Archive of Our Own ^omega

1. In dawn that breaks with the moon’s howls

        I’ll find your palace of thorn and storm

       A solitary beacon of valour

       For a man such as yourself

Jon moves his legs off the bed and immediately winces as an almost electrical surge of pain goes through them, beginning at his ankles. He kicks them out several times, hoping to get rid of the tight, unbearable feeling around his knees. It feels like someone wrapped them in a thick bandage when he wasn’t looking. It doesn’t help. Not like it ever does, but a man can only hope.

He braces himself as his legs hit the floor and he stands up, which is perhaps why the sharp jolt of pain followed by its duller form doesn’t hit nearly as much as it could have. It still keeps him wincing, an expression he takes measures to transform into his usual semi-scowl. His wrists feel stiff as well, but it is nothing compared to the ache spreading through his legs as he walks.

It’s cold out, which isn’t surprising. At this point, he could use his joints as thermometers for external temperature. That’s probably the only good thing about them, he thinks, as he opens the drawer next to his bed and tries to find a box of painkillers that he could have sworn he shoved in there at some point.  

‘You’re exaggerating’  says a voice in his head, ‘It doesn’t even hurt that much.’

He remembers telling that to himself when the pain first got bad and he was trying to find ways to make it more bearable. He isn’t sure how much truth is in it, at this point.

Jon thinks about all the people who cannot walk because of real, life-altering health conditions and sets his jaw (ignoring the way it pops back into place painfully; his ear hurts, as it often does. He ignores that as well). He can walk and do fine. He probably hasn’t had an actual bad day since his second year working at The Magnus Institute and the primary reason why he uses painkillers so often are tension headaches that seem to have come as a package deal with his position as Head Archivist.

It isn’t as if working at the Archives puts much strain on his joints. He’s going to be just fine. He leaves the medicine in the drawer and shuts it with a huff.

He eyes a cane Georgie bought him when they were still together and the prospect of him being in so much pain as not to be able to walk horrified her. He doesn’t know why he kept it, because he doesn’t need it. It doesn’t hurt that much anyway. It will pass and he’ll feel even more ridiculous for even considering using an aid. If he doesn’t try to fight it off, why would it leave? He has to power through the pain, that is the only way to get better.

He doesn’t find it in himself to wash his hair, spraying it with dry shampoo and thanking heavens that the dusty coating blends in with his grey streaks – just one of the many benefits of premature ageing (it’s the only one).

He grits his teeth as he walks down the stairs from his apartment. He’s just hoping that the tube will have a free seat for him – he doesn’t much see himself standing with enough stability in a moving vehicle. Besides, he could use the time to start reading up on work already.

He clenches his fist when a particular jolt catches him off guard, his mouth pursing to stifle a groan. He can’t even walk right, it seems. It’s his own fault, really. When he relaxes his hand, he recognises a tightness in his thumb. Jon sighs, walks down the rest of the stairs, and then breathes in as he re-sets that annoying joint.

He needs to shake his leg. He needs to move somehow because the words on the page in front of him are blurring and that, in turn, is probably caused by the fact that it has been four hours since he came to this godforsaken office, where all three of his assistants are seemingly set on making him as irritated as humanely possible.

Martin knocks on the doors to his office and opens it just a notch without Jon even inviting him in. Jon scowls and waits for the most incompetent man to ever enter the archives (sans Gertrude Robinson, maybe, if the state of the place is anything to go by) to ask his imprudent queries, or whatever it is that he needs.

He blinks, seemingly having clocked out of reality for a moment, and then Martin is putting a steaming mug of tea on his desk. He sniffs at it and feels his scowl deepen, involuntarily.

“What is this?’ Jon drawls.

“Um- well… Tea, I suppose?”

“You suppose,” he tries to hold back a wince as he realises his jaw has subluxated (again). “Why is it chamomile?”

Martin wraps one of his hands around the other, fumbling with his sleeves. His face, though probably distorted by his circular glasses, appears softer than usual, though Jon did not think that possible.

“You- Oh, you know… I- You-“

And then Tim is barging in with a bellow of “Well, boss!”, because of course he is. “I have a little thing to...”

Jon takes to subtly trying to reset his jaw, blocking whatever nonsense Tim may be talking about out. His ear hurts.

He moves his legs. His knee pangs with pain, somehow sharp and dull at once. He moves them back to their previous position, but it doesn’t help. His eyes drift down to the two appendages, a crease between his brows forming as he stares daggers at his legs. It yields no results.

“You listening, bossman? I was being so polite and all with my reasonable requests!” a rustle of fabric has Jon’s eyes travelling up, back to his two unwarranted visitors. Tim now has an arm slung over Martin’s shoulder, though he, like Jon, is shorter than Blackwood.  “Look at him, Marto, he didn’t even pay attention! Preposterous!”

“Those are big words for you, Timothy,” a feminine voice sings and Jon sighs because sure, why not, let's get all of Archival Storage and Rosie down here while we’re at it. His jaw stays out of place. He doesn’t want to open his mouth, though keeping it closed isn’t exactly painless.

“Hello Sasha, Tim,” he speaks. It comes out more of a murmur, what with him trying to keep his mouth as shut as possible without looking suspicious. There is absolutely no way he’ll disclose this ridiculous problem of his to his staff. Not only is it private, but it’s not even really something he should be struggling with. He’s read about it, a lot, in fact. Plenty of people have joint hypermobility, and that his is classified as HSD doesn’t change a thing.  They manage and he shall too. He doesn’t need his assistants thinking him unfit or worse, babying him as a result of finding out about his condition. “What can I help you with?”

“Oh, I’m just here to bother mister Stoker, you carry on with whatever important business you have to tend to,” she winks, poking Tim’s arm, which obviously causes the man in question to sigh dramatically and pull it away with a flourish. He wouldn’t be Tim if he didn’t.

“And Tim?”

Tim’s chestnut eyes desperately try to catch his with an amused glint. He looks away, tense, and tries to shake off the tension immediately. It bothers his neck – he forgot his neck could even be bothered. Is the pressure off today, or what?

“Martin here brought you chamomile tea and you were already all grumpy about it! I can’t have that in my space! Oh, and I also wanted permission to stick googly eyes on the kitchen cabinets, but that’s secondary.”

Jon rubs at his temples and decides that he is in no mood to try to dissuade Tim from his wild ideas; therefore, he chooses to ignore the second sentence. What he notices, though, is that as an effect of Tim’s chastising Martin blushes. He rolls his eyes.

“I don’t drink chamomile.”

They all stare at him, different flavours of softness and tension, though Jon cannot identify anything beyond that. His eyes travel from one to the next, expecting some kind of reaction, anything. Martin’s eyes, probably involuntarily, drop to the mug on Jon’s desk and then back to Jon. He sighs and slowly, carefully extends his arm (a dislocated shoulder because he was being reckless with his movement is the last thing he needs today) grabbing it and taking a sip. It tastes disgusting, as expected. He forces a bit more down his throat, but he is sure he’s grimacing.

They all still stare at him in silence.

He has an imminent urge to growl. He shoves it down.

“What?” he asks. “What was this for?”

Sasha flees, but she doesn’t seem to be in a hurry. Tim is leaning on the doorframe, now, and Martin is staring at the ground, his back somehow still straight as a rod.

“You seem tense,’ Tim says, his voice a higher register than usual. “So…”

“So?”

“Oh, fuck’s sake, Jon, we’re worried.”

He squints.

“What?’

Martin snorts, Tim following soon after. He looks between the two men, but can’t understand what it is they seem to find so incredibly amusing.

“What?” he asks again. His voice gets louder, and he opens his jaw more. Fuck he thinks. He should just reset it. He doesn’t want to do that with them present, though.

“Well, you’ve been sitting here and wincing every minute or so, for starters, boss-“

“I don’t see how that’s any of your concern.”

He adjusts his glasses. Tim sighs but pushes off the doorframe and catches Martin’s arm in his as both of them walk away. Jon hears a whisper of ‘not worth it’ as their figures retreat and the door to his office falls closed.

He debated eating some kind of lunch but he’s fairly certain that that would only inspire more questions from his assistants. Normally, he wouldn’t even think of it, too absorbed in his work, but it has become unbearably clear to Jon that it’s very difficult to focus when your body seems intent on making you miserable.

It’s fine. People have it worse. He’s probably just exaggerating.

He clenches his muscles and focuses on the words in front of him. Some bullshit statement about a guy whose dog disappears, and it even records on his laptop. He doesn’t know why he hasn’t thrown it on the ‘discredited’ pile yet.

“Bossman!” how Tim manages to yell loud enough for Jon to hear him, but not for the entire institute to come rushing in alarm remains a mystery. The last statement he was researching was also a rather calm one, and the only reason Jon didn’t dismiss it was…

Well, there was a reason, for sure. Regardless, based on how the statement was, he doesn’t expect Tim to have any information that would be groundbreaking or pertinent to anything useful.

