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“Well, as fun as listening to you monologue is, I will give you some privacy. Go for a walk.”
As Martin grabs his scarf from the coat rack, Jon smiles at him from the sofa, the box of statements carefully balanced on the cushion next to him. “Let me know if you see any good cows.”
“Obviously I’m going to tell you if I see any good cows.” With that, Martin heads out the door, letting it clatter shut behind him.
Jon is still smiling. It feels good to smile. Being here feels good. Being here with Martin feels even better. Like a dream. Like a happy ending.
This is hardly an ending, a soft-spoken but cruel part of his brain tells him. You still have Jonah to deal with. And the hunters, and Not-Sasha. And the Eye.
Shaking himself, he reaches down and picks up the first statement on the pile. And begins. “Right. Statement of Hazel Rutter—"
It’s been cold and damp all day, but as Martin walks slowly down the quiet field path winding away behind the cabin, the sky grows darker and lower almost before his eyes. Looks like a storm.
His plan is to keep walking, at least for a little while. He’s never minded the rain, so long as there’s no thunder or lightning. And he really isn’t keen on listening to a statement. He doesn’t like when Jon reads them. They’re necessary, he knows, to keep Jon…fed. But that doesn’t mean he has to like them.
The clouds are growing thicker and blacker by the second. Boiling with wind. Twisting and churning overhead like bath water draining into the pipes. There’s suddenly an odor to the air, as well. Like rain or ozone but…more sour. More like bile, or sickness.
Martin stops to stare up into the spinning heavens. A tornado? Do they even get tornados in Scotland?
When the first flash of lightning arcs across the sky, Martin’s heart stops in his chest and he jumps back. Something is wrong. After years of being employed at the Magnus Institute and seeing (or hearing about) every horrible thing you can imagine, he’s grown good at detecting when things aren’t right. And they’re not. They are very, very wrong.
Oh, God.
Jon.
By the time he makes it back to the cabin, the sky is almost pitch-black, like night has fallen. It’s an unnatural darkness, especially at four in the afternoon. The only time he can truly see where he’s putting his feet is when the lightning flashes.
The cabin door is stubbornly closed. The knob twists in his hand, but it still won’t open. From inside, muffled through the walls, he hears Jon’s voice. Reading. But…something is wrong. He’s too loud. And it sounds like he’s struggling.
And that’s enough for Martin, who takes a step back and braces himself. He has enough of this for one day, enough for a lifetime. Being separated from Jon. Watching him suffer. Being powerless to help stop it, to protect him. Enough.
Gritting his teeth (because he knows this will hurt) Martin bodily slams into the thick, oak door with all his strength.
And it flies open. So hard that it bangs into the interior wall and shakes the bare bulb hanging from the ceiling, causing it to flicker momentarily. But even the brief darkness doesn’t cause Jon to stop reading.
When the light is back on, Martin sees his face. And he knows instantly that he was right.
Something is very, very wrong.
Jon’s eyes are wide and wild with terror. His hands are shaking. His back is too straight, too tense. It almost looks like he wants to jump up off the couch, but his body won’t let him. And his mouth won’t stop reading.
“And there, I think, we are brought just about up to date. I have enjoyed our little trip down memory lane, but past here lies only impatience.”
At the end of the sentence, Jon’s eyes flash up. Just for a second. Not even that – a split-second. But Martin sees the awful, bone-deep horror shining in them. And he can hear Jon’s cry as plainly as if he shouted it out loud.
Help me!
“You are prepared. You are ready. You are marked. The power of the Ceaseless Watcher flows through you, and the time of our victory is here.”
“J-Jon!” Martin stammers, stepping forward. The air inside the cabin is thick and oppressive. Like breathing smoke, only without the smell. It burns his throat. “W-what’s happening? What do I do? How can I help!”
Jon’s mouth keeps moving, opening and closing and spilling words. “Don’t worry, John. You’ll get used to it here, in the world that we have made. Now…” The laugh that claws its way out of Jon’s throat is cruel. And familiar.
