Archive of Our Own

Tim’s voice… penetrates.

Not when it’s light and boisterous and meant to be heard, but the moment he lowers his voice to impart a secret, his voice resonates. It’s why Jon doesn’t hear anything he said to Martin, and it’s why he clearly overhears Tim ‘whisper’ to Sasha, “Our Martin has a little crush. Pay up.”

He can hear Sasha’s giggle, but not her response, because she has some degree of discretion. Still, there’s a smirk on her face as she slaps a bill into Tim’s hand as Jon passes them. Maybe she isn’t that discreet.

He ignores them, mostly, and knocks lightly on Martin’s door. Tim had just left, so it was unlikely Martin had had enough time to start doing anything that would justify the indignant irritation with which he snaps at Jon. “What, What?”

Jon steps into the room, and Martin’s indignation fades, even as his mouth keeps moving. “What… what…”

“What are you so irritable about?” Jon asks, which wasn’t what he meant to say, but covers up his first odd reaction which is to feel weirdly hurt by Martin’s anger.

Martin immediately seems to shrink, his broad frame hunching slightly and all signs of aggression melting into embarrassment. “Oh, just… been having a bit of a time. You know?”

Jon does know. “Haven’t we all.” But he’s not here to commiserate. “What did Tim want? He was… grinning.”

And then Martin… lies. And he lies well. Jon doesn’t know what to do with that, other than act like he doesn’t know Martin is lying. He gives Martin an assignment and awkwardly asks how he’s holding up. Martin deflects and then… lies again.

“Really, I’m fine.”

None of them are fine. Tim and Sasha are good at pretending, and Jon somewhat appreciates having a puzzle he can try to solve, but Martin is living in a sealed room in the Archives because he’s too scared to go home. He’s so far from fine that he might as well have told Jon he was running off to become a circus clown.

But, apart from challenging Martin and accusing him of lying, there’s not much Jon can say to that.

What he does say is monumentally stupid and a little cruel. “Alright. Well… in that case, get back to work. Just because you’re living here, doesn’t mean it’s not still a place of business.” He leaves before he can see the hurt or shame on Martin’s face. He’s seen both expressions far too frequently lately.

He’s not entirely sure what he was expecting. Martin might not be a recluse by nature the way Jon is, but he’s a fairly private person. At least, compared to Tim who regales the Institute with every story about his conquests at every opportunity. In fact, apart from Martin’s rather fraught relationship with his mother, Jon doesn’t know anything about his life outside of work. He could have a crush on any of the nine million or so people in London.

No. Tim is far too smug to not have at least an idea of whom Martin’s crush was. The list is short and, if Jon excludes Tim and Sasha who had made the bet in the first place, it gets much shorter.

And there are signs.

Martin stares at him. All the time. Jon’s used to the piercing gazes and glares of potential bullies, looking for weaknesses, for opportunities to strike. Martin looks at Jon like he has no other agenda, just… looking. It’s completely unthreatening, and Jon mostly ignores it.

Martin doesn’t touch him. He’s not exactly exuberantly tactile to start with, always trying to take up less room, avoiding imposing his self on others. But he’ll playfully punch Tim’s arm, or steady himself on Sasha’s shoulder as he watches her at her computer. He’ll even gently nudge people with his shoulder sometimes. They went to the pub, once, and Martin is a surprising lightweight for his size. Even tipsy, he was careful to keep his hands away from Jon’s, accidently brushing against everyone else’s. Even Elias’s.

Martin had lit up when Jon believed him about the worms. Jon had never seen someone go from despondent to confused to delighted that quickly. Martin had been trying to hide it, but he’d been much more tired than today, and his grateful joy had shone through. Jon hadn’t even been particularly kind about it, but Martin had just… lit up.

He doesn’t even mind Jon’s criticisms, and those were a lot more frequent than his questionable kindnesses. Even if he’s rather incompetent, he works harder for Jon than he ever had before his promotion. He makes Jon tea. It’s as easy to make four cups as two, but he makes tea for himself and Jon.

He makes tea for himself. And Jon.

Half of Jon is berating himself for drawing conclusions from far too little evidence. Tea is not a… mating ritual. It’s a collegial thing. Like sandwich runs and sharing a cigarette break.

