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voiceless-terror · 4 years

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Respite (The Magnus Archives)

Whumptober 2020 Day Twenty Three: Exhaustion

Fandom: The Magnus Archives

Characters: Jonathan Sims, Sasha James, Tim Stoker, Martin Blackwood, Elias Bouchard, Rosie

Summary: Archiving is hard work, but someone’s got to do it.

Or, five people who caught Jonathan Sims sleeping on the job.

“Alright Jon, I think I’m going to head out-oh.”

Sasha had been gone for five minutes, tops. And yet here was Jonathan Sims, fast asleep in his chair and using her messenger bag as a pillow. And snoring.

They worked late into the night on some hunch Jon had - once he got on a research kick, there was no stopping him. Sasha wasn’t much better. They encouraged the worst in each other sometimes, but that’s how they got their sterling reputations as researchers. So this was not an unfamiliar scene.

But it was ten at night and Sasha had been looking forward to finally getting home, putting her feet up and knocking back a glass of wine or two. They had hit a dead end and wouldn’t be able to continue until tomorrow, anyway. Jon had begrudgingly agreed and she popped over to the bathroom only to return to...this.

It couldn’t be comfortable. Her bag was covered in buttons and pins, some particularly pointy. It wasn’t exactly clean either; it had been thrown on one too many questionable surfaces in the past few months. But Jon seemed comfortable, if his open mouth and the tiny bit of drool currently on the front pouch were anything to go by. Gross.

She contemplated waking him up. He would want to head home soon as well, the trains became entirely unpredictable the later it got and they boarded at the same station. But something stopped her. Maybe it was the dark shadows under his eyes, the small, wheezing breaths. The way his brow slightly furrowed even in sleep. The crankiness that increased as the week went on. If anyone deserved a quick rest, it was him.

Sasha had been in the job for three years before Jon came on. She cut her teeth in Artefact Storage for the first six months- initially she’d been excited to delve into the dangerous and mysterious objects they had on site, but that excitement quickly faded into dread after a week on the job. She got the first transfer out into research, much more her speed. She was steadily making her way up the ladder and was now trusted to train new hires and interns. Ergo, Jon.

When she first met him, she honestly thought he wouldn’t make it far. He was fresh out of college, twitchy and short-tempered with an intermittent stutter. She didn’t fault him for that of course, but that didn’t save him from the judgment of others. No one wanted to get within a mile of him until Sasha volunteered her services in a rare moment of pity. His hand was dry and shook in hers when they were introduced; he was clearly not used to touch, though surely he must have shaken many a hand by now.

Sasha was good at teaching, though she wasn’t very interested in it. “You should teach!” so many of her friends and family members said. Sasha hated being told what to do even more than she hated teaching.

Jon was a difficult student. He had constant questions that Sasha patiently answered. He did not take criticism well, once getting up and walking away for an hour after Sasha fixed his grammar. He couldn’t seem to focus, which was not at all promising in a career that demanded it. Still, she worked with him as a sort of pet project. If she could make a functioning researcher out of Jon, she could prove herself worthy of respect and perhaps a promotion or two herself. So she figured out how Jon ticked- what worked for him and what didn’t. It took some hard work but Jon opened up bit by bit, giving her more insight into the person he was. And he wasn’t all that bad, once you got past the prickly exterior. He was whip-smart with a dry, clever humor that Sasha could appreciate. When he got on the trail of something interesting, he followed it to the end with a dogged determination. Sasha found herself opening up in turn, talking to him about her past jobs in academia and her frustrations with the Institute. They had a lot in common, it turned out. Both were academics at their core, finding debate and discussion endlessly entertaining. They both had a soft spot for nice wine and greasy pub food. And they were both constantly underestimated and overlooked- Sasha, as a woman in her field with a tendency towards “aggressive behavior” which in any man would just be called confidence and expertise, Jon with his inability to read social situations, the stutter in his voice that undermined his points, and the painful earnestness in every word he said, no matter how pointed. So yes, they got on. He made her laugh. That was hard to do these days.

Five more minutes, she promised, sitting back down at the table with a fond look to her companion. Thirty minutes later she woke him up, smiling at his panicked embarrassment and laughing in exhilaration as they ran to the station, just barely making the last train.

___________

What does Elias think he’s playing at, putting this poor young man in charge of the Archives?

Rosie had worked at the Magnus Institute for two decades and had seen many a manager come and go. She was Elias’s first and only secretary, coming in a bright-eyed young girl and now a tired, disillusioned woman firmly in middle age. You see a lot of things at the Institute. Sometimes you have to turn a blind eye.

When Gertrude Robinson went missing, Elias handled the situation with a bizarre aloofness that Rosie felt no need to question. Questioning things got you in trouble around here. But when he told Rosie of his plans for Jonathan Sims, she had to stop herself from scoffing. She had seen the way Elias spoke to him, mentoring him in a way he never had with any other employee. Perhaps he just had a fondness for the boy, though she wasn’t sure what he had done to earn it. Jon never got used to Elias’s presence, constantly jumping at a hand on his shoulder and laughing nervously through any of their conversations. It would be endearing if it wasn’t so pitiful.

But to make him Head Archivist? The man had only been here four years, there were plenty of other researchers and staff members who had not only seniority but the credentials to match. Jonathan Sims had an Oxford pedigree, impressive to be sure, but in Literature and History. It didn’t help that he seemed one missing file away from a nervous breakdown at all times. And they were going to give him an entire department to manage? A department that was in shambles and hadn’t been properly handled in the last fifty or so years? Good luck, kiddo.

She had been a little short with him the day he took the position- she had a monster of a headache and he wasn’t exactly making it easy on her, what with his questions about Gertrude and his ridiculous little proclamations of “I don’t believe in ghosts!” But the sincere gratitude in his voice as he told her to thank Elias for the opportunity came back to her hours later. You have no idea what you’re in for. It seemed almost sadistic to put a man like that in charge of the Archives.

The situation never seemed to improve. From what little she saw of him in the hallways, he always looked haggard and on edge. When he stood in front of Elias’s door waiting to be let in for another meeting (Elias had been scheduling a lot of them as of late), his hands fidgeted and his feet shuffled. She felt bad for him, when she remembered to. She had twenty years to get used to Elias, but he seemed to get worse with every visit to his office.

It was with a reluctant sigh that she took the paperwork from Elias and headed down to the Archives. Just a few things that slipped my mind on the last visit, so sorry Rosie. It was the end of the day and she was punctual to a fault, meaning she very rarely stayed past five unless Elias requested it. Even the Archives were empty- the assistants had all filtered out earlier and her footsteps echoed in silence as she made her way to the Head Archivist’s office.

“Mr. Sims?” she called, immediately regretting the choice of name. It sounded unnatural coming out of her mouth. “Jon, are you in there?” There was no one in his desk chair, though his bag and coat were still accounted for. She was not about to do a scavenger hunt through the Archives, the place gave her the creeps and it got worse with each passing minute. She contemplated just leaving them on his desk when she saw a half-opened door labeled “Document Storage.” I’ll just peek in, can’t hurt.