He grunts, moves his chair away and starts walking out of his office, nevertheless. He doesn’t want someone to think something is actually afoot in the archives because Tim cannot come and knock on his door like a normal person.

His legs are somewhat better, too. It should be fine.

He opens the door and his eyes lock on Tim, who is bent over a computer, his Hawaiian shirt with too many buttons open hanging off one of his shoulders and exposing his taped-up chest. He rolls his eyes. He hears Sasha giggle from her desk.

“Cover yourself, Stoker, or we’ll have to take Jon to the ER,” she snickers, her hands never halting on her keyboard. Jon doesn’t dignify that with a response, Tim, however, immediately whips his head up and makes a performance of buttoning his shirt.

Jon rubs his temple.

“What did you want, Tim?”

“You’re going to have to come here and see!” he’s his usual cheerful. Jon senses some kind of trick in it, though he cannot for the life of him figure out what it is that Tim wants. For lack of an excuse not to do so, he makes his way to his assistant. He bites his lip when his thigh cramps, probably from having sat on his ass for about six hours. He tries to walk normally but his knee pain and the muscle spasm make that task impossible.

Tim’s eyes are gleaming.

“He is limping! I told you,” he smirks in Sasha’s direction and ducks when a crumpled-up piece of paper flies his way.

“Why are you so interested in the state of my walking?”

Tim rolls his eyes and waves his hands around. Jon spots movement from the corner of his eye and turns his head just in time to see Martin coming into the room, hands holding three mugs of tea.

Tim is still grinning at him.

“What? Answer me!”

Sasha starts laughing. Jon is not having a good time.

“Oh, stop that, he’s getting annoyed!” Jon is not a violent person, but if he could, without risking dislocating his elbow, he would punch Tim at this very moment. It must show somehow on his face, because Tim clears his throat and straightens up, visibly trying to appear put together. “Okay, Jon, as I said before, we’re worried.”

“Worried?”

“Yes!” he didn’t expect Martin to chime in, especially not with such confidence in his voice. Where he gets it, Jon doesn’t know, given that he remains a useless ass. “Because the entire day, since you came here, you’ve been looking like you have a gunshot wound in your leg and- Well, I don’t know! I’d like- We would like to know if you have a gunshot wound!”

“I do not have a gunshot wound,” he drawls.

“Then what do you have?” Sasha speaks from behind Jon, and he startles. He didn’t hear her get up. “Don’t think you’re getting out of this. If you don’t understand that co-workers in such a small office as this one tend to care about each other’s health, then at least accept that your productivity seems to be at its lowest today!”

She lays a hand on his shoulder. He shrugs it off.

“Let us help, you-“

“I am still your boss.”

Tim kicks him, his eyes crinkling. Jon sighs. There really doesn’t seem to be a way to avoid this unnecessary talk.

“It’s nothing, my joints just hurt. There. You can’t help me. Will you show me whatever it is that was so important, now, Tim?”

Sasha, who is now in his field of view, squints.

“Your joints hurt?”

“Yes, I’m hypermobile, is this really so important-“

“You’re hypermobile? I have a good physiotherapist friend I could refer you to,” she pulls out her phone and seems to scroll through her contacts. “She also has it, I think, she could help you with the pain, we haven’t spoken in a little bit but…”

She trails off, focused on her phone. Jon crosses his arms.

“Physiotherapy is for people who are injured or disabled.”

“And you’re what?” Tim asks, with his usual over-exaggerated lilt at the end. “You’re clearly not unaffected.’

“Countless people have this and they’re fine, it’s nothing.”

“It doesn’t seem like nothing,” he rolls his eyes at the mere sound of Martin’s voice.

“And what do you know, you have been nothing but a bother since you started working here,” that’s probably too rude. He doesn’t terribly care, at the moment.

“I know because I’ve been hanging around nurses for over five years.”

“Whatever,” hanging around nurses doesn’t equate to having the knowledge of one. “It doesn’t ever hurt enough to consider myself-“

He shuts his mouth. These are his assistants, not people he should be having semi-personal conversations with.

Tim tilts his head back, sighing loudly.

“To consider yourself disabled enough? Jesus, Jon, there isn’t a- a damned amount of extended, bothersome pain that you have to be in to be disabled enough.”

He doesn’t like the way Sasha is speaking.

“There is, otherwise everyone with a stubbed toe would be walking around calling themselves handicapped.”

She runs a hand down her face.

“A stubbed toe doesn’t impact your ability to walk for an entire day, Jon.”

“This doesn’t happen often! And can we stop talking about this? This is unprofessional.”

“Damn it, Jonathan, we’re your friends, in case you haven’t noticed, and no, we can’t, because for some reason you can’t accept that you’re in pain, which is certainly a sentence.”

Sasha looks like she’s about to try to hit him over the head with her laptop.

“I know I’m in pain, but some people have it worse and I have full days without pain! Well, aside from my jaw, but that doesn’t matter. It’s not chronic enough. It doesn’t stop me from doing things, I’m not disabled,” he’s seconds away from just storming off when he realises he did, indeed, end up sharing personal details with his insufferable and insubordinate subordinates. “Leave it!”

Tim opens his mouth but Martin (Jon keeps forgetting he’s there) lays a hand on his shoulder.

“Fine,” he says. “You’re not disabled. But you’re in pain and physiotherapy could help.”

“I don’t have time or money, and it’s for-“

“And who said it was only for very disabled people? What, are they gonna check your disability ID at the door? And I said I have a friend. Maybe she could just send you some tips.”

Jon doesn’t want to be having this conversation anymore. He says nothing, hoping that his assistants will simply leave him alone, but Sasha seems to take his silence as agreement.

“Good,” she grins. “I’ll text you her number.”

Jon only scoffs at her, not finding it in him to argue.

2. Your mangled hands can never have

        I cannot steal them from flesh and bless

        My only prayer to gods of horror

        Sanctify this union cursed

Running after Sasha was probably one of Tim’s dumber ideas, in Jon’s opinion. From Martin’s testimony, it seems as if she tried to push him to the office, so they’d separate, but he disregarded her very reasonable suggestion and ran out after her.

“Goddamn it, Tim, why couldn’t you follow directions just once, if she catches the both of you it will be your own damned fault-“

“Can you stop? It’s not like he can hear you.”

“And what am I supposed to do, Martin? Sit here and contemplate in silence. For all we know, they’ve already been eaten.”

“Your muttering isn’t helping, in any case. Sorry, that was probably…”

“I know it’s not! But what am I to do!”

Martin stays silent. His hands are drumming a discordant melody into the floor.

“Is it like your rationalisations? Is it supposed to keep the fear away?”

“We just had this conversation, Martin,” but his companion still stares at him with his head tilted. “Yes, of course it’s like that!”

Martin sighs. His head rests against the wall.

“It seems we’re stuck,” he says, as if that wasn’t obvious. Jon knows it’s like his complaints, just words meant to fill an oppressive silence, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t have the urge to comment on their uselessness. “Damn it, I wish I could quit.”

Jon sighs.

“Why don’t you?”

“Wow, that’s real encouraging-“

“You know what I mean!” he tries to get himself under control. “When did you get so sarcastic?”

“Bold words from you.”

“Just answer. Why haven’t you quit? Why are you here?”

“I doubt this is the time for a performance review.”

“That’s not-“ Jon bites his tongue. “Never mind, forget I asked.”

But Martin takes a deep breath, his hands coming up to tangle in his sweater. His eyes are closed, as he speaks.

“I don’t- I’m not really sure,” Jon rolls his eyes, but Martin doesn’t seem done. “I’ve typed up a few resignation letters, but I just couldn’t bring myself to hand them in.”

They stay in silence for a moment. Jon desperately tries not to listen for concerning sounds from outside.

“It’s like I’m stuck here. I can’t move on, I can’t- can’t return to whatever I was before, in any case.”

Jon swallows a question that he’s pretty sure would make Martin start laughing. If the answer isn’t affirmative, of course.

“Whatever. Can you see anything out there?” Martin shakes his head. “I wish we knew where they went. I don’t need Tim and Sasha haunting the Archives if they die today, it’s enough that-“ he stops himself. His mouth seems not to have gotten the memo; And just after he decided not to mention it, too.

“It’s enough that what?”

Well, fuck.

“Well… Martin, you’re not, uh…” he takes a deep breath. Focuses on the pain everywhere in his body to ground himself. “You didn’t die here, did you?”

Martin stares at him. His face has gone slack, except for his mouth, which is open wide and gaping. He blinks, shakes his head, and blinks again as if checking if Jon isn’t a hallucination.

“What? Sorry, what?” he shakes his head and blinks again, only then seeming satisfied with the reality that Jon isn’t just a phantom brought on by adrenaline. “No? I mean, no. What?”