Elias.
“Repeat after me…”
Martin lunges. Whatever Jon was about to say—whatever he was about to read—is not good. Martin can feel it in his bones, flowing off the page in waves of hate and terror and death.
He rips the statement out of Jon’s hands, wrenching it back so hard the page tears. And the reaction is instantaneous: Jon is released.
And he screams. Loud, and ragged, and desperate. The scream of a man trapped in his own body, now set free.
And when the scream is done, he screams again – this time, with words: “BURN IT, MARTIN! PLEASE!”
So, Martin whips it into the fire, like it was a spider crawling on his arm. He flings it like a venomous snake. And the paper catches quickly, charring, and browning, and burning. Outside, thunder shakes the sky.
Only when it has burned down to ash does Jon wrap his arms around his midsection, and double over with a wail.
“Oh, Christ,” Martin says, his hands shaking. “Oh, shit. What was that! What just happened!”
Jon is in no condition to answer him. He’s sobbing, trembling like a leaf.
Martin is next to him in a heartbeat, gathering him up, pulling him against his chest. Martin’s jumper is wet in seconds, but he doesn’t care. He just watches the statement burn, and rubs Jon’s back, and buries his face in Jon’s hair as they rock together on the sofa.
An hour later, Martin is in the kitchen, making a mug of hot broth. When it’s done, he carries it into the living room, where Jon is curled on the sofa.
He’s still trembling and pale, but he has stopped crying, at least. And when Martin sits beside him, he drags his legs in closer to make room for him. But he doesn’t look. He doesn’t take his eyes off the fire, which Martin has stocked and restocked three times already. All to ensure nothing of that statement survives. Not even the ash.
“I…made you some chicken broth,” Martin says gently, placing the mug on the table in front of him. “Do you…do you think you can stomach it?”
It takes a few seconds too long for Jon to register the question. When he does, he shakes his head, mutely. He hasn’t said a word since screaming for Martin to burn the page. He looks ill. There’s a hollowness in his eyes that frightens Martin. The bags under his eyes are darker and angrier than they have been in a long time. As Martin watches him, Jon’s throat bobs like he’s swallowing down nausea.
“Jon,” he tries again, just as gently. “Please, talk to me. What was that?”
Again, it takes him longer than Martin is comfortable with to open his mouth. When he does finally speak, his voice is thin and reedy. Dry from the abuse it took. And almost devoid of emotion, like everything in Jon has been drained out. “That was…the Watcher’s Crown,” he says.
“The…the Watcher’s Crown? Like, like the ritual—”
“Jonah hid it inside a statement,” Jon says with a sniffle. His eyes are wet again. He rubs them on his arm. “The ritual to end the world.”
“Jesus…”
When Jon inhales shakily, Martin realizes he has started to cry again. “I—I couldn’t stop. I couldn’t stop, Martin. The words just…they kept p-pouring out of me. I couldn’t…I couldn’t…”
“Hey, hey…” Martin gets down on the floor in front of him, on his knees, and combs back the hair falling into Jon’s face. His own hand is shaking a bit, but he wills it to be steady. He can freak out later. Right now, Jon needs him. “It’s all right. Nothing happened. We stopped it in time.”
“You stopped it.” Jon sits up on his elbow then, so they’re eye-to-eye, and the look of gray horror on his face is momentarily eclipsed by devastating relief. “Martin… Oh, Martin.” He reaches out, clumsily, wrapping both arms around the back of Martin’s neck. “Y-you…I don’t…”
“Hey, it’s all right. It’s okay.” Martin returns the embrace, despite the awkward position and angle. “We’re okay.”
“You saved the world, Martin,” Jon says, his voice shaking with either tears or laughter, or both. “You saved the entire world.”
Martin can’t even begin to touch that, right now. Not something that big, not right now. So instead, he continues to shush Jon, and pet him, and kiss his head. “Everything’s okay,” he murmurs. “You’re okay.”