“Jon?” she called again, creaking open the door and peering inside. It was not very well-lit; half of the lights were flickering like something out of a horror film. No one answered her. “Jon, if you’re here I have a few papers for you to sign. I’ll just leave them on your desk-” It was then she noticed a cot in the corner. That’s not allowed, she thought testily. It was rumpled- somebody had used it recently, she deduced. And then she looked down to the floor to find one leg sticking out from under the cot. She shrieked, grabbing at her chest as she slowly made her way over, unsure of whether she was about to die or if she had to call an ambulance.

She kneeled down gingerly, her legs trembling as she found one Jonathan Sims entangled with a small, tattered blanket and snoring softly, completely lost to the world. She sighed in relief and no small amount of irritation- the man had just taken about three years off her life, at least. And what was he doing under the cot? Such a strange thing, that Jonathan Sims.

She reached out and grabbed his arm, giving it a good shake. “Jon!” He kept right on sleeping, completely ignorant to her entreaties. She gave him another, harder shake- nothing. This is ridiculous. She leaned in closer and opened her mouth to give one last deafening shriek of his name. “Jon!”

That did the trick. Too well, one might say.

Jon immediately sat up, which wasn’t a good idea- he only had a few inches of room left under the bed and ended up slamming his head against the metal rungs and leaning back down with a cry. “Agh!” he squeezed his eyes shut as she reached out her hand in apology.

“God, I’m so sorry,” she babbled, patting his arm. “It’s just, you weren’t waking up and- are you alright?” His silence was worrying. Oh god, Elias is going to murder me if I’ve killed his Archivist.

“Yes,” he hissed, awkwardly sliding out from under the bed in a sort of shimmying motion and rubbing at his forehead. Luckily he hadn’t broken any skin, it was just red at the point of impact. “What on earth- ah, Rosie!” The instant switch in tone as his eyes focused on her form would be amusing in any other situation. “So sorry, d-did Elias need anything from me?”

She paused, considering the man in front of her. He looked bad, really bad, like call-the-doctor-bad. Thinner than ever with dark circles under his eyes, like he hadn’t had a good nights’ sleep in weeks, if ever. And that look in his eyes, the change in his voice as soon as he noticed her- Elias had sway even through proxy. Suddenly Mr. Sims was all eager-to-please, as if he hadn’t just been caught collapsed under a bed in sheer exhaustion.

“What are you doing under there?” is what she asked, though she did not mean to. She wasn’t really supposed to care about anyone in the institute and she’d done a good job of it thus far. But something about this situation felt off, even to her.

He ran a hand through messy hair (he’s going gray so young) and gave her a self-deprecating smile. “Ah, just a- I’m just a bit tired, that’s all.” He made no attempt to explain his odd choice of napping area. “If you could please not tell Elias-”

“Of course,” she assured, again strangely protective of the silly little man in front of her. “Think nothing of it- just need you to sign a few papers, is all.” She got up to allow him room to move, ignoring the creaking of limbs far too young to sound so bad. “Should probably use the bed next time, dear. That floor’s got to be horrible on your back.”

Jon blushed, grabbing at the papers and looking anywhere but her eyes. “Yes, well,” he shifted his feet, gesturing at the tattered blanket he had extracted himself from. “I’ve got that, so it’s fine.”

She fixed him with a dubious stare, but let him have this one. He headed back to his office to grab a pen, limping in obvious pain. The papers were signed and they said their goodbyes, Rosie heading home and Jon heading back to Document Storage, whether to sleep or work she couldn’t tell.

In her next round of discretionary spending, she ordered a few pillows and a nice knitted throw for the Archives. The break room had been looking a bit drab, it deserved a little sprucing up.

______________

“Mr. Stoker, if you could come get your Archivist I’d be much obliged.”

“I’m on it, Janice.”

Tim sighed. Just another Wednesday night at the Magnus Institute.

Jon was running them ragged with investigations, following up on every statement he deemed ‘unsatisfactory’ in terms of research. So far, he had deemed almost every statement as so. It was not very fun.

Tim had taken pains to finish his research bright and early, wanting to get home as quickly as possible and finish up the series he’d been binging. This plan included the added plus of avoiding the worms that had been showing up outside the institute over the past couple of days. But then Jon had come out of his office, looking sad and lost as he handed over another statement for Tim to work on. “Tomorrow is fine, Tim,” Jon said, in an uncharacteristic show of generosity. “No need to worry.” Tim was worried now, for an entirely different reason.

He promised himself he would only stay an extra hour, just to make sure Jon got home alright. That was two hours ago. Jon had apparently snuck out to the library without him noticing, and now needed to be fetched for reasons Tim was pretty sure he could guess at.

Jon was never really on good terms with the librarians. What he lacked in charm, he did not make up for in well, anything really. He got upset when a book was in the wrong place; he was very short whenever something would take longer than a few minutes. He constantly hid from the librarians when it was time to close- one night he was quite literally chased out by Janice, and another night he was locked in (also by Janice) and didn’t even notice.

So finding him tucked in between two bookshelves fast asleep was not surprising in the least. It didn’t look comfortable but Jon seemed fairly relaxed, crammed as he was. This had happened more than a few times back in research but never recently. And never was he quite so hidden away, not even a limb giving away his position. He knew Jon liked his small spaces, but even this was pushing it. Janice hadn’t attempted to wake him, knowing what a fools errand it would be. “That boy could sleep through the end of days, I reckon,” she said as she opened the door for Tim and ushered him down the aisles. “I don’t know how he does it.”

“That makes two of us,” Tim mumbled as he crouched down in front of the man he previously called a friend and now a boss. “Jon? You up, mate?”

No response. Typical. Tim could keep this going for the rest of the night, or he could take matters into his own hands.

Let it never be said that Tim wasn’t hands-on.

He managed to maneuver Jon into his arms without waking the man, a feat he’d perfected over the years. Jon, for his part, just slumped into his chest and muttered some nonsense under his breath that Tim couldn’t make out. Jon was a fairly vocal sleep-talker, something he found endlessly amusing. This situation was anything but amusing, however, and he could barely summon up a smile to give Janice as he carted his boss back down to the Archives.

Jon was falling back into old habits. He was becoming distant and moody, snapping at any inquiry about his health or well-being. It took all of Tim’s strength not to snap back at times. Sasha helped keep him in check, giving him warning glances whenever she believed he went too far, which was happening more and more often. He was afraid for the frail man in his arms. He had a strange sense of impending calamity that woke him up in the middle of the night, heart racing like it did after his encounter with the circus. It awoke a strange, primal fear inside of him that Tim couldn’t control and it crept in more and more by the day.

Even when Jon was safe and comfortable, tucked neatly into the cot in Document Storage, the fear didn’t ease. He wanted to stay and keep watch, though that didn’t make much sense. The Archives were probably the safest place to be. Nothing could reach them in this dank, dusty prison cell of a workplace. Not even Prentiss. But he was tired, so he decided to leave Jon to his dreams and chew him out tomorrow morning. Now wasn’t the time.

He took a quick detour to his desk and back to Document Storage before he left, throwing one of his cardigans over Jon’s sleeping form. Just in case he gets cold, he reasoned. In reality, he didn’t know who it was actually for- Jon or himself. Maybe both.

_________

This is ridiculous.

Initially, he had been happy and slightly proud to see his Archivist stumbling back into work, bleeding and freshly marked by the Corruption. He of course told him the opposite, encouraging him to take all the time available to him to recover. But his Archivist was nothing if not stubborn, and watching him limp about the Archives, paranoid and afraid, was a wonder to behold.