The other half is quietly having a mental breakdown. Martin Blackwood, the most useless, troublesome, hopeless Assistant Archivist, had a crush on him. Was courting him, in his useless, troublesome, hopeless way. Emphasis on the hopeless.

And Jon has no idea why.

He’s not likeable. He likes to think he has admirable qualities, that people think well of him for being clever, forthright, honest, succinct. But no one likes him. Well, Georgie did (does?), but she’s weird. So, apparently, is Martin.

No. He’s getting ahead of himself. He needs more proof. While he has his assistants looking into Paul McKenzie’s statement, he plots ways of getting that proof.

The biggest problem is that Martin is inconveniently traumatized. Episodes of him staring into space, nursing his tea and looking not-quite-there, can be easily explained as him using dissociation as a coping mechanism for being stalked by worms. Jon catches him at it a few times, and just observes, but it’s hard to tell if Martin is daydreaming about something pleasant, or escaping the horrifying realities of his life.

Jon knows Martin writes poetry and, if he could stomach it, Martin’s poetry might hold some clues. But the thought of asking to read it is ridiculous, and Martin lives here now, so sneaking peeks at it would be too risky.

Tim is always an option, but despite Tim’s overall jovial nature he, unlike Martin, is sensible and doesn’t like Jon. He hides it well, but… not that well. Not that Jon minds. Tim does, however, like Martin, and Jon knows that if it’s a choice between keeping Martin’s confidence and sating Jon’s curiosity, Tim wouldn’t even hesitate to tell Jon off. Sasha’s just discreet and a good person and wouldn’t violate Martin’s trust. Besides, Jon doesn’t want them to know that he knows that they know.

If they even know.

If Jon’s going to get more evidence, he’s going to have to provoke it.

He does, however note the tea. Martin still makes the two them tea, but he does also make tea for all four of them as well. Maybe it wasn’t as significant as Jon had thought. Then he notices that Martin makes his tea up, with cream and sugar how Jon likes it, while Tim and Sasha finish preparing theirs to their own taste. Does that mean something? Jon can feel himself going a little crazy.

So it’s back to procuring evidence instead of just observing it.

He starts with touch. Martin is understandably jumpy, but he’ll allow Tim to clasp his shoulder and Sasha to smooth her hand down his arm. Jon tries for the first time while Martin is in the kitchen, nursing a cup of tea because…

Maybe Jon’s a little frustrated and has a mean streak, that’s why. He’s more than half expecting the full body startle Martin makes when Jon gently grips his upper arm, and the spilled tea is oddly gratifying. “Are you all right?”

“You grabbed me!” Martin protests and… yes. His cheeks are indeed flushed. Two points of evidence.

“I was trying not to startle you,” Jon says, and it’s half true. From anyone else, the light touch would have been a gentle warning. Anyone who wasn’t Jon, that is.

Martin is still blushing, still covered in tea, and not meeting Jon’s eyes. “Well, it didn’t exactly work.” Jon waits, and Martin deflates, all defensiveness easing out of him. “Sorry. I should have been paying more attention.”

His flush has faded, but he’s still not looking at Jon. Jon sighs. “I suppose it’s better than being hypervigilant. I assume if you’re able to relax to this extent that you’re sleeping well?” Why is it that every time he asks after Martin’s wellbeing it sounds like an interrogation?

Martin gives a small laugh, as if he’s thinking along similar lines. “Well enough. I mean, yeah, there’s the nightmares and I… I miss my bed. But it’s better than it was when I was trapped in my flat. I feel safer here. Not sure if I should… but I do.”

Jon tries again, this time a hand on Martin’s shoulder. Martin’s reaction is smaller now, but it’s still there. Jon ticks of the mental box of replicable data, furthering his theory. “I’m glad.”

Martin finally turns to him, eyes wide. “Jon…” There’s a tremor in his voice, the same stunned surprise when Jon offered him the room in the Archives. The realization that they are having a moment crashes over Jon and he pulls his hand away and, for lack of anything better, wipes it on his pants as if that would erase the past thirty seconds.

“Poor sleep leads to poor work,” Jon says, hiding behind the persona of asshole boss that is at least 90% of his actual personality. “If you’re getting better rest, you’ll do better research. That’s all.”

“Right,” Martin says and, if his voice his small, his smile is too. “That’s all. Thanks.”