Except, Jon isn’t okay. He might never be okay again.
He spends the next two days in the exact same place on the couch, just watching the fire crackle and pop. He doesn’t let it dim or die. He feeds it logs, and twigs, and tissues, and even statements sometimes, when there’s nothing else in arm’s reach. Anything to keep the flames high.
He barely ever gets up. Only for the necessities, and then it’s right back to his vigil by the fire. He even sleeps on the couch – if he sleeps, at all. Which Martin is pretty sure he isn’t.
On the morning of day three, Martin wakes up on the floor with his arm numb and cold above his head. The last thing he remembers is sitting on the floor, last night, holding Jon’s hand. He must have fallen asleep.
“Hi.” Jon’s voice sounds more or less back to normal, if a little flat.
Martin looks up and gives him a groggy smile. “Hi.”
“Do you want this back?” Jon’s thumb strokes the back of Martin’s hand, which is still intertwined with his. He looks like he’s been awake for a while.
“Oh—” Martin huffs a laugh, nodding. “Yeah, actually. It’s a bit…asleep.” He takes his arm back, rotating it and flexing his dead fingers until they start to tingle. “Did you…um, did you sleep at all?”
Jon is looking at him rather than the fire, which is a good sign. He shrugs. “Maybe? For an…hour or two.” He pauses, watching Martin roll his shoulder and stretch. “Sorry. I should have woken you, but…” Jon frowns then, and it’s the first facial expression he’s made in days. “I’m sorry, Martin.”
“Sorry? For—for what?” Martin is having a hard time keeping up, to be honest. He’s only just woken up, and when Jon is wrapped up in his self-loathing, his train of thought is hard to follow on a good day.
“For…what I almost did. To the world.” Jon turns his face away, back to the fire. It’s just embers now. Glowing red coal and ash. The inside is blasted black from the soot.
“What?” Martin shakes his head and grabs Jon’s hands again, trapping them in his own. “Jon. You didn’t do anything.”
“I would have. If you hadn’t stopped me.” He’s spiraling again.
Martin makes a sound of exasperation and shakes his head again. “Well, if we’re apologizing for things we never did, then…I’m sorry I stayed in the Lonely forever. Oh, wait! I didn’t stay there forever! Because you stopped me.”
Jon pulls a face. “I don’t think that’s…quite the same as nearly being the cause of the apocalypse...”
“Jon. You didn’t end the world. Look—” Martin gets up and crosses the small living room. He grabs a handful of the thick, dusty curtains and throws them wide open, letting in the morning sun. “Look? Do you see? It’s fine. Everything’s fine.”
And Jon does look. Squinting at the brightness, he gazes out the cloudy, white sky and the hills and trees and fields. Untouched by any great apocalypse or catastrophe. Perfectly fine. There are even a few cows grazing this morning, swaddled in the early morning mist. He sighs. “I suppose… I just…” He sits up then, drawing his legs in and hugging his knees. “I…”
Martin frowns. He lets the curtains go and returns to the sofa, sitting beside him. “Talk to me. Tell me what you’re feeling.”
“I feel…I feel guilty. And ashamed. Ashamed that Jonah was able to use me like that, and I didn’t see it coming, and I couldn’t do anything to stop it. And…” Jon turns his eyes down, toward his lap, and gives a humorless laugh. “I feel violated.” His expression twists unpleasantly. “I know, that’s rich coming from me… My very existence demands my violation of other people’s deepest terrors, but…”
Martin waits for him to say more, but after a few seconds of silence, he scoots closer and gently takes Jon by the shoulders. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry you had to go through that. It sounds…terrifying.”
“It was,” Jon mumbles to his lap.
“Here. Come here.” Martin pulls Jon against his chest, settling his chin on the top of his head. “It’s all right.”
After it feels like Jon has relaxed a bit, Martin scooches back and gives him a smile, which Jon actually returns (gloomily, of course. But baby steps!)