Today, however, might not have been the best time to come back.

The Magnus Institute, on paper, had a fully functioning HR department. That this HR department only included one incredibly overworked woman who was willing to let many things slide in order to collect a paycheck was no matter. They still had to observe the basic requirements that came along with it, and that included having mandatory yearly training in things such as workplace harassment. The modern workplace truly was a marvel - as if anyone willing to commit these acts would be cowed by one seminar.

But here they were on a Thursday afternoon, every supervisor gathered in the conference room to undergo ‘mandatory training’ in sensitive subject matters. The training wasn’t actually training at all but an instructional video of about thirty minutes. It was quite literally the least they could do- Elias wasn’t about to go wasting precious money on hiring more professionals to help them avoid inappropriate conduct. That’s what lawyers were for, after all.

Jon had stumbled in once the video had already begun, looking bedraggled and worse for wear. The only seat left was in the back, conveniently located right next to Elias. He gave his Archivist a short nod and glanced back at the screen with a bored detachment, watching from another pair of judging eyes as Jon stumbled and struggled his way around his colleagues, murmuring apologies.

He didn’t acknowledge Jon’s greeting, preferring instead to keep him at a distance. He didn’t want him to get too comfortable with him, not at this early stage. But he still noted the exhaustion in his features with some concern- he did need him semi-functioning, how else would they get any statements recorded?

Jon managed valiantly to stay awake for the first ten minutes before he started to nod off, his head jerking backwards in a sad attempt at consciousness. Elias rolled his eyes, clearing his throat several times in an effort to keep him awake. He didn’t much care for Jon’s dignity, but it was rather embarrassing for him to have an Archivist who couldn’t stay awake for a mere thirty minutes once the lights were down.

But then it started to veer into dangerous territory. Jon was slumping down further and further in his seat, each jerk awake more distracting than the last. Elias would ask him to leave if he didn’t think he would collapse on his way out the door and cause even more of a commotion. No, it would be fine to let him sleep if his head wasn’t constantly listing to the left, further and further and- Christ.

Jon’s head found purchase on his shoulder and there he remained, finally content to doze in peace.

They were tucked far enough in the corner that nobody could really see unless they strained their eyes. Everyone else was either watching the video or falling asleep themselves. Elias considered his options- he could wake the man, knowing the force required to do so would only cause a scene, or he could let him sleep until the end credits rolled- credits he knew were incredibly loud, and thus would cover up any yelp the Archivist emitted upon waking.

Both were terrible choices. If Elias had his way Jon would have collapsed back in the Archives and avoided this mess entirely. He would also have the added bonus of being able to scold him later- a win-win, certainly. But alas, it was not meant to be. He sacrificed his pride and let the man continue to sleep on his shoulder, tensing as much as he could to keep Jon from slipping further down into a more embarrassing position. The added irony of the subject on the screen- Unwanted Workplace Advances- was not lost on him.

At least the man was having unpleasant dreams. He contented himself with watching the Archivist flit across his nightmares, running from worms and spiders and whatever other horrors his mind conjured. It was much more entertaining than the video on the screen.

And then the credits rolled. A few seconds before they began, Elias placed a firm hand on Jon’s shoulder and shook him once, hard. Just in time, the outdated, cheesy music blasted from the speakers and nicely covered his Archivist's shriek of terror and subsequent heavy breathing as his eyes shot open, panicked. No one was the wiser to that little display.

His hand turned light, friendly. Just a boss showing concern for an unwell employee. “Jon, are you alright?” he asked, schooling his face into a parental sort of worry. That always seemed to work well with Jon- he was much more apt to be agreeable when the authority figure in question made it personal. “Do you need to go home?”

His eyes could barely focus as everyone else in the room stood up, yawning and stretching and milling about. “I-yes, I think I just need a lie down.” Elias nodded in faux-concern, helping the man to his feet.

Jon didn’t say a word as he walked him past the front door and into the Archives. He knew he had work to do.

________

Jon was in the way.

This was not a sentence Martin Blackwood had ever thought before. Even when Jon was technically in the way, he wasn’t, not really. Wherever Jon was, was wherever Jon needed to be. Whether it was standing in front of Martin when he needed to get to the break room, or blocking the water cooler as he lectured Tim about ‘workplace standards,’ Martin wasn’t going to ask him to move. Fighting with the man was absolutely exhausting and a lesson in futility.

But Jon was literally in his way. As in if he didn’t move, Martin would not be able to do his job for the rest of the day.

The man was curled on top of a box of files, the exact box of files that Martin needed to access. He wasn’t moving- Martin had thought at first that he was dead, but his slow, even breaths disproved that. Why would he choose this spot to take a nap? It couldn’t be comfortable- his back was hunched and his bad leg stuck out at an awkward angle. His arms were sprawled over the box as if guarding it. Sasha had told him a few stories from their research days, but he had never seen the man asleep over anything but his desk. Jon was looking far too vulnerable these days, and Martin didn’t know what to do with that.

“Jon?” he tried quietly. The man didn’t stir. Figures. He wanted to reach out and shake him awake, but his wounds were barely healed and kept opening up, probably from his nighttime escapades. He didn’t want to be the cause of more of Jon’s pain. So he stood there awkwardly, shifting from side to side as his boss continued his slumber.

“Something wrong?” Martin jumped at the sound of Tim’s voice- Jon did not. He was leaning in the doorway, looking almost as tired as Jon and definitely in need of a nap as well. He recovered a bit better, having taken every day allotted to him. But that didn’t mean he was back at peak performance. Tim followed his gaze to the floor and rolled his eyes upon seeing Jon asleep. ‘Really?” Tim was very irritated these days. Martin didn’t blame him.

“I didn’t know what to do!” he whispered back, though he probably didn’t need to keep his voice down. “I don’t want to hurt him, but I need that box-”

“Just move him,” Tim replied unkindly, making his way over. “He won’t wake up, he’s a very heavy sleeper, honest.” He reached out a hand to grab Jon’s shoulder but Martin stopped him.

“N-No!” he stuttered forcefully, well aware of Tim’s attitude towards Jon these days. “I’ll just, I can wait, I guess-”

“You said he was in your way.” With a wince Tim crouched down, placing an arm around Jon’s waist and hoisting him over his shoulder in one smooth, practiced move. “See?” he said, also whispering. “Not a peep.” It was true, Jon hadn’t stirred one bit. It was also very concerning. He watched as Tim slowly made his way across the room to the cot, placing Jon in bed with an infinite care he didn’t think the man capable of. Like hands at a piano remembering a well-practiced tune, Tim’s body played out a gentleness he no longer felt, not anymore. He even placed a blanket over Jon, pausing for a moment to look down at him. Martin couldn’t see the look on his face and couldn’t guess at what it was.

“There.” He turned around and abruptly exited the room, not sparing another glance at either of them. When Martin looks back at this moment, he’ll wonder if that’s the last kindness Tim ever offered Jon, and how sad it was that he wasn’t even awake to see it.

________________

A year later and Martin finds himself standing over Jon, watching him sleep. He is curled around a tape recorder. The light is on, it’s recording. For what end, Martin does not know.

He slips an arm around Jon’s waist like he saw Tim once do. Jon shivers- Martin is very cold these days, so he doesn’t fault him. He deposits him in the cot he knows so well- he will be safe here. Warm. Basira is here, and Melanie- they’ll look out for him, in their own way. He pauses, looking down at the man in the bed. He is alive, but Martin couldn’t tell you if he is breathing.

