Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

Tex stormed into the office “This is such bullshit!”

The Director didn’t even look up from his papers, “Which intern pissed you off this time?”

“You did you asshole.” Tex pointed a finger at the Director, literally.

“You appointed a new fucking head of the archives!”

“Because the position was empty? That’s what happens when the former head dies, you replace them so the department keeps running.” The Director explained casually, noting something down on his papers.

“But this is you we’re talking about, it took you years to replace her position! So why him?” Tex fired back.

“Sometimes it takes time to find the right person to fit the position, especially one that- important.” He explained, still sounding uninterested and going through his paperwork, ignoring the question.

“There was multiple people in the department you could have picked from.” Tex argued.

“I hope you’re not saying I should have put Caboose or Tucker in that position?” He asked, almost joking. If that man could even joke that is. “Caboose has a bad habit of making more work for everyone, and Tucker spends more time flirting with you or other coworkers than actually working some days.”

“Then why do you keep them around?” Tex asked before adding “And they aren’t the only ones in the department.”

“I have my reasons for keeping them around, maybe I’ll reveal them to you someday. And why would you think I’d let you have the department head position?”

“Idk, maybe because you made me replace the last head and everything.” With that last comment the Director finally looked up, staring directly at Tex with those bright green eyes. Anyone but Tex would be surprised with how the lighting in the office made it appear like his eyes were faintly glowing. Tex of course knew better. Tex knew it wasn’t the lighting.

“I didn’t make you replace her.” He sternly corrected.

“Oh sure, so then what do you call making me look like her and work in the same department she worked in?” Tex fired back accusingly.

“We made an agreement, you resemble her the best you can and work in the archives, and I’ll let you feed on the occasional office worker or person who comes in-” the Director reminded the blond woman in front of him until she cut him off.

“-and you’ll answer any question I have with your omnipotence power shit.” Tex finished. “So answer my question, why now? Why him?”

“Surely you felt it. There’s something different about him.” The Director explained, a spark in his eyes.

“I mean- the Web’s been showing up more around since he showed up?” Tex guessed.

“He’s been marked by the Web and it seemed to take a liking to him.” The Director explained more before he continued. “He is exactly the person I’ve been looking for for years, with him all my plans will come to fruition. I had to get him before anyone else did. If I had waited too much longer then the Web would have made him into an avatar.”

“Ugh I can’t take avatars of the Web, you can never get a straight answer out of them.” Tex complained.

“Well, perhaps you can’t.” The Director responded with a smirk.

“And avatars of the Eye are know it alls.” Tex fired back.

“And avatars of the Stranger are predictable.” The Director commented.

“Predictable?! We’re fun! We don’t bring about destruction for destruction’s sake, or make people feel like they can’t breathe, or make them spill their guts. We fuck with them. We play with them. We play little pranks that make them question what they know and who’s really a monster.” Tex defended.

“And that’s awfully predictable when you’ve lived as long as I have. Then again, all avatars are. Everyone has their plans to make a ritual for their entity, to be the one who brings their entity and no one else’s here and create their ideal world.” The Director commented.

“You say that like you’re any different.” Tex commented.

“In some ways I’m the same as the rest of them, you’re right. But I also plan more than they do. I observe more. Instead of focusing on myself and my patron I learn about all of them.” The Director rambled.

“And you’re convinced the new guy will be more like you and different than the rest of them?” Tex asked.

“Oh Church isn’t like them or me. He’s unique, he’s different.” The Director explained.

“You keep saying that, what makes him so different?!” Tex asked.

“Oh you’ll see someday. I have a good feeling about him.”

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“Fucking hell- where do these fucking spiders keep coming from?! Tucker!!” Church called out to his assistant from his office. The door to his office flung open.

“What?! Why’re you yelling?!” Tucker, the aforementioned assistant, yelled while walking into his boss’s office. Although Tucker being Tucker wouldn’t seriously call Church his boss, unless he was giving Church a hard time for being a shitty one.

“Why did no one warn me about the fucking spider problem in here?!” Church snapped, gesturing at his desk. Tucker of course didn’t look at the desk, and just gave Church a confused look.

“There’s not a spider problem?” Tucker responded almost as a question, confused because what the hell was Church on this time, there weren't any spiders other than the normal amount for a place with old shit, and even then, the Director would insist on not letting there be ‘too many’ spiders in the Institute.

“Yeah there fucking is! I find webs on my shit all the time!” Church snapped back, holding up a book for emphasis that, yeah, was covered in webs. Tucker finally looked at Church’s desk and oh- that book wasn’t the only thing covered in webs.

“Dude how long do you leave your shit laying out for it to get covered in that much webs?!” Tucker fired back because holy shit, that book was covered like it had been left in an abandoned spider museum for a hundred years, and the rest of his shit looked like it had been in one almost as long.

