, brushing away the remaining tears with his thumb. “What happened to me?”

Martin doesn’t make eye contact as he speaks.

“One… one moment we were just lying there. We had our eyes closed and... at one point I felt you fade away. It’s like you were made of smoke. You don’t weigh an awful lot so it uh- it took me a moment to realize. I opened my eyes and you were lying beside me, but it was just a smoky outline. I uh- think I might’ve been in shock for a little bit but eventually I got up and reached out to you. You felt like you were burning up and- and the smoke got darker and more solid and suddenly you looked like when you’re smiting someone.”

Jon winces. He’s not certain what that form looks like. All he’s caught are glimpses of his outstretched arms, or his distorted reflection in The Eye’s pupil when it gazed upon their victims. He becomes a hole torn into reality, a humanoid shadow covered in glowing eyes. Martin told him he has wings and antennae as well, like some twisted imitation of a moth. Jon has accepted the form as the price he must pay to destroy evil beings, but to hear he became that, while so close to Martin…

“Or, at least the eyes were there,” Martin continues, “but they were closed, and like, not in a relaxed way. It looked like you were... fighting against something. Your body was so hot I- I couldn’t cool it down. I couldn’t do anything. I thought- I really thought…”

Jon moves his head to look at Martin’s hands, still resting on his shoulders. The skin of his boyfriend’s palms have blackened, burnt where they meet Jon’s body.

“I’m sorry, Martin,” he responds, still quiet, though much less raspy. In just a couple minutes, Jon already feels much better.

“It’s… fine. It went away, and you were you again, but you still weren’t moving- and I thought it wasn’t enough, but it was. It was. You’re- you’re alright.”

With a nod, Jon lowers his hand from Martin’s face to drape it around his shoulder, pulling him down for an embrace. The two take a moment to lie beside one another, Jon’s head against Martin’s chest once more.

“Yes... I’m alright,” he mutters, running his hand up and down the length of Martin’s back.

“Do… you know what happened to you? Not what it looked like but- but what actually happened?” Martin whispers as he curls his fingers in Jon’s hair, watching the fog as it continues pulling away from them.

Jon takes a moment to consider the question. That man… Jon knows so little about him, though he seemed just as confused. Sure he tried to kill Jon, but seemingly out of necessity rather than ill intent. Though the man commanded fire, and that fire was formed of darkness, it didn’t feel like those Entities. Maybe… he’s part of The Extinction? Jon just doesn’t know. It’s a strange feeling, to not know.
However, malicious or not, this “John” had tried to kill him, and may have even succeeded, temporary as that death was. Even so, Jon didn’t think that anything was capable of killing him (maybe Elias, he’s not sure yet) so the execution came as a surprise.

Jon is still curious about who John is and where his power comes from… but if confronting John means risking his life, stalling their quest to confront Elias, and leaving Martin vulnerable and Alone, Jon’s fine with never seeing him again. That’s right. He’s. Fine. Not. Knowing.

The thought alone makes Jon feel physically ill, his fingers curling against Martin’s back. He resists the feeling, which he finds completely ridiculous. He knows everything else, he can live without knowing this. He has to go to the Panopticon and he has to make things right. Anything else is a distraction. Besides… if it isn’t going to happen again, there’s no point worrying Martin.

“I saw someone but… it was just a dream. I don’t think it meant anything,” Jon responds.

“Are you sure?” questions Martin. “Do you want to tell me about it? Or, uh, make a statement, I guess?”

Just hearing the word fills Jon with the urge to start talking. He can feel the slight weight of a tape recorder appearing in his coat pocket, beckoning him to speak. Jon opens his mouth, the glowing outlines of eyes blinking open around his head, before he pushes his jaw shut. There’s no point. He doesn’t want to talk about it.

“I’ll be fine, Martin, really. Come on, we’ve rested long enough, we need to keep going,” Jon insists, moving away from Martin and lifting himself upright.
He extends a hand for his boyfriend to take, though Martin just stares for a moment, with a look of quiet concern. However, he quickly relents, letting Jon drop the subject and grabbing his hand. After Martin pulls himself up, he doesn’t let go. Neither does Jon. The two share a look, green and grey eyes bearing the marks of their Entities. Yet, no matter how much they’ve changed, no matter how much danger they’re in, they’re still glad to have one another. Their bonds are wrapped tightly together, a powerful connection formed by love.