He does not visit the Archives again.

ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27162460

#whumptober2020 #exhaustion #no.23 #fic #tma #the magnus archives #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #tim stoker #sasha james #elias bouchard #my writing #jonmartin #not a lot but its there #not really any cws

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somuchbetterthanthat · 4 years

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Probably too long for tumblr, un-betaed, written in one rush, utterly and completely self-indulgent. Have a little bit of touch-adverse/kiss-adverse Martin (with a good deal of denial and internalize prejudice to boot, so warning) for Aspec Martin Week.

It’s been a week, and they haven’t kissed.

It makes sense, Martin insists to tell himself, eager to find excuses for that one little discordant note in his otherwise perfect fairytale. What they shared in the Lonely had been -- much more powerful than that, for starters. And afterwards, there’d been the rush of getting somewhere safe, first to Martin’s flat, then to Scotland. They’d gone from stuttering at each other, exhausted and soft, blatantly trying to get over months of separation, to falling back in each other’s orbit with an easiness that made Martin light-headed when he thought about it too long.

So they hadn’t kissed. It just hadn’t -- came up yet. They’d gone so fast, so suddenly, it was nice to have that little thrill of anticipation. They were building towards something. They were building something, right now. There was no rush, was there?

After all, they’d hold hands, a few times. In the train to Scotland, fingers loosely intertwined, when Martin was still shivering from a coldness that had nothing to do with the rain pouring outside, and everything with the pervasive attraction of the sea that was still trying to drown out the beating of his own heart. They’d hold hands and it was warm and good and -- and well, sweaty, sometimes, when they kept at it for too long, but Martin had daydreamed of holding Jon’s hand for so long he could never make himself let go (and if there was an odd drop of relief wherever Jon let go first, at last, well, that was -- that was --)

Jon was affectionate, the way Martin had seen cats be when he fell into YouTube spirals, before. He hovered in Martin’s physical space, nuzzle his shoulder when he was sleepy, put his legs on Martin’s lap when they sat on the couch, and downright beamed and melted into his arms the first time Martin, filled with abrupt courage and stubbornness had decided to hug him, and every single time after that (this chased away the sound of the sea; if he kept Jon’s close enough, all he could hear was Jon’s voice and Jon’s heart and Jon’s breathing --)

(And if it get too much, sometimes, if he had to bite his tongue not to flinch when Jon’s hand brushed over his arms, his neck, his back, suddenly and without any apparent pattern, well, that was --)

They slept in the same bed, for heaven’s sake. They hadn’t even talked about it. The first night, tiredness had won over any potential flustering. Afterwards, it’d been easy, like everything else between them. Martin adored the intimacy of it in a way that was hard to describe properly. He loved it most in the morning, when the sun came in and he woke up before Jon, liked going to prepare breakfast knowing that he could come back whenever he wanted, and Jon would be there still, comfortable and vulnerable and in their bed, probably curled on Martin’s side, nose pressed against Martin’s pillow. He loved it most when they spent the evening there, still dressed, Jon’s reading, Martin scribbling in the small notebook Jon had bought for him at the London train station, cheeks flushed and eyes hopeful.

(They slept in the same bed, and Jon’s pajamas were too short, and his legs hairy, and his feet cold, and when he fell asleep he had a tendency to roll over and lean his legs against Martin’s, and Martin closed his hands into fists and breathed, breathed, and tried not to feel like he was trapped between suffocating in the bed, or disappearing into the fog to escape it all together. It was intimate. It was intimacy. It was what normal couples did, sharing a bed, and why couldn’t he enjoy it, he who’d dreamed of this his whole life? Intimacy. A relationship. Someone to love and to hold and fall asleep with, he who had been craving gentle, casual, loving touches his whole life, why couldn’t he ----)

So they hadn’t kissed; it didn’t matter, because Martin knew they would anyway. It was just that, out of everything, he had dreamed of kissing the most his whole life. When he was very young, the person hadn’t even had a face; he’d thought this would happen very officially, at his wedding. As a teenager, it’d slowly dawned on him he had no desire to kiss girls. Harder, he’d thought, but that would happen, he knew it could, Mr Anders had a boyfriend, everybody knew he had. Martin had imagined his first kiss with Louis who was two years older and played Rugby. Then it’d been with Tom, and Samir, and -- and then, there hadn’t been school anymore, but that was fine; he’d imagined his first kiss to be with an half stranger in a café, or in this bar where they hosted poetry nights.

It’d never happened, of course, but that was fine. That was fine. Who needed a relationship, anyway? Lots of people were single, and didn’t kiss people all the time, and if Martin sometimes felt icy envy when Tim used to speak of how easily he seduced people, well, that was easily pushed back down. (Martin had thought, once or twice, that he could ask Tim. Warm, friendly, easy-going Tim, who would never judge him for being inexperienced. He could have, but Martin didn’t want to kiss Tim. There was no pull, no attraction, no matter how charming Tim’s smile was. He wasn’t in love --)

And then there was Jon. The first time he’d daydreamed about kissing Jon, he was sleeping in his cot, and it smelled like his awful-but-not-quite-boss and safety-safety-safe-. Afterwards, there’d been million of other occasions. God, how much he’d craved, this past months, to go down the Archives, the hell with Peter, and to cup Jon’s face and to -- (and then he hadn’t wanted to anymore, and that was fine, too, it was easier, to stare at Jon and care in a pragmatic way instead of like a pathetic, lovesick fool. One of us should, he’d thought in his worst moment, and he loathed the man he’d been for those weeks so much -- there was a quiet dread in him that liked to murmur back to him Daisy’s words, that the entities didn’t force anything on them, just exacerbated what was already inside them, and every time, inevitably, he felt so cold again--)

So they hadn’t kissed. It was fine. They were going to. They were building to it. They just needed the perfect moment. First kisses weren’t just about the right person. They were about the right place, at the right time. Martin had wanted this for so long --

Tonight, Jon’s scowling at their puzzle like it personally insulted him, has been for the past ten minutes, and the light of the fire is reflecting in his eyes; he’s wearing Martin’s jumper and his hair is still wet from his earlier shower and Martin’s heart jumps at his throat as he thinks now. It has to be now.

“I’d like to kiss you,” he blurts out, filled with a sudden urgency. “Please? If -- If that’s -- if you want to.”

Jon looks up, startled, and it’s magic, the way his scowl disappears under his sudden flush and shy, happy smile. “Ah, yes,” he says, like he’s surprised. “Yes, I want -- I thought you might not --”

“No,” Martin says, “No I really really do --” “Well, then.” Jon’s lips curled into something that’s full of mischief, and Martin didn’t know it was possible to adore someone just as much as he adores Jon. “Come here, Mr Blackwood.”

“Oh I’ve got to work for it, have I?” Martin retorts, but he’s grinning, and already moving to Jon. They push the puzzle away, and Martin’s whole body is thrumming with nervous energy, abruptly, as Jon looks up to him, eyes dark and beautiful and soft. “I haven’t -- I haven’t actually ever done this,” he says, and is surprised to find he’s not embarrassed to say.