Jon refuses to flirt. That would be unkind, in a way that he isn’t. He has no interest in leading Martin on, he just wants to know if Martin’s crush is on him. And it seems like it is.

Except that a few minutes later, in the comfort of his office, he realizes that no. It doesn’t. Not really. Martin’s jumpiness has several possible explanations, and Jon’s touches were out-of-character enough to have startled him for that reason alone.

So the staring didn’t mean anything, and the touches were too weird to be conclusive. Martin still reacted like a flower blooming under the mildest of kind words from Jon, but surely that wasn’t enough on its own, especially with Martin’s issues with his mother which is something Jon does not have the time or energy to unpack.

He’d seen a movie. Part of a movie? A commercial, maybe? Where someone passed a note to someone else, in a classroom setting he thinks, with the query Do you like me? Circle yes/no. For a wild moment, he contemplates it.

He hears Sasha and Tim leaving, calling their goodbyes to Martin as they go. He hasn’t done nearly as much work as he’d planned, but staying in the Archives with just him and Martin, after their conversation today…

It would be fine. Martin probably hadn’t even noticed.

That thought comforts him until there’s a tentative knock on his door about an hour after everyone else has gone home, and Martin pokes his head in. The scent of hot tea wafts into the room and Jon sighs. “Yes, Martin?”

“I don’t suppose you’d want some tea?” Martin asks, setting it on a clear section of Jon’s desk before Jon can answer. “If you stay here much longer, you’re going to want to order something for dinner.”

Jon stops what he’s doing and contemplates Martin for a moment. This is bolder than Martin has been in the past. The tea is… expected, but the suggestion of dinner is not. It’s not forward, Martin hasn’t implied anything like them sharing a meal, but it’s certainly a more personal and direct approach than his usual method of sliding a few biscuits onto the saucer.

Martin meets his narrowed eyes with nothing but a genteel care in his. Jon imagines that dogs look at their sick masters in such a way, hoping they’ll get better while knowing they’re unable to directly help. He runs through memories of other times Martin showed concern for him. Had his eyes always done… that?

“…Jon?” Martin sounds concerned, and Jon realizes he had been starting for… well, for far too long.

“You’re right,” Jon says, standing. “It’s late. I should head home.”

Martin visibly wilts, but takes the tea back. “Probably for the best. Be safe.”

It’s an instinctive farewell wish, but it’s more sincerely meant since Jane Prentiss entered their lives.

Martin’s not going anywhere. Still Jon echoes him.

“Be safe, Martin.”

Jon is a creature of habit. He has been coming in early and leaving late for weeks now, and when he enters the Archives a full hour before Tim or Sasha are expected, he’s not thinking about Martin and awkwardness and the whole not-flirting thing they’re doing.

Martin seems to have forgotten about it too. Or never noticed. He’s boiling water and humming softly to himself as he prepares a rather sad breakfast of off-brand cereal and untoasted toast. Simple carbs, Jon assesses. Comfort foods?

Martin looks up and him and smiles, only slightly surprised and mostly pleased. “Jon! I’m just setting up… ah… would you like a cup of tea?”

Jon almost mouths the last four words along with Martin. It’s comforting and predictable the way yesterday hadn’t been. He nods and heads to his office to set up. He intends to return to the kitchen, he does, but he’d left in something of a hurry last night and his desk is dreadfully disorganized, and minutes slip by as he sets everything right.

Martin knocks, even though his door is still open, carrying the promised cup of tea in his other hand.

“Oh.” Jon tries to hide how flustered he is. “Right. The tea. I… forgot.”

“Lost in your desk maze?” Martin asks fondly. “I figured. Anyway, here it is!”

He’s cheerful this morning. Jon feels his eyes narrow and Martin actually laughs.

“It’s not going to bite you. If you’ve changed your mind, I can always drink it. Can’t have too much tea, I always say.”

“I believe that,” Jon mutters. If Martin had a slogan, that would suit him well. “No, I… thank you, Martin. For the tea.”

“Anytime,” Martin says, and it really does sound as though he means it. “Are you reading A Statement today?”

“I was planning on reading a few,” Jon says before Martin’s tone breaks through. “…what?”