But it’s not the only bond tied to The Archivist. Eventually, the two will wish to rest once more, to take a break from travelling through such horrid domains. When they do, that other bond will pull Jon from his ruined world, and he will be beckoned to Parlay once again.

—————

The next time Jon returns to the parlour, it’s different. The painted drywall has been replaced with dark wood. The former office chairs are now wooden as well, adorned with plain cushions. However, the main difference is the presence of bookshelves in every wall (except the massive window) filled with books, loose files, maps, diagrams, and even a couple harmless artifacts. The room smells like dust and old paper. Jon breathes deeply, realizing he’s only smelt blood, death, and rot for so long.
The look, the scent, the feel, it reminds him so strongly of The Archives. Yet, though that job was all an elaborate lie, though he lost almost everything because of it, this room reminds him of a simpler time. Jon remembers when he was no more than a grumpy head archivist, able to convince himself that none of the statements were real. He remembers when he had... friends. He hadn’t treated them like friends, he knows he was only ever their shitty boss, but still, he misses them. He misses them a lot.

Seeking a distraction from his own sorrow, Jon turns towards the bookshelves, hoping they might contain some useful information. Yet, just by looking at them, he realizes that they don’t. Everything on those shelves is completely blank, an illusion meant to make the room more comfortable for him. That seems strange, that the room should change now when it hadn’t last time. It had looked the same every time John visited, Jon knew that too. Yet, isn’t that the strangest part… the fact he’s able to know that at all? Last time he had felt severed from The Eye, unable to access his powers, but this time...

However, before he can ponder on that much longer, his gaze lands on the figure at the other end of the table. There stands the mysterious John, glancing nervously around the room.
He looks the same as before: crisp black suit, luxurious shoes, not a hair out of place. The man looks very professional, and Jonathan finds it quite irritating. He misses the ability to put that much pride in his appearance. The worse things got, the lower priority it became, until it stopped mattering completely. Why should he get to look fancy while everyone else suffered in the hell he created? Of course, that never stopped Elias. Maybe that’s why John’s appearance is getting under his skin.

“What?” he mutters to himself. “Why did it change? It never changed before.”

Jon smirks back, getting some satisfaction at seeing the man who killed him so confused.

“Hello again, John,” he calls out.
John jolts slightly in response, still looking bewildered. Upon seeing Jon he sighs, a resigned smile on his face.

“I’m beginning to think that immortality is a prerequisite for Parlay,” he chuckles to himself. “Apologies for last time then, I suppose.”

However, John’s smile quickly falls, as he begins looking around the room again.

“The Parlour has never changed its interior like this. I don’t know why it’s suddenly different, do you?”

Jon watches the man for a moment, before his gaze slowly drifts towards the window. The clouds are thicker now, a blanket of greyish-green, covering the previous sunset. Jon peers into it, before he sees— he feels— something moving behind the clouds. It’s staring back at him, and he’s starting to realize what happened to the room.

Jon is grimacing when he looks back at the other man.

“Ah… I see now. Hey, John?”

“Yes?” John responds, an impatient tone underlying his usual calm demeanour.

“Why don’t you try to kill me again?”

John stares at him, squinting as if he heard him wrong.

“You want me to kill you?”

“Yes,” Jon nods. “Weren’t you going to do it anyways? I don’t see why it’s such a big deal. You don’t want to waste time on a mistake.”

John grits his teeth for a moment, taking one last look around the room, before extending his hand. The motion is casual at first, like the fire should come easily to him, but his concentration strengthens the longer nothing happens. After a minute he is staring at Jon with such a pointed gaze, every muscle in his hand tensed, that for a moment Jon worries he’s wrong, that he underestimated John’s power. Indeed, he can feel that very power straining against the room, ripples of black appearing and vanishing in every surface.

Then John drops his hand, panting slightly, sweat dripping down his face, marking the effort he exerted. Yet, despite that, he still lost. Jon is right, and his smile redoubles itself.

“That’s right… you can’t, can you? After all… that would make you a pretty terrible host.”

John looks down at his hand, still trembling at his side, then back at Jon. For a moment, that calm demeanour crumbles, and he looks the tiniest bit scared. Jon feels the fear radiating off the man, and for a moment it’s overwhelming. Even after feeling the fear of the entire planet for days? Weeks? Months? For a moment John’s fear is too much. It’s not just his, it’s the worry and terror of something incomprehensibly massive. If an Entity could feel fear, Jon imagines it would feel like this. It makes him sick, as he suddenly staggers forward, catching himself on the table by his elbows. A dark liquid oozes from his mouth and nose. It isn’t blood, Jon isn’t sure he has blood anymore, but rather whatever strange substance consumes his body when he draws on The Eye’s power.
Then John composes himself, and the feeling is gone. Both men straighten their posture, staring at one another with an even gaze, as though challenging the other to speak.