Jon feels his blood flowing up to his face, colouring it an embarrassing shade of rose, for all he knows. He focuses on the pain in his right shoulder, lets it ground him.

“No, I just… No, just the way you phrased that-“

“Made you think I was a ghost?”

“No- I mean… It was a reasonable assumption! Have you seen this place?” he waves his right arm around, gesturing to the chaos all around them. Why does this goddamned limb hurt so much? “None of this is normal.”

“I mean, I know, but…” Martin drops his head down and Jon worries for a moment that maybe they’re somehow running out of air. Then, he hears a noise from Martin. Through his laughter, his companion still manages to speak: “A ghost. A ghost, really?”

“No, unreally.”

He only half means it as a joke, but Martin seems to break out into a more intense laugh at his words, his hands clutching at his sweater. Jon locks his jaw, but it doesn’t stop a slight snort from escaping him.  It shakes through his body, moves his right arm.

“Shit, that hurts.”

“What?”

“My arm, it doesn’t matter.”

“But-“ he levels Martin with a look. The man raises both his hands up. “Fine.”

The sound of a fire alarm disrupts them.

“Sasha and Tim must have gotten to it.”

Jon nods, considering.

“Wait. This… Shit.”

“What?”

“We’re gonna choke with CO2 if we don’t get out.”

“What?”

“The fire alarm! It’s going to- well, it already has, probably.”

“Right. Will we really choke, though?”

“I don’t know! I don’t care, really! I don’t want to find out.”

Martin sighs.

“I can get out there and try to find a way out of here that doesn’t involve us both being at Prentiss’ mercy.”

“What? No-“

“Listen,” Martin’s eyes are closed again. His arms cross over his chest and he’s breathing shallowly. “You don’t want to die a mystery, you said so yourself. I… I don’t particularly care about my end, if I’m honest- not that I want to die, but, well… Yeah. It’s… better you have to find a new assistant than that Elias has to replace the archivist again, I guess.”

Jon pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Fine. But for the record, I don’t think it’s a good idea.”

Martin shrugs. He stands up and scans the area, before seemingly deeming it safe enough for him to make a break for it. Jon is just standing up when he sees his ginger hair disappearing in Jon’s office. He fights the unreasonable urge he has to run after Martin and drops back down to the ground. His eyes fall on the tape recorder lying at his feet, the tape still recording.

“It seems it’s just you and me,” he snorts. “Oh, the irony.”

His shoulder hurts.

“Fuck!”

He cannot stifle the yell even as his eyes blink away the dust caused by the wall falling and recognise the figure standing in the now gaping hole as Martin Blackwood, a goddamned CO2 canister in hand.

He doesn’t think he’s ever been this relieved to see Martin.

“Jesus, you’ve been gone for over- doesn’t matter, why did you-“ his words evade him. He stands up and hisses at the ache in his arm. His body should really get the memo that this is not the time.

Martin laughs, his eyes crinkling up, though Jon finds little actual amusement in it.

“I can’t believe I found a passage to here through that- whatever on earth that is. Come on, I’m pretty sure I saw light somewhere, we might be able to get out!” as if on cue, someone growls in the main area, reminding Jon that leaving that way is impossible. He casts a dubious look behind Martin, into the sprawling, thick darkness of the tunnels, and sighs. His left hand (not right, because that arm still hurts) reaches out to the front and Martin takes the hint, wrapping Jon’s flimsy palm in his large, warm one.

Big, strong hands. Comforting and nice. Jon tosses all thoughts of this calibre out of his mind as quickly as humanely possible.

He seems to be able to walk fine, his arms not really necessary for that endeavour, thank whatever gods there are. Martin leads the way, his right hand still holding Jon’s. Periodically, he sprays the space before them with the CO2 from the canister.

Jon must be getting loopy from all the gas inhalation because he can’t help but think how strong Martin’s arms must be to be able to hold the fire extinguisher up for so long. He doesn’t even know why he’s surprised – his very first impression of Martin, though he loathes to admit it, was that he looks like a big bear. A very clumsy bear, but one, nonetheless.

“I swear there was a turn somewhere to the right here…” his companion mutters, looking around with confusion. “No way I just…”

“I think we have the best chance of just going wherever,” Jon breaks Martin’s muttering and drags him to the left, where the corridor bends. They continue like that, turning wherever the corridor does, and Jon does his best to ignore Martin’s progressively more distressed muttering about how this isn’t right and this corridor branched out.

He doesn’t think giving into the urge to panic, sit down and do nothing but hope for someone to rescue them would do them any good. So, he perseveres, even in the face of the fact that it’s highly unlikely they will find the exit from the almost alive mass of concrete below the institute.

“Jon, look,” Martin pulls on his arm at some point, prompting Jon to cry out. “Sorry, didn’t mean to startle you- wait.”

Jon does not like his tone of voice at all.

“Jon,” he says and it’s like the time he and the other two assistants practically forced a confession of his condition out of him; his voice is confident and strong, none of his usual tentativeness and anxiety shining through (though Jon’s way to tell his emotion is mostly by the volume of his voice, so he isn’t fully confident in his assessment). It’s almost as though he’s been in similar situations, asking similar questions and chastising, multiple times. Jon doesn’t want to ponder much about the implications of that. “Is your shoulder alright?”

“Yes.”

“You’re a horrible liar, has anyone ever told you?”

“Yes.”

Martin sighs and adjusts his glasses. His face is barely visible in the darkness, but Jon still finds comfort in being able to vaguely make out his features. His lips, pursed with the corners turned downwards, his brows furrowed, nose wrinkled. Martin’s expressions are always so vivid and intense, easy to read. It contrasts with his personality so much.

“What’s wrong with it?”

“It just hurts, we don’t have time for this. What did you want to… show me?”

Martin runs a hand down his face and shakes his head. His hand lays gingerly on Jon’s aching shoulder and he freezes, unsure how to proceed. It doesn’t hurt, but that’s the least of his worries when Martin’s eyes are wide open and staring at him, while he worries his lip between his teeth. His eyes travel from Jon's face to his shoulder and then back to his face and Jon could swear he turns a little green.

“It’s dislocated, isn’t it?”

“Martin, I said-“

“Shh,” he’s about to yell at the man, but complies, if only to speed up this argument and finally proceed with their escape. Their surroundings are echoey, their breaths loud and laboured. He’s fairly certain he can hear their heartbeats in the silence. “It’s quiet. We have a moment. How do I help?”

“You don’t. It usually goes away on its own if it's subluxated and if not, an EMT has to...”

“I could try to re-set it.”

“Fifty-fifty chance it will pop right back out because my muscles will protest. Plus, you could do it wrong. Shoulders are tricky like that.”

“Then we immobilise it.”

“With what?”

Martin bends down and picks up a piece of wood. Jon’s eyes follow his movement and, though it is mostly blurry shadow, he realises that they’ve been standing next to a pile of sticks, collected there for whatever reason, this entire time.

“Fine,’ he sighs. His face feels hot. “Fine. But only because I’ll slow us down otherwise.”

“Of course,’ Martin nods, but the sigh that follows makes Jon think he isn’t content with his answer. Not that Jon cares, of course.

They don’t talk about it for a long while. Not when Jon winces as Martin creates a makeshift sling out of a sweater and sticks. Not when they finally enter the room Martin’s been wanting to show Jon the entire time. Not when Jon feels his world stop for a moment as he and Martin lay eyes on the body of Gertrude Robinson. Not when, in a panicked frenzy, they run out of the room, and finally outside.

Especially not when they have returned to the archive after the attack, and Martin smiles at him as he hands him his tea.

3. Stare in my eyes what shall you find

        A blinded soul beneath silken leaves

        Crush all my tendons as you tremor

        Swallowed by a velvet veil

Jon needs to get out of his office.

He needs to make tea because Martin is on sick leave (thankfully actually sick this time) and he’s found that neither Tim nor Sasha can satisfy his tastes in hot beverages.

He doesn’t know how long it’s been since he’s last drank something, only that his throat feels awfully dry, so much so that he can’t find it in himself to read another statement. But if he gets out of the office, that means he has to check in on Sasha and Tim. He has to finally send an email to Elias asking about the police investigation into Gertrude’s murder because he’s pretty sure he caught Sasha spying on Tim at the same time as he was last night, and that doesn’t bode well for either of them. He has to put all his dirty mugs in the wash, put away a box of files and ask Sasha for lotion. His hands are very dry.

Oh, he was supposed to buy lip balm. Come to think of it, he’s running out of instant rice. He stares at his desk, and it hits him he’s been putting off buying sticky notes.

He gets up. He should get refills for his fountain pen, as well, it hits him as he’s leaving his office.

