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His hands were stained with blood.
Now that Martin had time to think without the fear of losing Jon fully to the Eye, he felt almost sick with guilt. Jon had been so hesitant to hurt the other watchers at first, so wracked with guilt over killing even the monster that took Sasha, but Martin had just kept pushing .
“I need to take a break,” he said.
“Again?” Annabelle asked. “You just took one.”
“You’re the one who wanted me to come with you. So, we’re going at my pace.”
Annabelle shrugged and Martin sat down on the grass and pulled out a book. He used to hate the grass, it was always far too itchy for him, but he relished the feeling of it now.
“Stalling isn’t going to help your Archivist.”
“I- He’s not my Archivist.”
“Relationship troubles?”
Martin opened his mouth to protest but he just as quickly closed it. They hadn’t exactly parted on the best terms. “They’re not anyone’s anything,” he found himself saying. “He’s his own person. They’re just… Jon.”
“Do you even believe that?”
Before Jon died, he used to come back to the Archives after long stretches of barely explained absences with new scars or new humourless jokes to make about whatever new trauma they’d experienced. The closest he ever came to expressing how they actually felt was their last goodbye before the Unknowing, where he’d pressed his face into Martin’s jumper and whispered that he didn’t want to die but he didn’t want Elias to win, didn’t want to be used as a tool, kidnapped, burned, stabbed, never helped because it could hinder his development.
Martin had heard that, read the statement that ended the world, and still used Jon as a weapon, encouraged his worst impulses, turned on him when he needed Martin there the most.
Martin opened his book. If it weren’t for the camera it would have probably been transformed into his angsty teenage poetry about how everything was always his fault. Except it was true, wasn’t it.
—
His hands were stained with blood.
Jon wouldn’t blame Martin if he decided that he didn’t want to be with them anymore, not after realizing what a monster -
Self-pity/hatred could wait. He needed to find Martin, smite — kill — Annabelle and then deal with any lingering guilt. There was already blood on their hands, killing one more monster wouldn’t make much of a difference.
“All the world loses is another monster.”
With every watcher they kill they could feel themself slipping, giving way to the feelings the Ceaseless Watcher wants him to feel. He felt the sadistic joy as the watched in the constantly burning block of flats desperately tried to navigate out. He felt what was almost pride at the Mortal Garden, blooming even without the gardener there to keep it in line. He felt sick.
“They carry a certain flavor, a… seasoning.”
It was just like it was before, when the worst Jon did was further traumatize traumatized people and haunt their nightmares. He was a monster, but they needed a monster.
Martin needed him. When Martin was safe, Jon could apologize and Martin could not forgive him and Martin would be in the right. But the whole goddamn world’s blood was on his hands already, so he might as well put his monstrosity to good use, protecting his one tether to humanity.