Eventually, it’s John who talks first, as he wipes his brow with the kerchief in his pocket.

“Hm. That’s troubling, actually. It should come as no surprise that I didn’t mean to invite you here,” he sighs, balling his still trembling hand into a fist. “No sense in wasting time then. Kill me and be done with it.”

Jon likewise cleans his face, intending to use the inside of his scarf before a cloth appears in his hand. It’s nice to know he can create things in here.

“Now you know how I felt,” Jon replies.
It’s a familiar sentiment. He’s been using The Eye for retribution this whole time, why should this be any different? He could make John feel the confusion and worry that he had. He could make John pay for removing him from his goal, from his loved one. Jon is very tempted to kill him, to turn The Eye’s gaze upon him and destroy him utterly like the rest. Yet… what then? He just continues on, never knowing who John was or why this happened?
Jon isn’t fine not knowing. He has to learn. He has to see. The retribution can wait.

“As for the bit about killing you… seems like a bit of a waste, doesn’t it? I know we’re both very busy, but if this is happening unintentionally, we’d return here soon enough. Wouldn’t it be better to learn who we are and why this is happening?”

John considers this for a moment, staring at the empty surface of this strange new table, before sighing.

“Do I really have a choice? You hold the cards this time around.”

“I guess not,” Jon responds, shrugging. “Still, I can’t be the only one who’s curious. If I have power equal to yours… don’t you want to know why?”

John nods slowly in response, calm but defeated. “I doubt it’s equal but… yes, I suppose I do. I actually had a system for Parlay, an equal exchange of information, one question each.”

Jon thinks on that for a moment, before shaking his head.

“Two for me, and one for you. I may as well get an extra to make up for you killing me.”

John can only sigh in response.

“Very well. I’m guessing you want to go first?”

“Yes, actually. I need to know…” Jon begins, before staring directly into John’s eyes.
“Which Entity do you serve?”

The question only receives a blank stare from John, and a couple confused blinks.

“I’ll be honest Jonathan, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Next question?”

“No. If you don’t use Entity… then what Fear do you serve? What God?”

John seems to understand slightly more, actually taking time to choose his words.

“Yes… I suppose we must look like a God from the outside. Such magnificence… how could it be anything but divine? Yet, we’re not a God. Even they are beholden to the rules of reality. We are something more. If you wish for a name, I’ve been told we’re called… The Hunger.”

Jon’s breath catches in his throat as he hears the name, feeling John’s power trying to seize control of the room again, though it slips away after a few moments of futile effort.

“The Hunger… that… there can’t be a fifteenth— or a sixteenth counting The Extinction. Food isn’t even necessary anymore, so it can’t be new. I would’ve heard about it, I would’ve known about it by now. If it existed before I would’ve needed its mark…” Jon mutters, though his voice hitches with that last word. However, before John can get his own word in, Jon continues, his speech slightly frantic.

“Then it has to be another one. Hunger… Hunger suggests The Flesh, meat is meat, the idea of being eaten, though Hunger implies you’re the one needing to eat. Perhaps starvation is an animalistic fear, same as being prey. Yet it’s also a human fear, famines have occurred throughout human history. Would that still be The Flesh then? Perhaps The Slaughter? Or would the fear of death by starvation be part of The End, since that wasting death affects avatars too? Or... at least it used to. Now we will never starve for lack of fear, it seems. Yet the fire… the fire suggests The Desolation but the radiant shadow suggests The Dark. Though it could also be The Extinction if nothing else. It’s still developing, still coming into its own, still has overlap with many other fears, though one could also say that every fear overlaps with one another, all twisted and tangled and knotted and-”

“Jonathan,” John interrupts, putting a hand up to call for silence. He looks equally nervous and annoyed.

Jon himself appears startled, as though breaking out of a stupor. Sure enough, there is a tape recorder sitting in front of him on the table, patiently waiting for him to continue. Instead, Jon sighs and concentrates, trying to exercise his control of the room, and the device vanishes with a static pop.

“Are you… alright to continue? Your eyes got a little strange there,” John asks, before receiving a tired look from Jon in return.