“There’s really not much to it,” Jon tells him, but he cups Martin’s face, tender as ever, and Martin thinks -- non sense, what is there more intense and intimate in the world than this? What else embodies love as much as kissing? -- and then Jon’s lips gently brush against his

-- and it’s good; for a few seconds, Martin feels electrified and so happy he could float; and then Jon’s lips are pressing back a little more insistently, and they’re a bit dry, and chapped, and his breath is hot against Martin’s face, and Martin’s knees are not wobbly, and the electricity has passed and all there is left is two bodies, pressed awkwardly against each other, skin and flesh and that odd, wet noise, and he wants to run, he wants to run so badly, this is ---

Jon moves away. Blinks worriedly, smile gone. “Martin?”

“No,” Martin says, his voice too tight, his hands trembling. “No, come back it’s -- sorry, i’m going to -- I’m just, i’m new to this? It’s got to -- It’s just -- I need --”

“Martin, breathe,” Jon snaps (he’s not angry, Martin has learnt to recognize the different ways Jon snaps over the years. He’s worried, and anxious, and probably thinking he’s done something wrong, the beautiful idiot --)

Martin breathes.

“Let me try again,” he stammers, after a minute.

“...Are you sure?” Jon tentatively asks. He’s so far away, careful not to lean too close while clearly yearning for it, and Martin forbids himself to start crying.

“Please,” he says instead.

“Okay,” Jon says. This time, he is so much more hesitant, so Martin is the one who crosses the distance between them, heart racing desperately in his chest. He tries to think of every movie, every story he’s ever watched or read or listen to; he puts one hand on Jon’s shoulder, and one hand on Jon’s hair, and Jon sighs, and their lips met and this time it’s right except, except it’s --

it’s all wrong, everything is wrong, and all that Martin manages to be aware of is how awkward and weird it all is; just like the hand-holding, when they do it too long, just like those little unexpected touches Jon offer at random moments, just like Jon’s legs in bed, and his damn cold feet;

Martin doesn’t remember breaking off the kiss; suddenly he is sobbing angrily -- at the lonely, at himself, at his childhood self who’s probably dreamed of this so much he’s ruined the reality of it all for themselves as an adult, -- and hides his face in Jon’s shoulder, apologizing like an idiot; he doesn’t even know what he babblers on. Stupid stuff, properly, because he’s an idiot, because he’s doing this horribly wrong, all of this, because he’s not feeling anything of what he should feel right now, because there is something ugly in him that refuses to be tamed even by love, and so what now? What now?

(Jon holds him. Jon murmurs it’s okay, it’s okay, we don’t have to, it’s okay, I love you, breathe for me, Martin, it’s okay, you’re okay -- and how is it, that Martin can love him so much and yet not be able to --)

“I want to,” he manages to say. “I’ve wanted to. All my life I just --”

“I’m sorry,” Jon says, as if he is in any way responsible for this disaster. “Kisses are very much overstated, if you want my opinion.”

“But it’s not,” Martin argues, clinging to him harder. “It’s how you, you show love --”

“Is it? I never thought so. I like kissing just fine, I suppose, but It does get boring, especially if you do it for too long. Assuming we’re speaking of mouth kissing, of course.”

“How can you -- How can you say that?” Martin sputters, tearing himself away from Jon’s arms to stare at him. Jon is frowning, but he also looks so calm, it’s baffling.

“Easily,” Jon said, shrugging, a bit defensively. “Look, Martin, I told you four days ago I didn’t have sex. Ever. And you said it was fine, that you didn’t mind.”

“Well, yes, but --”

“How is that in any way different than kissing?”

“It’s, it’s -- I don’t know but --” Martin can feel himself tearing up again. Jon’s eyes soften, and he gently squeezes Martin’s hand.

“If you want to try again, at some point, we can,” he tells him, and it’s so impossibly gentle. “But it’s alright if it’s not -- something you enjoy. If we don’t kiss, ever, I won’t love you any less for it.”

“Maybe I just -- I just need to practice,” Martin says, quieter now.

“Maybe,” Jon admits. “But if it makes you this distressed every time, I might be the one who has to say no, here.”

Martin wants to argue some more, but something in Jon’s expression, stubborn and worried still, stopped him from doing so. “I love you,” he says instead, because that part is true, that part he trust; if he cannot control his body, at least he has mastered his heart;

Jon smiles. “I love you,” he says back, and he brings Martin’s hand to his mouth and kisses it gently.

Martin’s heart stops; his cheeks warm up abruptly; a shiver runs down his spine. He feels his breath hitch up his throat.

“Do that again?” he tries, voice trembling.

Jon raises his eyebrows. “This?” his lips linger on Martin’s knuckles, this time. Martin’s knees feel weak. Jon’s smile gets wider; warmer. “Oh, I can do this,” he nods, seriously. “Tell me if it’s get boring.” and he kisses Martin’s hand again; each finger, with a tenderness that makes Martin feel dizzy.

“I love you,” he repeats, because he thinks, he’s starting to understand what Jon was saying. “I love you so much.”

Jon kisses his wrist; his lips are a bit chapped and it’s slightly wet and Martin’s pulse is loud in his ears.

This. this is perfect.

There is no but; there is no quiet, shameful parentheses; Martin thinks he might have to talk to Jon about the bed, maybe, tomorrow; for now, his eyes fall back on Jon’s hand. He wonders what it’ll be like, to kiss it. He’s got a feeling it might be very pleasant, indeed.

#the magnus archives #aspecmartinweek #tw: internalized prejudice #i /guess/ it can vaguely fit the prompt #exploration #?#or together #but mmh #tma stories #sorry there is an actual story i'm working on properly that ought to arrive hopefully next week or so

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nyctolovian · 4 years

Link

(this is my first tma fic so i struggled a bit haha) Inspired by this amazing fancomic by @mod2amaryllis. I borrowed some of ur stuff cos it’s really just ;-;

Summary: TMA 170 from Jon's perspective

Even as he stood outside the looming mansion, Jon could already hear the despair-brimmed tears of its victims drip upon its creaky oak floorboards. He also instantly Knew that this house expanded far beyond its original physical form, dipping far into the reaches of existential emptiness. As Jon lightly encircled his fingers around the metal of the door handle, its frigid seeped into his bones. He glanced to his side. The way Martin was steadying himself with deep controlled breaths as he worried at his lower lip sent a pang through Jon.

This was The Lonely’s domain after all.

However, Martin’s chestnut eyes also held steely determination. His voice, too, was firm when he said, “Let’s go in.”

“B-But are you going to be okay?” Jon asked, placing a gentle hand on Martin’s forearm.

The huff Martin let out was resigned and he pursed his lips for a second. “It’s not like we can just – I don't know – saunter round the building now, can we?”

“I- Well, no, we can’t,” he mumbled, “but I still don’t want to force you through this.”

“I’ve come this far, Jon. I’m not letting you go on by yourself."

"Um, a break perhaps?"

"It's really fine," Martin assured. "I'm ready."

Gripping the strap of his bag, Jon nodded. “Alright. Remember to stay close then. I know the route.” He clenched his jaw and pushed the heavy door, which opened with a hollow groan.

A long corridor stretched before them, but they couldn’t see much beyond several doors along it. There was a thick fog obscuring the rest of the house. Martin flinched as white mist extended through the doorway and curled slowly, like a thin finger beckoning him in. However, when Jon looked at Martin again, he was met with an adamant glare, so he licked his lips and faced the corridors again.