Martin shrugs. “Some of them… take more out of you than others. They’re usually the ones you have us running around hunting people and paperwork down for. We’re all really quiet on Statement Days, even though Tim thinks we should just kidnap you and take you out for drinks or coffee or ice cream.”

“…ice cream?” There’s a lot of information for Jon to process, but that bit sticks out.

“Yeah. I mean, nothing less Statement-y than ice cream, is there?”

Jon can’t even argue with that. Although, with a warm cup of Martin’s tea in his hands, he can think of one thing less Statement-y.

Martin frowns lightly and Jon can almost see him going through their conversation. Colour creeps into his cheeks and Jon watches, fascinated, as Martin slowly blushes for no reason.

Jon waits. It would probably be easier on Martin if he says something, even if he just turns and starts fiddling with things on his desk or takes a sip of tea. But he just waits and watches.

“I… don’t think I was supposed to tell you that,” Martin says awkwardly.

It’s been months since Jon had started recording what he had very privately been thinking of as True Statements – the ones that wouldn’t record digitally. They did take a lot out of him. Did he actually think his staff were so stupid and unobservant that they wouldn’t have noticed?

Yes. Actually, he had. God, he was bad at people.

Come to think of it, the days he reads those statements, and the days just after, were usually very quiet. “What… what do you do?”

Martin looks like he’d give anything to rewind the last minute of his life for a re-do. “Um. Well, Sasha takes the walk-ins and phone calls, and Tim runs interference with Elias…”

“Elias?”

“Yeah. He always comes down after you’ve read one of Those Statements.” Martin practically intones the last two words. “Tim distracts him with his… Tim-ness.”

“And… you?”

Martin shrugs. “You know how it is. The less I do, the more I’m appreciated.” He gives a little laugh and Jon frowns. Those words could have come out of his own mouth. “I mostly just stay out of the way.”

Jon hums thoughtfully. “No. I don’t believe you.”

“What?”

“I can believe that Sasha takes the Archive over the moment I let my guard down.” And probably does a better job, Jon adds silently. “And I can believe that Tim would keep Elias from interfering with the days I’m less… on top of things. But I can’t believe that you, Martin Blackwood, could see anyone in any kind of distress and not try to help.”

Martin’s mouth is open in a slack-jawed kind of amazement. Jon smothers any kind of satisfied smile at the expression. “So, I’ll ask again. What do you do?”

Martin gestures silently at the cup of tea that is rapidly cooling in Jon’s hand. The tactile memory of it hits him, so often the first sensation of comfort and calm after the terror of the Statement, and the defensive retreat into scepticism. “…of course.”

“It’s not much,” Martin says. “I mean, I also make sure the filing gets done so that if you need anything we can find it quickly, but…”

Do you have a crush on me? Jon almost asks. Surely Martin wasn’t so generous of spirit that he treated everyone like this. And even if he did, the fact that he persisted with Jon while Jon was so ungrateful and cruel and awful to him…

“Just, please, don’t tell the others I told you,” Martin says. “I don’t think it was supposed to be a secret, but I don’t think you were supposed to know, either.”

“I won’t,” Jon says, and watches Martin back out of his office. He’s not sure if he won that conversation or not.

An hour and a half later, when he comes out of his office to ask if Martin has anything about Marcus McKenzie yet, he’s hit with three separate streams from three separate fire extinguishers.

Over his gasping and choking, he can hear Tim and Sasha.

“We got ‘im!” Tim crows.

“Keep the streams steady,” Sasha instructs. “And watch for any worms that wriggle out.”

There are three streams, and Jon hears nothing from Martin.

Eventually, the canisters are empty and Jon is a coughing, sputtering mess.

“Huh,” Tim says. “No worms.” Jon, bent over and wheezing, glares at him, but Tim just turns to Martin. “I thought you said he was possessed.”

“I thought he was!” Martin protests. “He was acting really weird.”

On one hand, Jon thinks, this is what he gets for being nice. On the other hand, through, he hadn’t been that nice, surely not nice enough to raise suspicions of possession.

“Well, you win some, you win some,” Tim says, tossing his hands up. “Sorry boss.” He sounds rather the opposite of sorry.