“Sasha, Tim, I’m going to the store,” he announces as he shrugs on his coat. Sasha hums noncommittally, clearly absorbed in something on her computer screen, while Tim shoots him a grin and thumbs up. His shirt is revealing too much again. Jon pinches the bridge of his nose.

“Hey, bossman, could you get me those… uh… colourful pens?”

‘Highlighters?”

“Sure, yes!”

‘Highlighters,’ Jon notes. ‘For Tim’.

He leaves and closes the doors behind him.

The nearest shop isn’t far, only about a ten-minute walk from the institute. The sky is overcast, clouds threatening to spill at any moment. Jon wraps his coat tightly around himself, warning the sky with his eyes that it shall not dare start raining before he returns to the institute. He didn’t think to grab an umbrella.

He’s crossing the sidewalk when he looks to the side and spots a strange billboard. It’s a woman, her mouth stretched in a wide grin, and she stares right at him with eyes wide and teeth bared, like she cannot figure out if she wants to be friendly or predatory. Jon shivers involuntarily. The whole thing seems familiar.

Right. A case Tim has been investigating. Someone found themselves strangling their partner in their sleep. Going to the sleep clinic did not help. The longer they spent with their lover, the more violent urges they felt towards them. The only unusual thing they could remember prior to the issue beginning was seeing such an advert on their way to work every day.

The text reads: Unleash the beast. Cut the ties that hold it back.

Quite a slogan.

Before he realises what he is doing, Jon turns and starts to walk to where the billboard is to see better. The brand, printed in small text at the corner of the advertisement (the first clue to the fact that something is majorly wrong with this thing) seems to be ‘hunter’s core’.

He types that into his phone and then immediately changes the search to ‘hunter’s core brand’ when his initial action shows only shirtless men exercising. The site that shows up as the first result repeats the slogan from the billboard. He clicks on it.

The first thing he sees is that this doesn’t seem to be a brand at all, but rather an archer’s association. The second thing is that, well, he’s fairly certain some of these names are actual murderers.

Ophelia Howard – he remembers that case, mostly because she did make a statement at the institute about how a ghost murdered her husband, and then the facility was swarming with the press for days on end after Gertrude turned her over to the police. Apparently, she pulled a knife on someone.

Jeremy Donald Carpenter – he must have been in prison for ten years by now. From what Jon read during his shameful true crime phase during college, he was a normal man until he just snapped one day. Tied his sister and her two kids to trees and shot at them with a crossbow. He then waited for her husband to come home and threw knives at him until the man was more holes than flesh.

Philip Greenwich – attacked a school. He was then charged with the murder of two of his colleagues. He was supposedly well-liked up until about a month before his crimes, when he began snapping at people, having angry outbursts-

A car honks at Jon and he startles. Had he been standing in the street this entire time?

He rushes off the road and notices it’s about to rain. He groans and starts hurrying back to the institute…

…only to realise he has no idea where he is.

He looks around. Sure, these streets seem familiar, he’s lived in London for most of his adult life, but that doesn’t mean he actually knows how to get from here to the institute. His idiotic brain refuses to save the actual journey in itself, only remembers the beginning of it and the end. Because it’s a useless organ that refuses to work. Because Jon is too irresponsible to handle himself alone in a city, like a child. He shakes his hands, his breathing becoming laboured as his chest tightens.

‘This is stupid, why can’t I just find my way back?’ he looks around. His coat feels all wrong, suddenly. There is traffic on the road and that’s too loud as well. He can’t focus, the woman from the poster stares at him, and it’s too loud and he is lost. His muscles are all wound up. He doesn’t know how to relax them.

He pulls out his phone, swallows down the embarrassment and dials Tim’s contact.

“Hey, bossman! Uhh… Right, I forgot to tell you what brand of highlighters I like-“

“Tim,” his voice is quiet. ‘Get yourself together.’ He thinks. “I’m horribly sorry but I- I seem to have got lost.”

Tim bursts out laughing.

“Oh god, how? You were going to the shops, that’s maybe… three streets over?” Jon can’t stop his left fist from clenching and unclenching. His breathing is laboured. The first drop of water hits his head, and he stifles a hiss. It’s all wrong, and he’s covered in sweat already. A motorcycle passes by, and his hands shoot to his ears automatically.

Tim becomes eerily quiet.

“Fuck, Jon, okay, sorry I laughed, clearly you- Where are you?”

“I don’t know!” he snaps his fingers. There must be some landmarks. “Uh… billboard with a creepy woman. Flower shop. Broken hydrant.”

“Right, right,” there is shuffling on Tim’s side. “Give me like… five minutes, alright? I’ll be right there.”

He doesn’t hang up, much to Jon’s relief. He lets himself rest on the wall behind him, tapping the fingers of his left hand against the thumb. The wall is cold. It makes him breathe slightly easier.

It’s at once an eternity later and not too long at all after that Tim shows up, an umbrella and headphones in his hand. He gives Jon a gigantic grin and waves as he approaches.

“Here, these should help,” he hands Jon the headphones as he shelters him with the umbrella. Jon stares at him, his phone still next to his ear. Tim sighs and nods to himself. “Put your phone away.”

Jon does.

“Put them on your head.”

He does. The world is silenced in an instant, more of a background rumble than an audible, bothersome distraction. He blinks and shoves his hands in his pockets so that Tim doesn’t see how they shake. Tim’s grin widens. He extends an elbow to Jon and Jon, reluctantly, hooks his arm on his. He must admit not having to touch someone else’s skin at this moment is comforting.

Which obviously makes him feel idiotic. He shouldn’t need this babying from Tim. He shouldn’t need headphones to think. He’s been a researcher; he’s uncovered blood and gore and he’s run away from people with knives or angry cops more times than he can count. He has handled all of that fine. Why can’t he handle a stupid walk to the store?

They arrive at the institute in no time. By the time they enter, Jon is already bolting back to his office. He sits down on his chair after closing the door and opens a desk drawer, intending to jot down the directions from where he went to the institute, only to realise he’s almost out of sticky notes. His clothes stick to his skin with sweat, impossible to ignore. His throat feels dry.

“Fuck!” he can’t help but punch the desk. He’s so goddamn stupid.

Tim nudges the door open. For all intents and purposes, he was probably just waiting for a chance to enter. Jon closes his eyes and tries to breathe deeply. By the time he opens them again, Tim is sitting in front of him on a chair he must have dragged in from the break room.

“Jon, are you okay?’

“I’m stupid.”

Tim rolls his eyes. His feet are drumming a melody on the floor.

“Not what I asked.”

“I should be fine.”

Tim clasps his hands together.

“Also, not what I asked! You’re pretty bad at this, boss!”

Jon looks down at his desk. He needs to get those goddamned post-its. And pens. And highlighters for Tim. And instant rice.

He gets up.

“I’m going to the store.”

“Uh, no, you’re not. Sasha will go.”

He wants to hit Tim. He won’t, but he’d like to. Only slightly, but still.

“I’m not a child, I can go to the store.”

“I know. But Sasha will go.”

“Don’t coddle me-“

“Damn it, Jon, every non-work related conversation with you is like some kind of a rigged carnival game where I’m the player and your honesty is the prize I want but I’ve used up all five coins and I still haven’t won anything because the claw machine is messed up on purpose so that I lose more money and then only sometimes do I figure out the trick to getting the prize!”

Jon gets lost about halfway into that explanation.

“What?” he sits back down.

“Ugh, right, never mind.” Tim runs a hand through his hair. There is a silence that extends around them, thick and oppressive. Jon feels it dripping down his throat, into his lungs, filling them with molasses-like substance.

“If you don’t have anything to say-“

“What happened when you tried to go to the shops? I won’t judge you, scouts honour!”

Jon drops his official tone. Not like it would get Tim to leave, anyway.

“Were you even ever a scout?”

“Don’t deflect!”

“I got lost,” he crosses his arms over his chest. “It was… distressing.”

Tim huffs a laugh.

“Yeah, I figured out as much. How did you get lost?”

“Uh…” Jon feels his throat seize in a cough. Why is it so dry? “I need tea.” He manages to get out.

Tim’s head perks up.

“I bet that’s how you got to the store!”

“What?”

“Tea. You were thirsty and wanted tea, but that would involve getting up, right?”

“Yes, I suppose.”

“So…”

“Ah, yes,” he shouldn’t feel so gleeful about uncovering his path to the billboard. “I wanted tea, but then I noticed I was running out of post-its, and then I thought about rice, and I needed pens, and you needed highlighters- shit, I need to email Elias and file a box… or was it put away a file? I’m so stupid, damn it! Why can’t I stop being an idiot and just remember-“

“Stop it.”

Jon raises his head and looks at Tim’s face briefly. His brows are furrowed, but he isn’t talking loud enough to appear mad.

“Huh?”

“You’re not stupid. Stop telling yourself that, it’s… ugh, how do I phrase this.”