As soon as he took the first step into the domain, he was enveloped in coldness. The shiver that ran through Martin as he followed told Jon that it wasn’t just him.

A statement tickled the back of his throat but he pushed it down in the interest of safety. He didn’t want to lose himself in the statement as he had in the burning building. Leaving Martin stranded here would have worse consequences than a wake-up slap across his face.

Jon stood at the entrance, assessing the domain as best as he could.

Unlike Peter Lukas’ Lonely, which had strong winds that smelled of salt, this coldness was still and smelled like an immaculately sterilised ward. The fog here, unlike the moving clouds of the seas, snaked lazily around the house. Not to mention, there was an incessant tick-tock surrounding them but none of the clocks in sight had hands, as though time was simultaneously passing and standing still. He could also hear the muffled creaks all around the house, even above him. It was unnerving.

As he slowly and tentatively moved forward, Jon spotted several silhouettes shuffling around in the fog, but they didn’t see anyone as they passed each other by. He peered into the nearest room and saw a little girl shivering as she sat hunched on a green metal foldable chair. Tears dripped from her small chin as she hiccuped silently. Jon tore his gaze from her.

Other than what was in his immediate surroundings, however, he couldn’t Know much else, other than the fact that a miasma of loneliness poisoned the air of this domain. With a hum, he said, “ How strange. I think The Eye can’t see much in this fog either.” He swung his hand backwards for Martin to take. “Let’s stay together until I can figure this…” His heart leapt to his throat.

He spun around. “Martin?”

Gone.

Only fog.

Frantically, Jon looked around. His breaths grew short and shallow. “Martin?!” he cried.

Gone.

He dashed through the corridor, searching, leaving no room spared. His voice broke as he called, “Martin!”

Gone. Gone. Gone.

Dread swallowed him whole as he scrambled around the mansion, passing by Lonely person after Lonely person. But Martin still couldn't be found.

“Martin! Where are you?!”

How could Jon just lose him? He was just behind! There wasn’t any logical way he could simply disappear from sight like this.

No, no. This distorted reality didn’t work logically anymore. People could very well up and vanish now. He shouldn’t have gotten distracted.

“Shit.” Jon ran his fingers through his hair. “Wh-where would Martin– Should– Shit shit shit. I don't–" He took in a long shuddering gasp and licked his lips. "I need to look for him. I need…"

Words that were not his bubbled in his chest, along with his swelling panic. His face was numb and his fingers tingled with terror.

"Wh-Where is he…"

It was hard to breathe at all, as though the fog was stuffing his lungs. He felt the beginnings of a sob.

He took another deep breath. Then, the words spilled out of The Archivist's lips. "One might assume that because he smiled often, he was free of worries, " he began, his features growing slack. “ What nobody sees are the tendrils of mist that enlace, encase and entrap him. However, that does not matter now. For he sits in the Moorland House, and there is no more illusion. He is truly and perfectly a-alone .” The Archivist choked. “Th-There is n- not … No… No! H-he isn’t–”

Jon slapped a hand over his mouth and fell to his knees. He gagged upon unspoken words, but he shoved them further downwards. Digging his fingers into the flesh of his arm, Jon forced himself to get out of his trance. Five seconds in, hold, five seconds out… Repeat.

His heart was still racing as he pushed himself to his feet again, leaning against the white walls for support. “I will not take that from him! Never from him!” Jon spat, raising his head to The Eye that was surely staring back. “And we don’t need you to find each other!”

He pulled a final defiant scowl at the entity before breaking into a run. “Martin!” he shouted. “Martin, where are you?”

God knows how long he had been running before he felt a familiar something flicker amidst the fog. Jon stopped in his tracks. His chest heaved as he strained his senses.

… There!

He followed the wavering presence. It was a mere dim spot of light in the thick haze. But it was light nonetheless.

Occasionally, it would fizzle out like a feeble flame. When it did, it would send a shot of alarm through Jon, and he willed it to come back (“please, please, please”). Time and again, it listened to Jon's desperate prayers and returned. Sometimes, it gradually grew into a shimmer. Sometimes, it would sputter alight. Each time it came back though, it felt ever-so-slightly closer.

And Jon chased this distant lighthouse with all his might.

Then, came a time when the light, after dying out for a while, crackled to life. It settled into a quivering glow and stabilised.

Then, it grew.

Jon gasped. “Martin!”

In the distance, he heard Martin’s voice, muffled but very much there.

"Martin!” he called.

A familiar silhouette moved from within the white heavy curtains of mist.

“Martin?”

The voice that responded pulled the weight off his chest. “Jon! Jon, over here!” Martin shouted, blessedly closer.

“Oh! Martin, hold on. I-I’m coming. I just–”

Bursting through the fog, he spotted Martin, in the middle of the room, clutching a tape recorder to his chest. A wide smile broke across Jon’s face and he sprinted harder. “Oh, Martin," he breathed.

Tension melted from Martin's shoulders at the sight and he made his way over.

Jon shook his head. “Thank god. I-I was–” A wheeze of relief escaped him as they met in a tight embrace. He was practically enveloped by Martin, and the sensation calmed him as he rested his forehead against Martin’s firm shoulder. Eyes sliding shut, Jon drank in the scent of warm tea and comfort. “I-I thought you were behind me.”

“I thought you’d left me behind,” Martin admitted, arms trembling around Jon’s thin body. “Gone on without me.”

Jon felt a shaky huff against his hair as worry returned to his features. “No, never! N-Never. I-I just-” he managed, pulling Martin closer. He couldn’t really register what he was even saying at this point; words fell out and tripped over themselves while Jon tried to explain, and tried to apologise.

“It’s okay,” said Martin. Running cool fingertips against the nape of Jon's neck, he pressed a kiss to the top of his greying hair in what Jon could tell was a silent assurance that he was here.

He was here.

#tma #tma spoilers #mag 170 #mag170 #magpod #the magnus archives #jonmartin #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #my writing #fanfic #mag170 spoilers

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haberdashing · 5 years

Text

The End Comes Near (5/?)

TMA AU where Jon isn’t entirely wrong when he asks if Martin is a ghost in episode 39.

on AO3

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6 / Chapter 7

It wasn’t much of a surprise to Martin that when he finally got to sleep, he ended up plagued with nightmares.

They were worm-themed nightmares, mostly, ones that mixed his actual experiences with them--being trapped in his flat, then trapped in one room in the Archives, then running for his life in the tunnels--with what could have happened if his luck had failed him--worms crawling freely across the floor of his flat, worms breaking down the door that kept him and Jon safe, worms digging under his skin and burrowing into his flesh when he tripped and fell.

He saw Jon over and over again in the dreams, even during the bits where Jon hadn’t actually been there in reality, which, god, if that didn’t say something awkward about his subconscious... well. It was sort of nice, really, having Jon there even when the logic of waking hours made it clear that he wouldn’t, couldn’t, have actually been present. At least Martin wasn’t facing the worms alone then.

There was pain in the nightmares, too, though most of it was that strange phantom pain that comes with dreams, registering that it is pain but not feeling quite like pain actually feels. His arm ached when the worm dug into it, but it felt ever so slightly off, ever so slightly wrong, even before waking. There were other aches, too, though, ones that were harder to pinpoint a source for. His neck, his back, his whole body thrummed with pain-not-pain in his dreams...