“Hey, I was thinking of popping down the village. We’re getting low on supplies. Did you want to maybe come with me?”
Jon presses his lips thinly as he considers it. After a moment, however, he shakes his head. “I don’t, uh…I don’t think that’s a good idea.”
“Hm? Why not?”
Then, Jon looks embarrassed. “I, uh…haven’t read a statement, properly, since…” He swallows. “Since that one. And…I’m not feeling…great.”
“Oh.” Martin’s eyes widen. “Oh, Jon. I didn’t even think…”
“No—no, it’s fine. It’s fine. I could have read one. There’s a box of them just in the other room, but I…I don’t want to read them.” He gives a visible shiver. “Just in case…”
“Jon, you can’t just stop reading statements. You said yourself, it makes you sick to stop.”
“I know. But what if Jonah put the ritual in more of them? What if I start to read and I find it again? You can’t always be here to stop me from accidentally ending the world.”
“Would it help if I looked them over? Gave them a little flip-through before you read them?”
Jon hesitates. “Well…yes, I think so…but Martin, you shouldn’t have to do that. You shouldn’t have to do so much…”
“What’s ‘so much’ about it? It’s reading. Not even reading – it’s skimming.”
“Yes, but—”
“Okay, okay.” Martin puts up his hands, stopping the argument before it can start. “Let’s put a pin in this for the moment.”
“Uh—okay?”
“Look. I’ve just woken up, and I haven’t had a single cup of tea for days. My back hurts from sleeping on the floor, and I haven’t even brushed my teeth yet this morning. I do not have the mental capacity for a fight right now.”
“I—I wasn’t trying to fight—”
“I know.” Martin softens his voice and speaks again. “I know. Just—right now, I’m going to walk down to the village and get some groceries. You can come with me, or you can stay here. Whatever makes you more comfortable.” Then he gets up, kisses Jon on the top of his head, and walks to the bathroom, closing the door behind him.
Jon doesn’t go with him to the village. Too dizzy, he said, giving Martin that weary smile of his as he laid back on the sofa. “You go,” he continued. “Get some sun. I think I’m going to sleep for a while.”
Going out the door, Martin looks up at the sky. No boiling clouds or rotten, sour stink. Thank God. Just clear, blue horizons and grazing cows chewing their mouthfuls of grass.
It feels good to be outside, out of the stuffy air of the cabin and the heavy press of dread and sadness, and Martin enjoys the walk. The fresh air. The sunlight on his skin. For the first time in days, he feels light. Almost weightless. Happy.
He breathes deeply, and the wind in his mouth tastes like dewy grass.
I miss Jon. The thought rises out of the happy silence of his mind like a sudden rock smashing into a ship. He blinks, stunned, then laughs at himself – out loud.
“For Christ’s sake,” he mumbles to himself. “You’ve just spent three entire days breathing the same air space as him, and now you ‘miss him?’ It’s been fifteen minutes!” He shakes his head. “Jesus, I’ve got it bad, haven’t I? Oh, well. That’s not exactly news.”
The village, like everything else, is unchanged. A few roads lined with stone buildings. The phone box is cherry-red and vacant when he arrives, so he steps in and dials Basira’s number. She picks up on the second ring.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Basira. It’s Martin.”
“Oh, hey. I was expecting your call, like, two or three days ago. You two okay?”
“We’re, uh…” Martin sighs and looks out the glass sides of the box, watching the foot traffic – people going into the grocer, stopping at the flower cart, kids playing with kites. “We had a bit of scare. But we’re okay.”
“A scare? Oh, no. Was it that Sasha thing?”
“No, no. Nothing like that; we’re safe here. It was… Anyway, it’s over. How, uh, how about you? How are things over there?”
“The same. I think the police are almost done here. They haven’t asked about you or Jon in a few days, so you might be in the clear. That, or they’re not bothering to ask me questions anymore.”
“Well, that’s a relief, at least. But how are you, Basira? How are you holding up?”