Sasha, on the other hand, seems genuinely contrite as she helps Jon up, half-heartedly dusting at his clothes. “I didn’t really believe Martin before and, well…” she trails off and Jon remembers how she sounded when she described Michael. “I’m glad it’s not true, but if there was any chance it was…”

And wasn’t that a nightmarish thought – worms getting into the Archive through one of them.

Jon pushes that thought aside. “Martin.”

“Yes!” Martin looks like he expects to be fired or hit or, at the very least, shouted at. His chin is up, but it trembles faintly.

“Can I borrow some clothes? I don’t have a change of my own at the office.”

There’s a moment of stunned silence when Jon doesn’t even sound angry.

Then Tim makes a dash for his phone, clearly setting it to the camera setting. “I’m ready. Pick something good for him, Martin.”

“You can pick whatever you like,” Martin says softly to Jon. Jon nods and they head towards what Jon has really come to consider Martin’s room.

Martin’s clothes, even folded neatly and stacked in a corner, are sad. Even if they weren’t three sizes too big for Jon, they weren’t clothes he would ever consider wearing. “Do you have a belt?” Martin nods, and Jon has a weird idea.

If he’s going to lose his dignity, he’s going to do so on his terms.

Martin’s longest shirt goes down to just over Jon’s knees after he cinches the belt around his waist. If he bunches the shirt awkwardly at he back, the front looks just far too big instead of like he’s trying to wear a balloon. Jon’s pants and socks are still fine, and his shoes can be cleaned. The rest of his clothes are a lost cause until they can be properly laundered, but for now Jon’s dressed, in very nearly the literal meaning of the word, and ready for ridicule.

Tim gets the first picture off before he, or any of the others realize what they’re actually looking at.

There’s not a lot of bared skin. Jon’s socks are fairly high and reach just over mid-calf, while Martin’s shirt covers everything from his neck to just above his knees. His forearms are bare, but so are Tim’s half the time. He looks like he’s wearing a very oddly tailored dress and men’s socks and no shoes, but he’s mostly covered.

Martin makes a small noise. Tim makes a louder one, but doesn’t quite laugh.

Sasha almost suppresses her smile as she hands him a folder. “For the McKenzie statement,” she says, and her tone is admirably professional. Her eyes glitter with mirth, but they’re clearly laughing with him. She’s impressed.

“Are… are you going to wear that all day?” Tim asks, and his voice is much less professional.

“I don’t see how I have much of a choice,” Jon says with whatever dignity he can muster. “I’ll be in my office. Thank you for this, Sasha.”

Martin comes in a few hours later. Jon’s a little chilly, but otherwise finds the outfit surprisingly comfortable. And it smells oddly nice. Martin has good taste in laundry detergent.

“I’m sorry.”

“I expect you are,” Jon says. He’s still not pleased at what happened, but he can see how Martin had jumped to the conclusion that a nice Jon who praised him for being a caring, considerate person was probably actually a giant pile of sentient worms. “I also expect that Tim is enjoying this immensely.”

“Actually, I think you broke him with how calmly you’re taking this,” Martin says. “He went out and got you these.” It’s a loud shirt and a pair of khakis, the kind with about a hundred pockets. They look like they’ll fit.

“I’ll wear them home,” Jon says. “Until then, I will continue to impose upon you by remaining in this outfit.”

“It’s not an outfit,” Martin protests. “It’s a shirt and a belt! You’ll catch your death in here.”

Jon rolls his eyes. “It’s not that cold. Besides, I’m sure I’ll have plenty of fresh tea to warm me up throughout the day.”

Martin’s jaw does something odd. “You’re seriously going to wear my shirt – just my shirt – for the rest of the day.”

“I’m certainly not wearing whatever Tim wants me to wear.”

“You’re so… fine.” Martin dumps the clothes in a corner, but keeps hold of what they were covering. “Here. At least wear some shoes.”

The shoes are not only cleaned, but freshly polished. Jon takes them and pulls away from the desk to put them on. Martin makes a sound when he crosses one leg over the other to slip the shoe onto his foot, and it’s a similar sound to the one he made when Jon had first come out. Jon ignores him before the thought occurs to him that he could use this to figure out if he was the person Martin had the crush on.

But how?

He’d figure something out, he supposed.