And then Martin would wake up in a cold sweat, and he’d be in his bed, back in his flat, not aching with pain and not surrounded by worms and without anyone (without Jon) watching over him.

It took a while for him to get back to sleep after that, especially once the cycle repeated, once he had established that all that further sleep was going to give him was worms and pain and terror.

Once it was morning and Martin had given up on the prospect of sleep entirely, he called the Institute and asked for the day off. Elias didn’t sound especially surprised by the request, though he also didn’t sound all that affected by the situation himself. Elias hadn’t been in the Archives, though, Martin supposed. Elias hadn’t seen the worst of it, hadn’t had to run for his life, hadn’t gotten lost in a maze of tunnels that had seemed like it would never end...

Not going back to the Institute for the day was certainly a blessing in many ways, but it was also a curse in that Martin had to find things to do with himself to fill the time he usually spent at work, find ways to distract himself from the darker side of his own thoughts and the fear that lingered even after a new day had dawned.

He could use groceries, he supposed, given that the food in the flat consisted of a handful of cans he hadn’t gotten to when Jane Prentiss had finally let him go and he was not going to eat another can of peaches in his life, even if it killed him-

Which brought Martin back to thinking about the whole ghost conversation again.

Admittedly, while Martin wasn’t willing to concede just yet, there was some solid evidence in support of Jon’s side of the argument. Ghosts didn’t need to eat, but Martin was starving right about now, having skipped- two? three? meals in all the hubbub. Ghosts didn’t need to sleep either, but he was exhausted both physically and emotionally, and the last thing Martin wanted to do was trudge through a store grabbing supplies to keep him going, even though he knew he’d have to do it eventually. Ghost didn’t- didn’t scrape their knees, or wince when they used peroxide on their wounds, or breathe way too loudly in their too-small flats, or get their clothes covered in sweat because they were still wearing jumpers in July-

Oh God, he was still wearing the same sweaty, bloodstained clothes he’d been wearing since the morning before, wasn’t he? Changing out of those had to be a priority, for hygiene’s sake if nothing else.

The clothes in his closet seemed oddly foreign, a wardrobe that he’d handpicked yet that he hadn’t worn in months, which was the sort of luxury Martin was very much not accustomed to, being more prone to wearing everything he had in rapid succession until he was wearing something patently ridiculous on laundry day. He wasn’t too far from that point now, truth be told, given that laundry was another thing he hadn’t bothered doing in between Prentiss leaving and him heading to the Institute, but the tank top he ended up picking out wasn’t too ratty, though it was a rather loud shade of lime green, and his shorts were just worn enough to be comfortable.

While in the closet, Martin came across the spider that lived inside it, and had for some months now--going on a year, he supposed, when you added in the months he’d been gone. The little guy--or girl, he didn’t actually know and didn’t want to assume either way--had been building a web in one of the far corners he never used much anyway, and Martin had started joking to himself that the spider was his roommate, even going to far as to name them George. (Not the most gender-neutral name, admittedly, but he reasoned that it could be short for Georgia or something similar if need be--and he wasn’t even sure it was always the same spider, let alone what gender that spider was, and it’s not like the spider was going to mind if he inadvertently misgendered them.)

The web had grown a bit in Martin’s absence, though it was still tucked away enough that he wouldn’t have to brush against it in order to reach any of his things.

And George lay dead at the foot of the web they had built.

“Oh, George.” Martin said quietly as he crouched down to get a better look. He couldn’t tell the cause of death at a glance. It didn’t look like he’d stepped on George when examining his wardrobe options in the closet, which would’ve been Martin’s first guess; George wasn’t flattened or crushed like would have been the case then, just very, very still with their legs curled tightly around them.

Martin didn’t know what species of spider George was, or what kind of lifespan George had had to look forward to. Maybe it was just George’s time... but it felt wrong, somehow, felt like a bad omen or a small fragment of a bigger picture he couldn’t quite piece together.

Then Martin’s stomach gurgled rather loudly, and he remembered that it had been far too long since he’d eaten, which probably was contributing to the exhaustion that felt like it sank into his very bones.

A trip to the grocery store would take more time and effort than he felt like expending right now, and eating the handful of canned goods he still had stocked was right out, so Martin settled on ordering a pizza delivered to his flat. Not the most budget-friendly option, but... maybe if he was lucky, Elias would give them all hazard pay for yesterday? They’d certainly earned it...

Martin’s fingers brushed gently against those of the delivery man as he grabbed the pizza out of his hands, and for a single horrible instant he thought the delivery man was going to keel over, his touch being as deadly to the stranger handing over a pizza as it had been to the worms back in the tunnels, but instead the delivery man just gave him a weird look and left rather hastily.

It was probably just hunger, or relief at having made it through Prentiss’ attack, or some combination of the two, but Martin could swear that that was the best pizza he’d ever eaten.

When he disposed of the empty box, still tired but at least full once more, Martin noticed that there were no ants visible on his counter. Good. Maybe his impromptu attack had done more to ward them off than he’d expected.

After that... it was the middle of the afternoon, and Martin knew he should do more with the day, but he couldn’t stand sitting around and overthinking things any further, so he just closed the shades and took a nap instead.

At least this time, he knew the nightmares were coming.

#tma #tma au #tma fic #tma fanfic #the magnus archives #the magnus archives au #the magnus archives fic #the magnus archives fanfic #personal #my writing

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eliasbouchardisarobloxthot · 5 years

Text

five times jon came out (and one time he didn’t have to)

spoilers up to the end of season 4, and cw for minor transphobia/cisnormativity

i. his grandmother

He was nine the first time.

His grandmother had asked him to wash the dishes, and as he did, he ran over the words in his head as he kicked one foot against the stepstool he had to use to reach the sink.

“Stop doing that,” she said sharply, her voice carrying across the kitchen from where she sat, reading the newspaper.

“Sorry,” he said, setting the dishes aside. She clicked her tongue at him, shaking her head.

After a moment, he approached her at the table. “Can I talk to you about something?” he asked quietly, making sure he wasn’t fidgeting or anything like that. It would only make his argument weaker if he was nervous. She wouldn’t listen to him if he was nervous.

“Well? What is it?”

“I don’t… feel like a girl,” he said, his voice shaky even if his body wasn’t. “I haven’t for a while. And… I want to start dressing and acting like a boy now. And pick another name.”

She looked up with her eyebrows raised higher than he’d ever seen them. “Absolutely not,” she said, adjusting the newspaper in her hands and looking away from him. “There is absolutely no way I am letting you destroy our reputation like that.”

“But—” He’d expected this, had sources, had a plan.

“No buts. Continue with your chores and then start your homework. Now.”

He left the point for nearly four years, just tried his best to get on with his life and be a normal person. And then he hit puberty, and then everything felt wrong.

From then on, he would insist at least once a month that he still wasn’t a girl, still felt wrong, still wanted to pick another name. And every single time, his grandmother would shut him down, tell him that he was going to ruin their reputation, force him back into the closet.

It was almost convincing. He gave up on it, thought it was just a phase every girl went through—until uni, until Oxford when he was free and could shave his head and dress how he liked and be who he liked…

ii. georgie

…and still he felt wrong. It became clearer and clearer that this wasn’t going to go away.