Jon doesn’t really understand what Tim is getting at.

“Okay. When I was fourteen, I kept forgetting to bring in my Spanish homework because I was really good at Spanish and the exercises were boring. It got to the point where my mother would have to stand over me and make me do it and I still managed to forget to take it or hand it in the next day. I felt so useless because I knew I had to do it, I knew I had to bring it and hand it in and I kept forgetting. Then, I couldn’t read anything, even though my favourite activity before that was reading silly little fantasy books. And then I suddenly couldn’t absorb anything from math classes because they were just… I don’t know. My brain had better things to think about. And I just… I remember feeling like a fucking idiot and I remember how disappointed everyone was because how did Tim, hyper but super intelligent Tim, suddenly become unable to… be intelligent,” Jon doesn’t know where this is going. All he knows is that he wants to tell Tim that he was never an idiot because none of that was clearly his fault. “And then, my parents decided enough was enough, and they took me to get tested. Turned out that all that intelligence, drive to learn, all my hyperactivity, all the time I spent obsessing over a specific book series and how nobody could touch me while I was reading it because I would not respond, how no room ever seemed bright enough for me as a child, all of that was just ADHD. It’s just that back then, all it did was make me look endearing and passionate and smart. But then, I turned fourteen, and the world changed, but I didn’t and suddenly, I was just the kid who couldn’t keep friends because he talked too much.”

“You have ADHD?” the too doesn’t leave his mouth. He also doesn’t ask how Tim’s figured out that Jon has it as well.

Tim snorts.

“Yeah, boss, I thought you would have figured out by now. Don’t you have access to my files?”

Jon doesn’t dignify that with a response.

“Anyway, back to my point,” he clears his throat. His hands have begun waving in the air to augment his tale. “Every time you call yourself an idiot, or stupid, I remember how I felt until I was like… twenty? And I told my girlfriend at the time that I had ADHD, and she was the first person to tell me that she loved it about me. Not because it made me a superhero or whatever those fucking motivational posts tend to say, but because it was part of my personality, and she doubts we would have connected like we did if I didn’t have it.”

“But it interferes with my job and I’m just-“

“Shit happens, okay? I’ll tell Sasha to get you sticky notes and you can use them for whatever purpose you use them. I’m assuming you’ve got strategies to deal with this by now.”

“I shouldn’t be given more credit just because my brain is fucked up!” Why doesn’t Tim understand that?

“Would you tell me I was stupid if I forgot my wallet at home and then, in the process of getting it, lost a statement on the tube because I forgot to put it back, boss?”

Jon snorts.

“You did that on Monday.”

“Yes. And what did you do?”

“I got annoyed and then I…”

“You told me it was fine and that it wasn’t that important anyway. And then you sent Sasha to try to retrieve it and she managed to get it for me because we both knew I’d just lose it again.”

Jon sighs.

“I see your point, but-“

“Jon, I don’t expect you to suddenly… love yourself or whatever because your good ol’ friend Tim sat you down and gave you a motivational speech,” he shoots finger guns and winks. Jon’s face heats up but he rubs at his cheeks to make it go away. Why is he blushing at this, he cannot tell. “I guess I just… I hate to see you feel helpless?”

“I’m not.”

“Oh, I know!” why Tim is smirking evades him. “But you feel helpless, don’t you?”

Jon waves a hand at him. He struggles not to yell at Tim as he shoots him finger guns from the doorway before finally, finally leaving Jon’s office.

4. Draw my sword of shadow and steel

         I light a candle march to fight

        A desolate war cry fires from your fervour

        You join me only in battle

Jon isn’t certain how Sasha managed to befriend Melanie. In his opinion, everyone would be all the better if they kept Melanie King at arm’s length at the closest. She is impulsive, short-tempered and too determined for her own good. Not to mention her pride. She is awfully proud.

Even weirder, Jon cannot understand how he’s found himself sitting at a table in a café near the institute with Melanie and Sasha both, talking about books that interest them.

“I hate Sheridan Le Fanu!” Melanie groans, throwing her head back. “Like, I get that Carmilla was fun and all, but he’s just… so decorative, it’s annoying. Like, I just want to read about the two vampire girlfriends kissing, thanks!”

Sasha giggles, covering her mouth with her hand. The two narrow braids surrounding her face slip out from behind her ears and bend slightly as the hair rests on the frames of her glasses. Jon finds it difficult to tear his eyes away from the movement.

“Come on, but it’s the tragedy that’s fun.”

“Oh, yes, I just can’t wait for Georgie to slightly murder me and then possibly be killed by my father, that would be so cool and amusing!”

Sasha twirls a braid between her fingers, leaning her body forward, face now closer to Melanie’s.

“How about you, Jon? Opinion on vampire girlfriends? You want one?”

He furrows his brows. What kind of a question is that?

“No,” he shakes his head. “I’d rather not be a vampire meal, thanks. Besides, real vampires are nothing like the ones in Carmilla. There is a statement about it from Trevor Herbert, though I still trust the guy as far as I can throw him. But Leitner confirmed his talking a bit, so… uh… right, the number was 0100710.”

Melanie raises a cup to her lips. Sasha smiles at him with her eyes narrowed, leaning on the table even more, now in his direction. He isn’t certain if he should lean back or stay where he is, or maybe follow suit until he can brush her nose with his. He’d like that, is a ridiculous thought stuck in his head.

“Want to tell me more about the vampires?”

“I doubt that’s a suitable lunch conversation. Besides, it wasn’t that… thrilling, or whatever,” he sips his tea. It’s lukewarm by now.

Sasha rolls her eyes. To his left, he can see Melanie’s face contort into what looks like an expression of disgust or annoyance.

‘Why is she annoyed? Did I say something she didn’t like, again? Insufferable, I swear.’

“Maybe you can find a suitable lunch conversation, then?” she keeps smiling. “I would love to hear you talk more.”

“Sasha, what..?” he shakes his head. ‘Why is she acting so weird? Is this… is she the one who killed Gertrude, actually?’ “I don’t have anything to say?”

It’s unusual, for him to feel so out of place to not even be able to bullshit his way out of the situation. To be stuck in an impossible moment of feeling like an entire conversation is happening right next to him, and yet the language of it is utterly foreign to him.

Melanie presses the balls of her hands to her eyes and groans.

“Sasha, this is painful!” something about her tone feels weird. Jon doesn’t question it that much. He’s tired of paranoia.

“Melanie, if you feel so horrible, go home. God knows I won’t mind your absence-“

“Oh, you are such an ass!” she yells, throwing her hands up in the air. He doesn’t think she realises how much like Tim she can be, with a dramatic flair and a presence that takes up the entire room. And an affinity to annoy Jon and yet, somehow, make him inclined to spend time with her anyway.

Jon sips his tea, refusing to respond to Melanie’s exhibit.

“Okay,” Sasha retreats a bit and sighs. “Let’s try this again.”

He isn’t sure what she’s talking about. There is no way in hell he’ll let her know of his confusion, though.

Sasha straightens her back, shoots a sharp look at Melanie and shakes her head, muttering something about Tim’s likely idiotic ideas, before she clears her throat and looks directly at Jon.

“Jonathan Sims,” he immediately doesn’t like this. “I heard you went by Jonny D’ville once. How would you like to Jonny D’vour my heart?”

He’s pretty sure all the blood rushing to his cheeks sends his head spinning. Melanie is snickering to his side.

“What? And how do you know about that?”

Melanie raises her hand, her shoulders shaking with unsuppressed laughter.

“Georgie told me.”

Jon makes several plans for Georgie Barker’s murder and the subsequent acquisition of The Admiral in his head.

Sasha is still staring at him, her dark skin shiny in the dim light of the coffee shop. She almost looks embarrassed, except she is Sasha James and so that’s practically impossible.

“What?” he asks, finally. She sighs and shakes her head. He feels bad. He shoots a still giggling Melanie a warning look. “Sorry, I don’t… Will you be quiet?”

Melanie kicks him under the table. He’s fully prepared to insult her blue hair when Sasha speaks.

“Do you want to go on a date, with me? That’s to the both of you, by the way, I figured if I asked you both at once it would be better because I have a higher chance of at least getting one yes, statistically speaking…” she says it all and then leans her head on her palm and smiles at him as if that was the most mundane request she could have made and as if she hasn’t just rambled her heart out while appearing moderately confident. Jon loses his ability to breathe, for a moment, and then all the air seems to enter his lungs at once, finally returning clarity to his brain. He sees Melanie’s skin cover with a dusting of blush as she tentatively nods. He wonders what it’s like to have it be so easy to answer, decide.

“I’m your boss?”

It comes out as more of a question than he’d like.

“That’s not a no, is it, Johnny?” she bites her lip when he glares at her.