There’s a pause, then Basira says, “I have to go, actually. Been good hearing from you, Martin.”
“O-oh. Okay. I’ll, uh, talk to you later, then?”
“Bye.”
“Bye—”
The line clicks, and Martin hangs the phone up, frowning deeply. He feels bad for Basira. Really bad. In all this mess, at least he and Jon have each other. Now that Daisy’s gone, Basira doesn’t have anyone.
Martin steps out of the phone box and goes straight for the shop, no more dawdling. He suddenly has the urge to get his shopping done as fast as possible, and get home to Jon.
The walk back to the cabin takes a bit longer because he’s weighed down, but when Martin sees the roof of the cabin rising over the hill, a wash of relief overcomes him and he smiles. Sure, it’s not the best circumstances in the world…but the feeling of coming home to Jonathan Sims still feels like a ball of sunshine in his stomach.
It’s silly, isn’t it? That after all these years, and all the horror, and all this baggage, he still gets butterflies thinking about Jon?
The door is closed but unlocked, and Martin lets himself in, grocery bags weighing down both his arms. “I’m back,” he calls out.
“Oh, hi.” Jon’s head pops up over the back of the couch, and Martin can tell right away that he was, indeed, asleep. His eyes are droopy and his smile is lopsided in a way that Martin now knows as the ‘sleepy Jon smile.’
“Oop, sorry to wake you,” he says, setting the bags down.
“Don’t be,” Jon says, waving his concern away with a flip of his hand. “If I sleep all day, I won’t get a wink tonight.” He sits up and stretches, and Martin has to take a moment just to admire the fact that he’s moving again. That he might even get off the couch at some point.
“Did they have tea this time?” Jon asks, still wearing that accursed adorable smile of his.
“Yes, they did! I got two boxes, just in case. I also got some biscuits and stuff for dinner. I thought we might have baked chicken tonight. Do you think you could eat that?”
“I could…definitely try,” Jon says unconvincingly. He’s leaning on the back of the sofa now, chin resting on his arms. That nap must have done him good. He almost looks alive. “Martin,” he says.
“Yes?”
“I love you.”
It’s not the first time he’s said it. Not even the second or third time. But it still stops Martin’s heart in his chest, still brings that goofy, love-sick teenager grin onto his face. “I love you, too,” he says.
“Sorry I’ve been so…gray the last few days. I…I think I’m doing better today.”
Martin shakes his head, leaving the shopping bags by the door as he crosses the living room to press a kiss to Jon’s hair. “Don’t apologize. You’ve been through hell. You have a right to experience your feelings, rather than just…shoving them down all the time.”
Jon gives him a sad, little smile that, thankfully, doesn’t darken his eyes. Which are brighter and more ‘Jon’ than they’ve been for a while.
“Also,” Martin says. “These are a very cute look on you.” He runs his thumb over the pillow creases on Jon’s cheek, and after a blank stare for a second, Jon huffs a laugh.
“Yes, yes. Thank you.” Jon cranes to see the shopping bags by the still-open door. “Do you need help putting those away?”
“No, no. You rest. I’ve got it.” Martin turns to pick up the bags, gathering them back onto his arms.
“It’s not fair for you to have to do everything,” Jon points out.
“I’m not doing everything. I’m doing the shopping.”
“And the cooking and cleaning for the last three days. And taking care of me. Here.” Jon gets off the sofa like an old man trying not to look as achy and tired as he is. “I’ll help. I could do with the movement anyway.”
“Well, if you’re feeling up to it…”
“I’m actually not bad right now,” Jon assures him, taking a couple of the bags off Martin’s arm and hauling them into the kitchen.
Between the two of them, they get the items packed away in just a few minutes. Jon holds up surprisingly well until they’ve finished, then he politely excuses himself to go sit down. When Martin brings him his cup of tea, Jon is sitting with his head between his knees, looking pale and winded.