“Yes… I’m sure they did,” Jon responds, rubbing a hand down his face, eyes blinking frequently. John swears they change colour as he does so: green, blue, yellow, red, before finally settling back to green.

“I’d like to ask my question now, if that’s alright,” John continues. “It should help me understand, because I’ll be honest Jonathan, you’ve just thrown a lot of titles at me and I’ve understood very few of them. So, if you don’t mind, what are you talking about? Your Entities, your Fears, please... just explain them to me.”

Jon takes a moment to consider this.
“You… really don’t know? How could you not..? Still, if that’s your question, I suppose I can humour you. Funny that I’m the one explaining these things now— part of me wishes Gerry was still here. Still, there’s no better being to ask than The Archive himself!” exclaims Jon, though he winces at the title.

“Please, try to stay on track,” John presses.

“Right, yes. You must know that all humans possess certain fears, at least. Animals too, though they’re more rudimentary. These fears… they come from Entities, these incomprehensible greater beings that exist outside our reality, while still influencing it. Fear feeds them, and enough fear can even create them, or at least let them split off from one another. In return, they change reality so they can obtain yet more fear. They create manifestations of their power through monsters and artifacts. Sometimes… they’ll reach out to humans and give them power, provided the human creates fear to feed them both. That person becomes an avatar.”

“And you’re one of these avatars, I presume,” John replies, seeming very intrigued by this information.

Jon winces again. As obvious as that may be, he doesn’t like the reminder. Still, he nods, albeit with grit teeth.

“Which one are you then? Which Entity do you serve?”

Now Jon shakes his head, holding up a hand.

“You’ve already asked your question. It’s my turn, and I have another one, actually. Which should I ask first…?”

“What?” John responds, scowling. “That wasn’t our agreement. You can’t just change the rules part way through.”

“Sorry. It’s like you said, I’m in control, and I have another question. It’s important I know more about you, but I don’t have time to answer every inquiry of yours.”

“You realize it’s not like I have much time myself. Perhaps you shouldn’t keep adding extra questions if you’re in such a hurry.”

“But this is something I need to know, and if I need to know something, then I will gain that knowledge. Again, sorry if this seems unfair to you, but that’s just the way things are.”

“Fine,” John replies sharply, staring at Jon with a look of irritation.

“I’ll start with this: Where are you from, John? It seems impossible that you wouldn’t know about the Entities. This involves the whole world. There’s nowhere you can hide from it. It just isn’t possible that you don’t know. I would hope you’re not lying to me.”

There’s a faint crackle in the air. John frowns at the noise before sighing and answering Jon’s question.

“As long as you aren’t lying I have no reason to. I’m not aware of this ‘worldwide phenomenon’ because I’m simply not from your world.”

“You’re… an alien? Bullshit. Answer me truthfully.”

John tenses for a moment, breath hitching as his eyes briefly flicker with green.

“I’m not lying to you Jonathan. I’m not an alien either, because I’m not from your dimension. As for where I am from, should I answer as John or as The Hunger?”

“Both..?” Jon responds, looking notably taken aback by the answer.

“Technically, both originate from the same place. I, John, am from a Plane of Thought. I assume you are as well, considering you only named humans and animals as beings capable of fear.”

“That’s because they are? What?”

“That’s because they are to you. You don’t know anything else. There’s more out there than you could ever imagine. Still, I know what it’s like to be in your position. As I said, I’m from the same type of Plane, and it’s what formed The Hunger. That very Plane is still held inside us, at our very core.”

“I… alright,” Jon responds quietly, visibly shaken by this information. “Where do you exist… now..?”

“That should count as another question, but I suppose you get as many of those as you want,” John responds with a scowl.
“The Hunger… doesn’t exist in any particular place. The laws of space… they’re not something we care to abide by. We glide through dimensions with ease, and we occupy the space between the Planes, existing but unnoticed. The Hunger doesn’t exist within a space, Jonathan, because we are the space, and things exist within us.”

Jon nods very slowly in response, with an expression of disbelief. Aliens? Honest to god extra-dimensional beings? Perhaps that’s not too surprising, The Entities are very similar. Still, it’s a lot to handle at once, and part of him yearns to retreat back into skepticism, like he could when things were simple. What is he supposed to take from this? That The Hunger is another Entity? That can’t be true, Jon would’ve dragged John into the world along with the rest, he would know what was happening. Could it be that there’s a parallel Earth, with a parallel set of Entities? Might beings as powerful as The Entities exist out there, beyond even Jon’s knowledge?