He thinks seriously about her question, disregarding the ethical conundrums for a moment. He thinks about her smile, the way that her orange and yellow clothes always make her light up the room, aided only by her cheery tone of voice. He thinks about how goddamn intelligent and supportive Sasha is, and how ambitious but also forgiving she can be.

The word yes pushes at his lips just as his thoughts take a rapid turn.

Suddenly, he’s thinking of Tim and his too-revealing shirts, of the way every time he’s feeling an emotion it looks like a performance that is at the same time perfectly natural. He thinks of how understanding and caring Tim can be and then his brain segues into Martin and his tea and solid, strong hands and how he possibly risked his life just to make sure Jon would survive during the Prentiss attack. He thinks and thinks and thinks.

“I- Tim and Martin.”

Sasha’s face falls only to immediately brighten up again as something seems to click in her mind. She lets out a quiet ‘ooh…’.

“You too?” she asks. Her voice is quiet, soft.

“What?”

“You know…” her lips form a side smile, and her eyes look to the side as well, eyelids dropping ever so slightly. Her hand waves around in the air and the other adjusts her hair behind her ear. Her brows go up only to drop down again.

‘What does it all mean?’ Jon can’t help but ask himself. He can’t tell.

“I don’t.”

Sasha tilts her head slightly before sighing with sudden realisation yet again.

“Right, I should have connected the dots… and with the… of course…” she keeps muttering while Jon grows more stressed and annoyed by the second. Finally, she returns her eyes to him and blinks slowly. “Do you like Tim and Martin as well? Romantically, I mean.”

He doesn’t. He doesn’t.

Does he?

Melanie is fully laughing her ass off next to him. He kicks her again.

“Uh… I suppose… maybe?”

“Perfect!” she clasps her hands together. “Then we can start planning! Not now, of course.”

“Of course,” he nods like he fully understands the situation. “Did you plan for yourself, Georgie, Melanie and me?”

“Of course,” she laughs. “Oh, and Jon, really, if you need help with social cues, you should just ask. I wouldn’t have thought less of you even before. Actually, this makes me reconsider my opinion about you for like the first year we worked together.”

Jon does not have a response to that.

5. Ablaze we stand in a cardboard shed

        Swallowed whole by a gluttonous flame

        Still miles between me-you-another

        No suffering buries void

It begins like all terrible things do, with a company-mandated party. Granted, this one has the additional disadvantage of being hosted by Elias who might or might not be actually trapping Jon, Tim, Martin, Sasha and Melanie at the institute with no way out. Basira, too, almost, except for the fact that Daisy pretty much grabbed her and bolted through the window the moment Elias offered her a job.

Apparently, though, being almost arrested, not actually hiring the person that would guarantee his livelihood and not even the unknowing approaching could deter Elias from hosting an event for patrons of the institute. Jon doesn’t even understand the point of it in that regard, because, as far as he’s concerned, the main donor to the Magnus Institute is the Lukas family, who prefer to keep to themselves rather than indulge in semi-lavish parties.

But who is he to rain on Elias Bouchard’s parade? Oh, wait.

It doesn’t help that Jon still hasn’t technically returned to his position as Head Archivist, instead recording statements from the comfort of Sasha’s flat, and yet it has been made clear to him that he shall be at the godforsaken event should it cost him his life.

He was still tempted to not go.

Jon knows three things as he settles into his place in the corner of the wide hall where the party is being held: one, he doesn’t recognise a single person attending, sans the other department heads and Elias himself, and he can’t say he’s exactly on speaking terms with any of them; two, the room is terribly hot, the air thick, uncomfortable; three, this idiotic even has forced him to miss his weekly visit to Georgie.

He doesn’t want to admit that that last part is what bothers him the most.

He would be fine sitting in a stuffy room for three or more hours any other day but Friday, but yet Elias, who probably knew how uncomfortable it would make him, stubbornly decided to host the party on that very day, from six PM to ten-ish.

“Hello, Jon,” speak of the devil. “How are you finding the evening.”

He scoffs.

“I think you know, Elias.”

Bouchard’s hand ghosts over his shoulder and he moves away. Elias doesn’t seem deterred and places his hand there, anyway, prompting a shiver to run down Jon’s entire body as he tenses.

“Have you forgotten everything I’ve told you, Archivist? Do try to be more polite.”

“Oh fuck off,” he says before he can stop himself.

Elias appears to be torn between surprised and annoyed. His face quickly becomes smoothed over with a mask of perfect pleasantness, but something within his entire being remains threatening, enough so to keep Jon on guard.

“You have been spending entirely too much time with Mr Stoker.”

Jon can’t help but laugh at that, though the sound is bitter and unpleasant.

“Don’t you dare touch him.”

Elias rubs at the bridge of his nose.

“Right, I have been meaning to talk to you about your attachments-“

Jon doesn’t want to hear it. In fact, this is the conversation that he would rather never have. So, without much ceremony, he pushes away from the wall and walks away, holding his breath as he enters the crowd of utterly foreign people gathered in the hall.

The sensation is horrible. There are so many bodies brushing against him. The array of fabric, plenty of it horrible, scratchy polyester that makes his skin feel as if it were on fire, would be bad enough, but he also has to endure his hands, forearms and occasionally even his cheek brushing against bare skin, as plenty of women have chosen to wear dresses with short sleeves and many men, like him, have rolled up their sleeves. And they all smell different, cologne upon perfume upon cologne mixing in a dizzying, nauseating cocktail of odour that makes his head immediately become overtaken by a headache.

He closes his eyes and clenches his fists, unclenching them and then clenching them again. His entire body is tense, his skin on fire, lungs seemingly unable to take in enough air. Breathing feels like a chore that he only continues to do because stopping to breathe would be an awful sensation as well. There is some kind of classical music playing in the background, which would be fine except the longer he spends trapped within a crowd of sweat, skin, polyester and perfume, the more conversations held by willing participants of the crowd reach his ears. That, just like the smells, also begins blending together until it’s a discordant melody of violin-Hey, Artie- he left me!- honey, I swear- that’s so flavourful- he’s a jerk- I’ve new plans- fear so intense- great achievements- piano.

He bumps into someone hard, forcing him to open his eyes. The man eyes him with discontent and Jon responds in kind with a glare of his own. The man huffs and turns away, hitting Jon in the shoulder with his elbow. Some of the drink he’s holding spills over Jon’s hand, cold and sticky and alcoholic and burning-

He shakes his hand like he’s been scorched, his mind hyper-focused on the sensation of one of his arms being wet while the other isn’t, on the millions of words reaching his ears at once as he smells lily, musk, sandalwood, basil, rose, rosemary, cinnamon, vanilla, pine all at once, as his forearms touch sweaty skin, polyester, burn with alcohol and oh god how he wishes to be at Georgie’s, this isn’t right.

‘I should be at Georgie’s.’

“You’re fine, this is just an idiotic, unnecessary party…“ he mutters, though words almost hurt to say as if his brain was actively fighting against letting them out. It doesn’t feel correct to be here, it makes him feel like he’d rather crawl out of his skin.

His throat is dry. Water, that’s what he needs. He rubs one of his hands against the other as he finally, finally escapes the crowd, and sighs in relief when both his forearms are at least equally wet…

…except now he’s noticed that his hands are dry and that’s terrible too. He cannot get rid of the perpetual thought of this being wrong, of needing to be at Georgie’s so that his brain isn’t working in overdrive trying to figure out a situation that should not even be happening because he wasn’t warned early enough, though he doesn’t think any warning would have really been sufficient in the face of such an important thing as a weekly evening with the Admiral. His skin burns, itches, crawls with every sound that reaches him, every smell, every flute- I just finished- such a silly- inexperienced, incompetent- sizeable profit and- firing squad- pride is hurt- he’s just lying- organ, every sensation of air and skin. He feels the sweat that has gathered on his forehead making it feel cooler as people pass him by, moving the air, and that’s horrible. It’s too hot. His skin is crawling. His ribcage is too tight. He shouldn’t be here. There is no escape. He wants to crush his ribs, pull them out and get rid of all his tendons, he wants to unwind his muscles, he wants to get out of his skin, he needs to-

“Jon?” he stops breathing and just stands, motionless, trying to figure out how to do… well, anything. Sasha raises a hand to put on him but, upon seeing his expression, it drops and she gets that look on her face that he recognises from their sessions of planning to ask out both Tim and Martin and somehow make it clear that yes, they are, in fact, very interested in them both, as well as each other. “Oh, honey, we’re going outside.”

She takes hold of his sleeve, not his hand, thankfully not his hand, and begins leading him through the crowd and into the cool air outside. He hears Elias approaching, calling out his name, but Sasha raises her hand and shoots him the middle finger, which seems to stall him enough for them to get away.