“You did too much,” Martin says, frowning. “You need to take it easy, especially if you’re going to be slowing down on the statements.”
“I know, I know…” Jon lifts his head then, blinking like he’s seeing stars. “I’ll be fine. I just…probably need to stay down for a bit.”
“Here.” Martin pushes the cup of tea into his hands. “Drink something. You’ve hardly had anything for days.”
Jon sips obediently, but whether it helps him or not remains to be seen. After a few seconds, he glances sheepishly in Martin’s direction. “What you said earlier…about, um, previewing the statements… Do you… Would you mind?”
“Of course, I don’t mind,” Martin says. “I offered.”
“I—I know. But, I mean…do you—do either of us—really know what to look for? If Jonah hadn’t written his gloating monologue beforehand, I probably wouldn’t have even known there was anything wrong. What…what does ‘the Watcher’s Crown’ even look like? What does it say?”
Martin chews his lip, then hops up.
“Martin? Where—”
His voice is muffled by the bedroom door as Martin goes in to grab the box of statements. He brings it back, drops it on the coffee table, and tries to ignore the way Jon’s body tenses up in its presence. Like he’s simultaneously terrified of it and ravenous for it. “Let’s see.” Martin plucks one off the top and skims the first page.
It’s harder than he expected not to read it out loud. Several times, he finds himself opening his mouth and drawing a breath like his body wants him to narrate the passage aloud. Maybe it helps that he isn’t reading it word-for-word. At the end, he looks up and hands the page to Jon, who holds it between two fingers like it’s a dead fish.
“Reads like a normal statement to me,” Martin says.
“Y-you’re sure? I mean, like I said, we don’t really know what we’re looking for…” He glances at the fireplace. “Maybe…maybe I shouldn’t have had you burn it.”
Martin snorts. “Are you saying you wish you still had it?”
“No! God, no.” Jon shakes himself. “I just meant, it would be…easier if we at least knew what the ritual was.”
“If I had to guess? Probably something like O’ terrifying eye that watches everything we do, come on in, time to end the world.”
Jon snorts, then looks like he instantly regrets. “We shouldn’t joke about this, Martin,” he says, even as he’s struggling not to smile.
“Oh, why not? We stopped it, Jon. The world is safe, and now we know to be more careful – and maybe even what to look for! We’re not going to let Elias—or Jonah, or whatever—do this. We’ve won.”
Jon stares into his eyes with such wonder that Martin feels self-conscious.
“What?” he asks, but Jon just shakes his head, still in apparent amazement.
“I’m glad you’re here, Martin,” is all he says for a moment. “I’m glad I have you. I couldn’t do this on my own.”
“Good thing you don’t have to then.” Martin kisses him, quick but soft. “Drink your tea and read. I’ll just be in the kitchen, if you need me, okay?”
Jon nods and watches him walk through the door. “I love you.”
“I love you, too.”
As Jon’s voice rises and falls with the statement, Martin dips chicken breasts into bread crumbs and lines a tin with foil. He’s humming a song he heard on the radio when he was shopping, and when he looks up through the window, he sees a field full of cows and even a couple of sheep placidly wandering the grass. It’s getting late now, the sky bruised purple and blue as the sun sinks toward the horizon.
We could stay here forever, if we wanted. Another thought out of nowhere. Another smile that makes him feel silly, like rolling his eyes at himself. He knows the horror isn’t over. There’s too much out there for it to all leave them alone forever. Jon is at the center of too much. The bad things will come for them, eventually.
But for now…
Just for right now, Martin puts the chicken breasts for their dinner in the oven, and hums his song a little louder, and pretends that none of it was ever real. That the Magnus Institute was just a bad job, and he and Jon are going to stay in this cabin together for the rest of their lives. Happy, and safe, and together.
He stops humming long enough to hear Jon’s voice through the wall, to make sure he’s still reading, then goes to make the salad.
We’ll stay here as long as we can, he promises himself self-indulgently. And if that turns out to be forever, great.
That would be so great.