Jon leans on the back of a chair for a moment, staring holes into the table, his face pale.

“Too much to handle?” John responds, the beginning of a smile returning to his face.

“Shut up. It’s… not. This is something I can understand, it’s just… not what I was expecting. It makes the scope of things a lot larger.”

Jon straightens his spine, pushing himself off the chair and giving John an even gaze, trying to conceal any nervousness in his expression.

“Now, answer me. If you’re not an Entity… what is The Hunger?”

“The Hunger is a name, a title. I’m not the one who came up with it. It’s a little vague for my tastes, but I suppose it works for them. Question answered.”

Jon’s eye twitches, and the whole room seems to twitch along with it.

“Don’t try that shit with me. You know what I mean. What is The Hunger?”

The static crackle swells again, as Jon’s eyes glow with a sickly green light. John tenses up, closing his own eyes in response, trying to block Jon out.

“I don’t appreciate your attitude,” he hisses.

“Tell me what The Hunger is,” Jon demands, hands pressed against the table as he leans forward, leering menacingly. The static increases in volume. The clouds outside begin to stir, a low rolling thunder joining the noise.

John’s eyes open again, filled with green light. His teeth are grit, hands balled into white-knuckled fists. He looks like he’s still trying to resist, but is struggling in the face of Jon’s power.

“So this… is what you- you tried to do before...”

Jon just stares, his gaze cold and commanding. A shadowy substance drips down his forehead, staining his scarf as it falls off his chin. His fingertips appear to be turning the same pitch black, staining the table where it meets his skin.

“Tell. Me. Now.”

John finally gives up and begins to speak, though his eyes are full of quiet rage, teeth grit and bared as he answers.

“The Hunger is more than you can possibly imagine. Far bigger than your human fears. We are united in our search for a better existence, and if we can’t find it, we will become it. We won’t be beholden to time, nor to space. We won’t be bound by entropy, nor eternity. And we certainly won’t be controlled by you. That’s it. No more questions.”

Cracks appear to lace through John’s own hands, splitting to reveal ribbons of darkness, speckled with bits of blue, red, yellow, and green.

Jon watches in silence. The power radiating off of him rattles the contents of the shelves. The shadowy substance continues enveloping him, pouring down his face and crawling up his arms. Wherever it touches, skin and clothes alike become a featureless silhouette. He finally opens his mouth to speak, and another wave of the substance oozes out, staining his chest.

“You’re reminding me of someone I hate right now, John,” he says, his voice quiet yet piercingly sharp.

“I’ll be honest, I don’t really care,” John dismisses, the cracks in his body getting larger and more intricate. The wall behind him starts cracking in turn, The Hunger making one last desperate push.

“I’ve had enough of this. I’m done.”

Jon would grimace, but the substance has dripped over his mouth, obscuring it. He gives John one last ominous look before it covers his eyes as well. Before John stands a figure torn into reality itself, hair flowing in dark tendrils around his blank face.

“You’re right. You are done.”

The voice rises from the static, emanating from the figure and the room itself. Despite sounding like Jon’s normal voice, it shakes the room, knocking files off the shelves. The clouds outside seem to churn, flashing with green lightning. John takes a single step backwards, and all at once the figure is covered in glowing eyes. Most are scattered throughout his body, though five of them are arranged in a semi-circle on his face. They start off green, but after blinking in unison they’re the same four colours as The Hunger. The figure raises a hand as his gaze pierces John’s very being.

“CEASELESS WATCHER.”

Suddenly the clouds part and the sky is filled with massive eyes, their irises glowing every imaginable hue. While at first they gaze in different directions, the moment Jon speaks they all turn towards him. Jon’s silhouette body shudders in response, before something changes: a pair of feathery antennae emerge from his forehead, and a pair of moth wings burst from his back. The wings stare at John, not with a moth’s pattern, nor the eye shapes that cover Jon’s body, but with eerily human eyes. The same sort of eyes that form the Watcher’s Crown encircling Jon’s head.

John takes in the scene, initially with horror, and then with a look of intrigue. His gaze moves back and forth between the monstrous Jon and the eyes outside, the slightest hysterical smile on his face.

“Oh, I see now. So that’s your fear.”

Jon says nothing. With his outstretched hand he points at John, who watches the entire sky turn to look at him. For a moment John and The Eye stare at each other, the static reaching its deafening crescendo. The noise is shattered by a CRACK as John’s skin starts breaking off in chunks, green light glowing from within. John watches with a morbid curiosity as he actually starts to die. He does not scream, as though not wishing to give Jon the pleasure. He just stands in place and breaks apart like a marble statue, every piece turning to shadow and every shadow dissolving into nothingness.