They fall out of the doors as if they were running from some eldritch horror (which, actually, given all of Elias’ weirdness, is strangely accurate). Sasha leads him to the side and then further, next to streetlamps and tall trees, until they reach what must be the external area belonging to the event hall, though it’s not being used by the Institute, thankfully. The gate is closed, but Sasha gets out a hairpin and fiddles with the lock until they can both get inside. She sits Jon down on a bench and takes a seat herself some centimetres away.

He needs to breathe. He needs to cry. He needs to- to hit himself, to get his goddamned skin off, to stop hearing anything, to put pressure on his ribcage, to fix this, fix himself, get to Georgie’s…

Sasha doesn’t say anything for a long moment. He desperately tries to suppress the urge to flap his hands around or drum his fists on his collarbone, or rock back and forth. That only exacerbates the problem, he knows from experience, but he is not a child and he will not act like one, he can calm himself like an adult.

He can’t breathe.

“Stop restraining yourself,” she speaks quietly. “I won’t judge you.”

He wants to answer her but finds that he cannot. Of course.

She sighs and kicks off her heels. He wants to ask why she’s even here, why she came. He can’t do that either.

“Let yourself do whatever you need,” she says and he’s still readying himself to say no when she raises her arms and starts to wave them around in constrained movements as she rocks her body back and forth.

‘What is she doing?’ is his first thought as he watches her, her mouth twisted in concentration.

He is so absorbed in his observation he fails to notice as he begins to mimic her. As his body follows the movements dictated by Sasha and slowly, bit by bit, his skin stops feeling like a prison. Once he starts, it seems almost impossible to stop, and even as she ceases her movement, staring off into the distance, he lets his hands hit his collarbone with just enough force to feel pressure. It makes his ribcage stop feeling so constrained. He can finally breathe.

He’s crying, he notices.

The night is cool, and it makes him feel how sweaty he is even more. He can still sense the spot on one of his arms where someone spilt a drink and the spot on his other arm on which he rubbed his other one to make himself ‘equally’ wet. A whine escapes his throat at that notice because that is horrible and unfair, and someone get the fucking liquid off him!

Sasha hands him a shawl she’s had wrapped around her neck. He manages to wipe his forearms clumsily and then wraps the fabric around the back of his neck and pulls with his hands, relieved at the pressure.

They sit like this for some time, Jon letting his muscles unwind moment by moment as he revels in the silence of the place and the freshness of the air.

When he finds himself calm enough to be able to breathe without issue, to sit relatively still without wanting to lose his body and become an energy-based life form, it hits him that this might be the first time he’s gotten through that without scratching himself badly.

“Are you better?” Sasha asks, never looking into his eyes. He squeezes his eyes shut as he readies himself to force out the words, but instead, he hears her breathe out one of her quiet ‘Oh’s and then something is being slipped into his hand.

It’s her phone, with the notes app open and the font enlarged, probably to make it comfortable for her to read.

“It’s fine, now.”  He writes though it feels immensely stupid to him. He shouldn’t need this.

Sasha nods as he shows her the phone and smiles at him.

“What happened, honey?” he tries to pretend that he doesn’t still feel something melt inside him every time she calls him that name.

“Everything was too much. And I was supposed to be at Georgie’s tonight, like every week. It’s idiotic.”

Sasha shakes her head, frowning.

“Not idiotic, you silly goose,” he shoots her a look for that, but she is in no way deterred. “ Elias is an asshole for setting this up, anyway.”

He laughs.

“Does this happen often?”

“Often enough.”

She nods.

“Can I touch you?”

He wants to say no. He doesn’t feel like he can handle any sensation on his skin at this moment. But he knows that’s rude, that’s what he’s been told, and while he barely cares about coming off as unpleasant on the best of days, Sasha is a special case.

“Okay, from your expression I understand the answer is no. That’s fine, I’ll survive without holding your hand for an evening, don’t worry.”

“R u sure?”

“Yes. You’re the one who just had a meltdown, not me.”

He quirks his head.

“That wasn’t a meltdown. I’m not autistic.”

Sasha raises a brow.

“You aren’t?”

“Used to think I was. Autistic friend of a friend said I was faking it for attention.”

Sasha gets that look she does when she’s about to hack someone’s email and then threaten their livelihood by way of sharing their information with all kinds of sketchy organisations and annoying companies.

“Who cares what they think?”

Jon shakes his head at her.

“They actually had a diagnosis. I’m not struggling enough, and I kept talking about having it when I thought I had it.”

“Because you got excited that you finally understood why you were like you were as a child!” Jon doesn’t know how she knew that and hates that she did while being simultaneously grateful for not having to say it. “God, them having a diagnosis doesn’t automatically make them an- an authority on the disorder. They weren’t even studying psych, just French philology, that has nothing to do with-“

“It doesn’t matter. It was still stupid.”

“Sometimes, I wanna take you by the shoulders and just shake you for a very long time, you know that?” he shakes his head. “Whatever you have or don’t have, you don’t have to force yourself into these situations. If you feel… that coming on, get out.”

“Easier said than done.”

“And would be even easier if you didn’t purposefully make yourself endure it until you were at breaking point.’

“I’m not weak, Sasha.”

“You’re not,” she agrees. “Nobody thinks you are. Nobody weak would survive Prentiss, or finding out Sonja from artefact storage was replaced by that thing or finding Jurgen Leitner in the tunnels and then stopping Elias with pipe mid-air.”

Jon snorts. That is a funny mental image to have now. Not so fun when he was using all his strength to stop the man from beating Jurgen to death with said pipe. He got a dislocated shoulder from that encounter.

“But your mind works differently and forcing yourself to feel like shit isn’t going to help anyone.”

“Whatever. I’m tired of this conversation.”

“You always do this. You always push everyone away when they try to help you.”

“I don’t need help”

“Not this again. Listen, even I need help. Tim needs help. God knows Martin needs help sometimes. We’d never get anything done if we all spent our time pretending like we can do everything ourselves.”

Jon scoffs.

“That’s different.’

“How, exactly?”

He tries very hard to find reasonable arguments. When a minute passes and he still has none, he just shoots Sasha a hopefully critical look and turns away, resting on the back support of the bench.

Sasha sighs.

“Okay, I’m dropping it for now. But I want to talk about this later. I refuse to let you just… do this to yourself. You deserve to be okay. Whatever that entails, for you.”

+1. And as the end catches your hand

     My face finally shatters to dust

     You sigh as you thread a glass needle “with

     Hope I’ll sew your wounds at last”.

If Jonathan Sims is certain of one thing, it’s that he’s never expected to find himself in such as position as he’s in. The day is gloomy, rain threatening to spill at any moment, and he stands, his right hand grasped by Martin while his left elbow is looped through Tim’s arm (Tim’s hands get too sweaty and both of them find that unbearable). Sasha is leaning on Martin, who has an arm wrapped around her shoulders. They’re all dressed in their most official black clothes, which range from a full suit or an elegant pants and vest set (Martin and Jon) to a wrinkled black shirt and suit pants (Tim) to a flowy dress that cuts off mid-ankle (Sasha). From where they stand, Jon has a good vantage point to stare at Georgie and Melanie, who have chosen to hide themselves partially behind a tree. He assumes Melanie is just here out of principle while Georgie serves as her moral support.

Jon is here because he will not believe the bastard is well and truly dead until his body is lowered to the ground and buried with heaps of soil. And even then, he might not be fully convinced.

Tim sighs as they wait for all of the funeral caravan to get to the cemetery. The four of them bolted from the church practically as soon as they realised they could. Jon cannot help but find it immensely funny that Elias Bouchard, or, more accurately, Jonah fucking Magnus’ temporary vessel, is having a catholic funeral. Judging by the way Martin periodically bites his lip and wrinkles his nose, the irony has not escaped him as well.

The past few months have felt like a fever dream, in Jon’s opinion. Granted, he’d spent three of them comatose and accompanied only by an equally passed-out Sasha. Still, if he were to tell someone about it, he isn’t even sure where he’d start.

Maybe with the unknowing. Maybe with forcing Tim to stay at the institute, as he cried and cursed them out, if only for his own safety. Maybe with Sasha being the only reason they even managed to stop the ritual, as she managed to grasp the detonator at the last possible moment and signed their… well, not death sentence, but certainly their transformation sentence with the press of a button that simultaneously cursed them and saved the world. Maybe with finding out that they might not have needed to do any of that because the ritual was bound to fail anyway. Maybe with stopping Martin from threatening to dispose of Leitner for not informing them of that earlier.  

Maybe with Jurgen Leitner. Maybe with Jon keeping him secret in his flat only to find it had been broken into one day, with Jurgen nowhere in sight. Maybe with engaging Martin’s help in the search for him. Maybe with Martin being injured by Daisy as she tried to drive a knife through Jurgen’s heart. Maybe with finding the strings of web that closed Martin’s wound almost as soon as it had appeared and his (now) boyfriend crying with relief as Jon allowed the web of his hands to tangle around his own, binding them at that moment.