“I don’t fucking know, overnight?” Church tried to respond, practically dropping the book back down with a frustrated thud.

“OVERNIGHT?! Dude, either the spiders just have it out for you, or those aren’t normal fucking spiders.” Tucker half joked. Maybe more than half joked just for his own sanity, Tucker didn’t want to think about the possibility of weird ass spiders in the archives. Tucker didn’t care how good the pay or anything was, he would quit on the spot. Make that 2 week notice a 2 second notice.

“Oh haha, Tucker. Really funny.” Church fired back sarcastically. “I’m being serious here, I leave my shit overnight and I come back and it’s like this!”

“Dude, I’m not joking. That’s not fucking normal, spiders don’t just do that.” Tucker responded, finally getting more serious.

“Yeah yeah, like hell you aren’t joking.” Church snapped back. Why didn’t he get that Tucker wasn’t fucking with him for once. Maybe it was because of how much Tucker fucked with him, but come on, this was basic shit.

“Dude seriously, it takes longer than that for spiders to cover your shit in webs.” Tucker tried to point out to his boss, gesturing at the book. How didn’t Church get this?!

“Well yeah, it usually takes like, a couple days to get this bad, but still.” Church grumpily tried to justify. Tucker didn’t see how a couple days made much of a difference with this.

“A couple days?” Tucker asked, still confused on how the hell Church thought that was normal? “Dude what kind of fucked up spiders did you piss off? It takes so much longer than that. Like- years for how covered that fucking book is.” Tucker gestured at Church’s desk for more emphasis.

“For fuck’s sake Tucker, stop messing with me, it doesn’t take that long for spiders to gets webs on shit!” Church argued, still being stubborn as hell and gesturing at the other web covered shit on his desk.

“Dude, you know that picture frame on my desk?” Tucker brought up, knowing Church would probably get pissed off more before Tucker had a chance to make his point.

“Yeah? What the hell does that have to do with anything?” Church snapped. And right on cue, a pissed off Church.

“Do you ever see spiderwebs on it?” Tucker asked, crossing his arms.

“I don’t fucking know, I don’t look at your desk!” Church argued, getting mad that Tucker was wasting his time with this shit.

“There’s never any webs on it, and I don’t move it or anything.” Tucker explained, finally making his point. Things finally started to click for Church.

“How the fuck? Webs always get on my shit, how does your shit not have any?” Church responded, trying to process and figure out what the fuck was going on.

“I don’t know dude, do webs get on all your shit?” Tucker asked, glad he didn’t have to clean webs off his picture of him and Junior every day.

“Well- no- not like, my chair? Or the shelves or desk themselves? But the tape recorders, some books, statements, shit like that?” Church tried to explain, looking around the office while he listed stuff off.

“So like- shit you use everyday?” Tucker asked, so confused, and wishing he paid more attention to the bug unit in science when he was like 7.

“Yeah- why?-” Church asked, trying to connect the dots.

“Yeah dude that’s not normal spider behavior.” Tucker commented. “What kind of weird science lesson did you get in school?”

“So these weird ass spiders only do this to me for some reason?!” Church exclaimed, throwing one of his hands up in frustration.

“Looks like it?” Tucker guessed. “Unless Tex and Caboose get this shit too and haven’t said anything?”

“Tex maybe, but you know Caboose would have said something if his mugs were always covered in webs.” Church commented. Tex didn’t really talk to Tucker enough for Tucker to know if she saw any, even with Tucker trying to talk to her multiple times a day.

“Oh absolutely.” Tucker agreed. Caboose was a little- protective at times about his mugs? One time he got a little- ok more than a little- upset with Tucker because Caboose thought Tucker stole one of his mugs, when Caboose just forgot it in the break room.

“So- what do we do now?” Church asked, finally not frustratedly yelling or gesturing around.

“I don’t know, get back to work?” Tucker half joked, sarcastically.

“I meant about the spiders dumbass. Do we get spider traps or something? Are those even a thing?” Church snapped, correcting him. And there’s good old frustrated Church, that didn’t last long.

“Dude I don’t think spider traps are a thing.” Tucker would have died laughing at that concept if he didn’t kinda agree with Church that they could use some.

“Well how do you get spiders out of somewhere?” Church argued, throwing his arms up.

“Look it up? There’s gotta be someone on the internet who knows some shit about getting rid of spiders.” Tucker explained before he turned to walk out of the office. “I’m heading back to work.”

“Isn’t research your job?” Church argued.

“Yeah, when it has to do with statements, not your pest problem.” Tucker teased, waving Church off and heading out the door, closing it behind him, not giving Church a chance to make an excuse for Tucker to do it.

“Fucking asshole Tucker.” Church grumbled to himself. “But he did have a bit of a point- these are some weird ass spiders.” Church tried to clean some of the webs off of his stuff before he noticed- “What the hell- how long has this been on? Fucking damnit malfunctioning-”

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