By the time the day was over, he hadn’t actually thought of any experiments. Martin hadn’t been angry at him for misusing his clothes, but since it had been Martin’s fault in the first place that he needed them, Martin hadn’t exactly had the high moral ground there. He was embarrassed around Jon, but he had accused him of being a sack of worms in a rotting man-suit, so that was likely the source of embarrassment. Tim took more pictures throughout the day, but his heart clearly wasn’t in it when Jon didn’t react. Jon had been told his whole life to ignore bullies, and it figured that the only time it worked was with the most good-natured “bully” he’d ever met. Sasha bought him lunch in apology, and had complimented his legs. Jon wondered if he had a sexual harassment case for that, but she’d been so cheerfully impressed that he couldn’t really argue it.

It had been a good day, all things considered. Looking back on it as he changes into the clothes that Tim bought for him, Jon has to admit that maybe the release of tension had been something they all had needed. He plans to sleep well tonight, at least.

He’s almost out the door when he hears the distinctive sound of a phone camera. Tim had definitively left, Jon had checked before changing. He turns and sees Martin. Martin takes another picture.

“Tim made me,” Martin says simply.

Jon ignores the fact that Martin is a full head taller than him and storms up to him. “Delete those.”

Martin just holds the phone up above his head and out of Jon’s reach. “I can’t, and I can’t tell you why I can’t.”

It had been a good day. All the anger and irritation and humiliation that Jon hadn’t let himself feel comes out at once and he launches himself at Martin. Martin is perhaps half again Jon’s weight, but he’s not expecting it and he over-balances and they tumble into a heap with a growl from Jon and a yelp from Martin. It puts the camera within Jon’s reach if he crawls over Martin’s body… there’s an “oof” from Martin as Jon’s knee presses into his stomach, and then Martin’s rolling over, pinning Jon beneath him.

The camera is still almost within Jon’s reach.

“Jon,” Martin says softly, and Jon tears his eyes away from the camera and looks at Martin. Martin is looming over him, both arms planted on either side of Jon’s head, while Jon’s legs are bracketing Martin’s abdomen. They’re not quite lined up properly, and Martin has to look up a little to look Jon in the eye and at this angle, Martin looks…

All the fight goes out of Jon and he goes limp and just watches Martin watching him, backlit by the dim lights of a half-closed down Archive.

Martin is breathing more heavily than he should be from their little tussle. Jon feels oddly out of breath as well. His lips part so he can breathe through his mouth, and Martin’s eyes dart down to look at them, then dart back up to Jon’s.

“Jon,” Martin says again, a little breathy.

“Why can’t you delete those pictures?” Jon asks, because I can’t tell you why I can’t is basically an invitation for the curious.

“Tim said he’d trade me for the ones he took of you in my shirt.”

That… doesn’t make any sense. “Why didn’t you just take your own pictures?”

“It felt… wrong.”

“But trading with Tim doesn’t feel wrong?”

Martin makes the same soft noise he’d made twice earlier that day. “Stop asking me questions. I can’t think like this.”

“You could let me up,” Jon suggests.

“I could…” Martin says, but he doesn’t sound convinced that he should. Then he blinks and kind of shakes himself and scrambles up. “Sorry.”

Jon’s not sure why Martin’s apologizing. He’s also not sure why he feels like he should be apologizing. “It’s fine. I… I’m going to go now.”

“Okay. Be safe.”

“You too.”

Jon’s home for a full two hours before he realizes he never got Martin to delete those pictures.

When Elias calls Jon up to his office, Jon runs through a list of reasons. Usually, that list is a list of names of people Jon has spoken to and possibly offended. Now, that list is mostly full of yesterday’s hijinks.

Turns out, Elias just wants to review the security measures.

“More cameras are, of course, an excellent idea,” Elias says, “but I am going to have to ask for more prudent uses of the fire extinguishers going forward. Replacing one for a false alarm is understandable. Replacing three…”

“I understand,” Jon says, even though he hardly had anything to do with it. “I’ll review the guidelines with my team.”

Elias looks up from his papers with a small frown and leans back in his chair. “What happened?”

“A false alarm,” Jon says. “A… misunderstanding.”

“Jon, two thirds of your team were in the running for your job. Until recently, they were your peers. I understand the instinct to make friends and seem more approachable, but going so far as to parade around in a dress?”

“That’s not what happened!” Jon protests. “And I hardly think you can call my management style approachable.”