Then there is a larger CRACK, like something ramming its full force into the room, and the far wall is smashed open. A tendril of that colour-flecked darkness encircles what remains of John, pulling him into itself and retreating through the broken wall.

Then all at once… the room is silent. The clouds roll over the eyes outside, and Jon is alone. He takes a moment to stare blankly at his arms, everything human about them painted in shadow, while those eyes blink back at him. After spending a few moments observing his twisted form, he wills it away. To his relief, the substance sloughs off his body and vanishes into the ground, leaving him looking human and exhausted.
Though he doesn’t want to admit it, Jon’s constantly scared that when he draws on The Eye’s power and assumes the form it made for him, he won’t be able to change back. Or, worse still, he won’t want to. However that has yet to happen, so it’s not something he’ll worry about right now.

Instead, Jon takes a look at the crack in the wooden wall, an ugly tear seeping darkness into the surrounding area. Perhaps it’s a little sad that a room so similar to the Archives got damaged, or it would be if he wasn’t so used to it by now.
Jon just waits there, staring at the wall with empty eyes, waiting for something to happen. He figured he would leave once John died, so he finds himself at a loss, alone in that silent tomb.

Though, it’s not entirely silent. Jon’s gaze drifts down to something on the table. The tape recorder has returned, its tape spinning quietly inside. Jon exhales a breath he didn’t know he was holding and grabs the device, pressing down the button to power it off.

The CLICK is deafening, it shatters the silence and the world cuts to black, severing Jon from consciousness.

—————

Jon wakes with a start, sitting upright and frantically looking around. When he realizes he’s not in the Parlor anymore, he lets himself relax slightly. He’s back where he stopped with Martin, one of the gaps between domains, where Jon wasn’t at risk of giving a statement and it was unlikely anything would attack them.
Even these areas are unpleasant, the field they’d settled in was burnt and smelt like ash, though it’s harder to tell now that fog covers everything. Martin sits a couple feet away, his back facing Jon and his head in his hands.

“Martin? Martin I’m here,” Jon calls out, and this time his voice is clear. There’s no searing pain like there was before. He feels great, perhaps a little too great.

“...I’m sorry,” Martin mumbles into his hand, before sitting up straight. “It was just… you were gone again and then, and then you were in the form and you weren’t moving but- but all the eyes were open and… I just, it just got a little… much.”

Jon looks away for a moment, drifting his hand through the fog. He feels terrible for leaving Martin again, and yet he wishes he felt worse, because his mind can’t seem to detach itself from the fact he won. He had channeled The Eye from within that space, he had killed what killed him, and he had emerged victorious, his opposition reduced to nothingness once more. Jon doesn’t like feeling so proud, but the sensation lingers in spite of that.

An awkward silence sits heavily on both of them as Jon gets lost in thought. Finally, Martin speaks up again.

“Will this... keep happening…?”

Jon wants to say that no, he killed John, it’s finally over and they can keep moving forward, or else he wants to say he doesn’t know. Both of those answers would be lies.

“...Yes,” Jon responds quietly. “There’s someone I meet when I vanish, somewhere far away from here. Neither of us intended this connection, and it won’t be severed through either of our deaths. I don’t know why it’s happening… but it is.”

Martin finally turns around, and Jon can see the way the static tears have stained his cheeks and coat. He brushes at them with a sleeve, which mainly seems to stain the sleeve as well. Jon shifts to get up and approach him, but Martin moves forward to close the gap before he can. The fog swirls around him, parting as he moves. Smiling gently, Jon rests an arm on Martin’s shoulder, burying a hand in his hair.

“I’d never leave you on purpose, Martin. If I could stay here and never see that man again, I would. However, we know I’m not in any permanent danger, and I believe I can get some useful information while I’m there.”

Martin sighs, exhaling a faint cloud of fog, before he gives a shaky smile.

“Guess I shouldn’t be surprised you’re popular…” he mutters, before his gaze trails down to Jon’s hand.

“Well then, if this is going to keep happening, the least you could do is tell me what’s really going on. Though… looks like you were already planning on it.”

Jon stares down at the tape recorder that he’s still gripping tightly. He can’t help but chuckle upon seeing it there. Perhaps his life really is some cosmic joke.

At least, now as always, it makes for a good story.