Maybe with them four. Maybe with sitting, huddled, in a corner of the Archives, with desperation trying to ground each other as their minds struggled to adjust to the rapid onslaught of pain, danger and change. Maybe with sleeping in one bed, Sasha and Tim consistently falling off during the night, because feeling that the other three were there was the only thing that could allow them to relax, to sleep. Maybe with Elias trying to separate them and failing miserably because they were the only stable thing in each other’s lives and were not about to give up on that.

Maybe with the panopticon and the tunnels below the institute, whose sprawling corridors called out to him too many times. Maybe with finding the body of Jonah Magnus, eyeless and motionless but undeniably intact. Maybe by trying to make heads or tails of that with the help of his three wonderful loves. Maybe with Jurgen Leitner finally revealing to them that Jonah was the one controlling Elias in the current day.

Or maybe he would just start with last week. Last week, when, on a chill Thursday morning, they had returned to the institute only to find it almost encased in black fabric, dripping from windows and replacing any décor there might have been before. And how they had opened their e-mails only to find a message from HR, informing them that Elias Bouchard had been a victim of a tragic car accident and had died on site.

The relief they’d felt then was indescribable. Jon still cannot believe how lucky they were that the man simply bluffed about his death being detrimental to the archives. What he cannot believe even more is how reckless the bastard must have been to allow his demise to come in the form of a damned car accident.

They were all asked to attend his funeral, of course. The Magnus Institute just couldn’t let them go without doing something impossibly annoying and bordering on wildly inappropriate. None of them bothered to argue with the request, though. They checked the panopticon, that day, and found Jonah Magnus’ body suddenly entering advanced stages of decay. So now, they are here, watching as the scarce friends of Elias Bouchard (or Jonah? The amount of people who knew about his actual identity remains a mystery) and multiple employees of the Magnus Institute gather around a hole in the ground.

Jon hopes that it won’t take too long for the stuffy ceremony to end. He hadn’t attended a funeral since his grandmother’s death, and even then, his grandmother had requested to be cremated, so the whole affair looked different. This is unbearable and probably would have been so even if the person being buried wasn’t one of Jon’s least favourite people.

He feels someone nudge him as he starts swinging back and forth on his heels, feeling antsy from trying to keep still. Turning around, he crosses eyes with an older woman, who shakes his head at him with disapproval. He has to fight the urge to roll his eyes at her – he is not in the mood to fight older ladies over his behaviour. Who even is this woman? How does she know Elias? He was fifty at best and she looks to be nearing eighty.

She’s Ethel Crossbridge the lovely ability he’s gained supplies. All her children died because of her inattentiveness.

‘Fuck off’ he tells the useless facts. They remain in his head, unsurprisingly.

He turns back around when he hears a mass of footsteps approach as the coffin is finally carried to the place of burial. The pallbearers set it down in the ground and the newly arrived people start to form a tight circle around the hole. Jon feels Tim drag him as they join the crowd. He cannot fathom what is so thrilling about a box in the earth.

“Now, the newly departed had left a letter that he requested be read by the priest on the day of his funeral, right as he was being buried,” the priest speaks. Jon feels Martin tense and he can’t blame him – he can think of a million different, bad things that could be in that letter.

While what ends up being read is none of those ideas, it is almost worse.

“Dear gathered, I am grateful for your attendance to say your final goodbye to me as I depart from the Earth. I am certain that I did so with… purpose and aim. As my final words, I would like to thank all the people who made my life brighter. Firstly, the archival staff of The Magnus Institute, who never managed to keep me bored. I forged quite a strong bond with my subordinate, Jonathan Sims…” and on and on he goes, for half the letter droning about just how close he’d managed to be to his employees in the Archives. Every second sentence is some kind of hidden jab at them, proving to Jon that this letter must have been written recently, or maybe it was something Elias updated as major events happened. He mentions having quite the passionate, firey relationship with Martin (which, to Jon, sounds thoroughly inappropriate) and seeing Sasha almost lose herself due to stressful conditions and how that made him reevaluate.

Jon finds it all so disgusting, feels his skin crawl with every word. The only positive thing about the experience is that, with how smug he is being, he likely had that letter ready in case he needed to bodyhop again. Jon failed to see why Jonah would be so smug if he didn’t think he’d be there to watch as they struggled not to attack the priest or do something equally rash.

The priests finally finishes reading. People give him a solemn, reluctant applause, the letter gets tucked away somewhere and then, one after another, people approach to pour dirt over the coffin. Martin nudges him as he himself moves to follow suit, and Jon decides he might as well comply.

He takes a spade and some of the soil.

“There you go, bastard,” he empties the shovel above the hole, his brows furrowed. As soon as he is done, he retreats, dragging his loves with him.

“The priest was not impressed, I love it,” Tim giggles into his hand, clearly trying and failing to stifle his joy. Jon swats at him, but he can’t get a smile off his face. When he looks at Martin and Sasha, they also appear to be grinning.

Their joy is short-lived.

“Oh, you poor dears,” the elderly woman from before hugs Martin before he can so much as acknowledge her. “I only barely knew Mr Bouchard, this must be so hard for you!”

And before Jon can step away or decline, she’s wrapping her arms around him and hugging him as well.

Her dog has cancer, she doesn’t know yet.

Jon winces.

She smells of moth balls and stale lavender. It intrudes on his nose, and he wants to get away. He doesn’t want to be touched, he had no time to prepare, and it feels horrible. She lets go quickly enough, but by then Jon has to use all his mental energy on stopping himself from making a noise or flapping his hands just to get rid of the awful sensation that still remains of having been touched when unwanted and having to inhale something disgusting.

A man approaches and says something, then takes Jon’s hand and shakes it vigorously. The man’s hands are sweaty and Jon all but rips his palm away from the hold. But behind him is a woman with polyester gloves on, and they also just have to be the scratchy kind that Jon wishes wouldn’t exist, and she shakes his hand as well, and by then apparently an entire line of people has formed, all ready to assault his mind by shaking and shaking and shaking his hand.

Then, because apparently, all that was not sufficient, the priest begins to sing. It’s a solemn tune, one that Jon doesn’t know the words for, but unfortunately, it seems that almost everybody else is familiar with it because they begin to join in, a discordant, uncoordinated chorus of voices that is loud and sounds awful.

It physically hurts because the melody doesn’t match up and half the people are off-key, and Jon cannot help but know that. And they won’t stop shaking his hand.

He retreats rapidly, stepping backwards and only has half a mind to grasp at Tim’s shirt as he does so.

“Too much,” he manages, his breath short. He can feel his cheeks become impossibly hot as embarrassment floods his whole being, along with the awful sense of failure, but Tim doesn’t seem annoyed or bothered. He grits his teeth, then feels his jaw sore and when he tries to open it, a sharp pain greets him. “And jaw is out.”

Tim nods, nudges Martin, and then, with seemingly just a stare, they seem to get whatever they needed known to each other. Martin moves so that he manages to almost cover both Tim and Jon with his body as he stare-communicates with Sasha, who begins to fake cry, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief she got from somewhere (from an old lady named Ruth, the beholding supplies, unhelpfully. At least Jon doesn’t get any morbid facts about her life).

Tim once again loops his shoulder with Jon’s and leads him away, amidst rows of graves, until they reach a bench. They sit down and Jon turns to look at his boyfriend. Tim pulls out his headphones from the messenger bag slung over Jon's shoulder (and he’d forgotten he even had it on, goodness gracious) and hands them to Jon.

Without hesitation, he puts them on. The sound of the singing is far enough now to technically not be bothersome, but it’s easier to recharge if his senses are muted.

“Do you want help with the ol’ old man's jaw?” Tim asks, and Jon rolls his eyes but nods. He knows that being touched, even by Tim, isn’t something he’d like currently, but it’s also preferable to the alternative of sitting with a dislocated jaw. He could set it himself, but it feels just slightly different from his usual dislocations in the area and he trusts Tim’s ability more. The man can see what he is doing, after all, and Jon, well, not so much without a mirror.

“Okay, here it goes, bossman!” Tim’s hands lay cautiously on his temporomandibular joints. “Three, two, one!”

Jon groans as his jaw is pushed into place and replaces Tim’s hands with his own as he goes through the motions that usually help his muscles relax and help with the pain. Through the corner of his eye, he sees Sasha and Martin approach.

And really, discounting all the awfulness of this experience, with them, it isn’t quite so bad.

“I can’t believe it, honey!” Sasha teases, her eyes crinkling. “You accepted help? Unbelievable!”

“I know, right, I think it’s because of how sexy I am-“

“Well… I didn’t want to brag before, but since Tim’s being so humble, I actually got him to let me help him a long time ago, when Prentiss…”

Jon changes his mind. He despises his partners. The smile on his face is totally just deceit.