“Not usually,” Elias agrees. “Which is why it’s so odd that you’d willingly humiliate yourself like that.”

Jon hadn’t thought of it that way. He still doesn’t. “Two of my team members are being stalked by inhuman horrors. One of them is being forced to live in the Archive itself. If I can’t show them that we have to soldier on through adversity, if I let little things like a lack of appropriate attire stop me from doing my job, what kind of example would I be setting?”

“A dignified one?” Elias ventures, then waves it off. “No, I see your point. Still, boundaries are important. I hope you continue to maintain yours with your staff, even through these trying times.”

It’s a valid point. Even if Martin has a crush on him, which Jon is still only mostly sure about, it’s not like anything could happen. Not that Jon wants anything to happen, but even if he did, he’s Martin’s boss and Martin is his subordinate. Nothing can happen.

Why does that feel disappointing?

Martin and Tim are shoulder-to-shoulder as they work on something that Jon hopes is Institute-related and not pictures-of-Jon-in-various-outfits-related. Sasha is on the phone, calmly talking someone down, and Jon… Jon heads for his office.

There’s so much to do. Worms and hijinks aside, the mess that Gertrude left is still a mess, and Jon is constantly reminded that he has fifty years of work that she never bothered to do to catch up on. His heart’s not in it today, but jobs aren’t always things you enjoy, but they’re still things you do. He gets to work.

He misses lunch, and barely nods as Martin drops off cup after cup of tea. Some of them he drinks. Some of them grow cold. Each of them is promptly replaced.

He comes out of his trance to find a significant dent and an organized pile of things that still need to be done. There’s weeks worth of work piled and neatly organized, more if even a tenth of the statements he’s organized are True Statements. He’s exhausted and hungry, but he feels a deep sense of accomplishment.

He stumbles a little as he leaves the office, feet dragging. Maybe he should take a nap before he heads out. Without thinking, he shuffles towards the room with the cot, tired enough that he’s running on old habits and forgetting new facts.

Like the small fact that Martin lives in the Archives now, and he’s sleeping on the cot that Jon had planned to sleep on. Apparently Martin runs warm, because he sleeps facing the wall without a shirt and lets the blankets pool around his waist. Jon stares at Martin’s broad shoulders, blinking slowly, trying to process… something.

He can’t sleep here. Can he? No. Even though Martin would be warm. Even though he would smell like that nice laundry detergent. Even though there were more muscles and less fat than Jon had expected on those shoulders. Martin sat at a desk all day, just like Jon. Why would he have any muscles?

Even though Jon hasn’t made a sound, Martin stirs and turns over, eyes blinking open and slowly focusing on Jon. He smiles. “Jon.” Then he wakes up. “Jon!” He pulls the sheets up to his neck. “What are you doing? You can’t just…” he pauses. “…you look awful.”

“Can’t sleep here,” Jon says, vocalizing his conclusion. “Sorry.”

“Right. I guess I stole your contingency plan for when you’re crazy and work until midnight.” It isn’t be midnight. Is it? Surely Martin’s exaggerating.

Martin. There’s something important Jon has to ask him. Oh, right. “Why d’you have muscles?”

“Uh huh,” Martin says, which isn’t an answer. “Look, you clearly need this bed more than I do. What were you even doing here so late?”

Jon tries to draw himself up indignantly. “My job.” He teeters a little.

Martin sighs. “You’re horrible after you’ve been with Elias. Why do you want to impress him so badly?”

There are a myriad of reasons. People forget how young Jon is, because his hair is greying and he works hard at projecting the aura of a grizzled old man. He’s too young to be Head Archivist. He should have had at least a few more years under his belt, more experience. He has the education and he’s smart enough, but he hasn’t been trained for this. Elias knows, Jon is sure, that he’d made the wrong choice. Jon has to work hard to prove him wrong. Jon doesn’t want to impress Elias. He wants to surpass him. Surpass his expectations.

What comes out is “You’re horrible.” Jon laughs at the look on Martin’s face.

“All right, funny guy.” Martin sighs again and gently leads Jon over towards the bed. He doesn’t seem to notice that he’s not wearing a shirt, or anything but his pants. Jon notices.

Jon sits down heavily while noticing and Martin kneels before him and starts undressing him. When he starts undoing the buttons to Jon’s shirt, Jon covers Martin’s hands with his. Well, partially covers Martin’s hands with his. Martin has large hands.

“You have nice hands,” Jon says, which is almost the same thing.

“Mhmm,” Martin agrees calmly, never pausing in his work. “Did you brush your teeth?”

“No,” Jon admits. Martin makes a disapproving sound, but doesn’t push the issue. When Jon’s shirt is off, Martin hands him one of his t-shirts. It’ll be too big for Jon to wear, but the perfect size to sleep in.

It smells like that nice detergent that Jon is almost willing to admit is the scent of Martin.

“I assume you can take off your own trousers,” Martin says, and his voice is so warm, so fond, so kind. “Sleep well.”

Jon tries, but the soft cloth and the scent of Martin and the exhaustion takes him, and he falls asleep with his trousers around his knees.

He wakes up with a headache. He’s lying on his side with his legs barely on the bed and his trousers around his knees, so he did that thing where he falls asleep and doesn’t move the entire time. It’s been a while since he’s done that. He’s stiff.

The clothes that Martin had taken off are folded onto a box that has become the side table and Jon starts quietly panicking as the details seep into his mind. He had stared at Martin like an idiot. He had asked him about his muscles. He had complimented his hands.

And Martin had undressed him without any inappropriateness and let him use his bed.

It isn’t Jon.

Whoever Martin had a crush on can’t be Jon, not after last night. Jon couldn’t have set up a more perfect experiment if he’d tried, and Martin…

If Martin had been more detached and impersonal, he’d have been an actual nurse.

Well, that’s a relief. Now Jon doesn’t have to worry about workplace guidelines on relationships and how to let Martin down easy if Martin ever decided to confess. He can rest easy knowing that Martin is just a guy with a crush on someone else who is still Jon’s borderline-incompetent subordinate, and nothing more.

Jon dresses quickly and heads to the kitchen, where he can hear a kettle boiling.

Martin turns to him with a smile. “Hey. Want a cup of–hmph…”

Jon’s not entirely sure why he’s kissing Martin. Or why he’s angry. They’re related, but he’s not sure how. He’s not sure of much right now. This is a mistake. This whole thing has been a mistake.

Martin’s large hand presses in the small of Jon’s back, urging him closer, and this is the best idea Jon’s ever had. He surges up, flinging one arm around Martin’s neck to pull him closer and kisses him until they’re both breathless.

The kettle is still boiling.

“What was that?” Martin asks as soon as Jon lets him breathe.

“Martin,” Jon says urgently. “Do you have a crush on me?”

Martin stares at him. “Shouldn’t you have asked that first if you weren’t sure?”

“Yes,” Jon says. Obviously he should have. “Do you?”

“Yes,” Martin says, and Jon smirks.

“I thought so.” He kisses Martin again, and the kettle’s impatient scream is joined by an impressive wolf-whistle.

“No, don’t stop!” Tim protests as Jon and Martin break apart. “It’s like a series finale! After the hiatus, one of you will be the real Jon or Martin’s evil twin.” He pauses. “Or, I guess in Jon’s case, the good twin?”

“What time is it?” Jon asks, impressively calmly.

“Half nine,” Martin says in a small voice. “You were sleeping so deeply, I couldn’t bring myself to wake you…”

So Tim and Sasha know he had slept here, in Martin’s bed. And Tim, at least, saw them kissing.

“Sasha! I owe you five pounds.” Bored of the non-kissing, Tim wanders away. “I thought Martin could do better, but you were right. It was Jon!”

Jon lets his head fall forward in despair. Any hope of earning the respect of his team is lost.

Fortunately, what’s in front of his head is a broad chest that smells really good. And it’s attached to a pair of arms that give excellent hugs.

“Jon,” Martin says tentatively. Jon makes a sound that he hopes Martin knows means he can continue. “Did you… do you have a crush on me?”

“I don’t have crushes,” Jon says with as much dignity as he can muster. It’s a surprising amount. Even after all the humiliation, there’s something fortifying about standing within Martin’s embrace.

“Oh.” Martin says. He sounds confused.

Jon lifts his head and kisses him, and the sound Martin makes when he does that is much nicer.

“I,” Jon says against Martin’s lips. “am infatuated.”