He started joining online support groups. There were some that confused him, some that helped, some that were just useless to him.

His college roommate talked to him about her friend groups—and the pair of boyfriends in it. He joined the gay-straight alliance with her and told everyone to use ‘they’ pronouns for him, and it felt… good. Really, really good. Not perfect, of course, because there was still that tiny sense of wrongness tweaking at the back of his mind, but good enough that he felt really, truly safe.

Georgie, one of the girls in the GSA, started to talk to him. Then started to hang out with him. Then they started to date, and by the end of their junior year they’d made plans to move in together. And then the sense of wrongness got stronger and stronger. He spent night after night worrying about it, barely eating or sleeping, just thinking and thinking. He spiraled—deep into his own thoughts, constantly on the edge of a panic attack or a breakdown.

He came out to Georgie only a few days later. She accepted him—of course she did, she was incredible about it. They went online and found a trading group, one that gave away binders from people who had finished their top surgery.

And then they fought, and then they broke up, and Jon was alone.

So he moved on. He got a job while closeted, and then was outed at work, and got fired. And then…

iii. elias

…he did something he wasn’t proud of.

He forged his documents. A birth certificate, resume, degree, everything he needed. He went back to the Magnus Institute, where he’d done an internship a few years before.

The interview had been a breeze. Apparently they’d been looking to fill a researcher position, and while he hadn’t studied anything even close to research science, his English degree was close enough. He wasn’t sure that was how it worked, but he wasn’t going to turn down a job he had basically gotten with no qualifications at all. Especially one that he was allowed to present male at.

There were the usual bumps, of course—he didn’t get along with everyone there, but he wasn’t expecting himself to, and for the most part, people were actually kind of nice.

He was transferred to the archives a few years later. He didn’t know the first thing about library science, much less have a degree in it, but apparently he was somehow qualified enough to become the head archivist. It had struck him as odd at the time, of course, but he didn’t question it. The job was well paying, and if he made anyone aware of the fact that he really wasn’t qualified to be doing this, he might lose it.

So he didn’t. He just kept doing his work, recording statements, getting poorly made bagged tea from Martin, staying later and later until he barely went home. It was absolutely perfect—until his new boss, Elias, did some digging.

He didn’t know what to do until Elias said that he wasn’t going to be fired. Of course, he was completely confused by that—why wouldn’t he be fired?

When he told Elias so, he just replied with a sigh and a shake of the head.

“You’re a capable archivist,” he said. “If I fired you over just a tiny bit of forgery, what would I do without you? I’d have to hire another, and…” He waved a many-ringed hand vaguely. “Really, too much work for me.”

And with that, Jon was still working there. Still drinking the slightly disgusting coffee that Sasha would make, still working with Martin and still avoiding Elias as much as he could.

Things started to get weirder and weirder, and before he knew it…

iv. tim

…there were worms. There were these terrible, awful worms everywhere and he had to save the Institute and then they were on him and he was fairly certain that he blacked out for a while because the next thing he knew, Martin had a corkscrew to his arm and he was having worms pulled out of him.

He knew where they were. He’d felt them. And there were some that they’d have to go under his binder to get.

They’d better give me a raise enough that I can get top surgery soon was the only coherent thought running through his head. He was panicking—very slightly, but still panicking.

“I can do the rest myself,” he said, standing up quickly and practically tearing the corkscrew from Martin’s hand.

It only took a few moments for him to lock himself in the bathroom and strip off his shirt, then his binder. He bit his lip, then drove the corkscrew into his upper chest.

It burned like hell as he drew it out of himself, but the worm was gone in moments. Then the next, then the next. He made his way down his chest, to his stomach, then prepared to drive it into his leg and—

“Jon?”

He flinched, seeing Tim standing at the door with a shocked expression on his face. His eyes flicked from Jon’s face to his chest back up to his face.

“Those look pretty bad,” he said hollowly as he stared vaguely in Jon’s direction.

“Yeah,” he said quietly.

Tim stood there in silence for a moment.

“You’re not going to tell anyone,” Jon said, his voice shaking violently.

“No. I’m not.”

Jon pulled his shirt back around himself. He looked away from Tim, praying he wouldn’t try anything.

He heard a sound from beside him as Tim sat down, looking straight ahead rather than at Jon. It was a small relief, but a relief nonetheless, and he tried to struggle back into his binder to little avail.

“Hey, hey, don’t do that. You’re still bleeding, Jesus, Jon.” Tim put a hand on his shoulder to steady him. “Just… just sit here, I’m gonna get you some gauze and we’re gonna get you down to the medical team so we can get you fixed up.”

Jon shut his eyes tightly, and he leaned heavily on Tim as they both tried desperately to get him sitting up.

“Just take your shirt—you want your jacket, too?” he asked, helping Jon to his feet.

“Y—yeah.” He struggled into his shirt, Tim helping him with the buttons. After a moment, he leaned on Tim, clinging to the lapel of Tim’s jacket tightly. He hated feeling so helpless, but he could barely walk for all the holes in his legs.

“This changes nothing between us,” Tim said as he brought him to the ambulances outside.

“Of course.”

v. basira

Everything was normal for a while. He could pretend things were normal for a while.

He flat-ironed his hair less regularly. Martin grew more distant. He and Basira started working together, traveling together.

America wasn’t the best place to be, but he was tolerating it. They were hopping, motel to motel, never staying in one place too long. Staying in the same room, same bed sometimes. Didn’t matter much—Jon went to bed far later than Basira most nights, anyway. So he was careful.

Really, it was inevitable that it would happen.

They were watching a movie together, curled up on the motel room couch, closer than Jon would ordinarily have wanted to be but close enough to satisfy the pain in his skin when someone wasn’t near enough to him. He couldn’t remember a single plot point from the rest of the movie, but there was something happening with explosions and a girl with spiky hair.

“You good, Jon?” she asked, one hand on his head and one around the massive bowl of microwave popcorn.

“Tired,” he murmured, curling up against Basira. “Really tired.”

“You want to shower and go to sleep?” she asked, turning the volume lower on the TV. He shook his head, still leaning against her shoulder.

“You always go to bed so late, Jon. Please? For once?”

He sighed, curling up into a ball next to her. “I can’t.”

“And why can’t you?”

“Just can’t.” Words were becoming difficult. He didn’t want to compel her to answer him, force her to do anything, but it was getting harder and harder. “You’ll—”

“Jon. Please just… just sleep. I don’t care about seeing you ‘unprofessional’ or whatever, I just—”

“I don’t care about you seeing me like that, I care about you seeing me without my binder!”

There was a long silence, where Basira didn’t move. Jon could feel himself getting more and more tense, until she finally shifted on the couch to pull him closer.

“I’m not going to judge you for that, Jon,” she said quietly. “I bind, too. Not like you’re special or anything.”

He sighed in relief. And things got easier. Travel got easier when he wasn’t hiding anything from Basira, movement got easier now that he could take off his binder for several more hours a day than he had before. They made far better time getting around than they ever had before, likely due to the fact that Jon wasn’t constantly exhausted.

And then they returned to the Institute and things were different. Worse. They had to rescue Martin—or, more accurately, Jon had to rescue Martin, because that was the only way.

Things were not normal. Normal wasn’t real anymore. But…

+i. martin

…what things were, that was more difficult. If Jon had to put a pinpoint on it, he would say things were comfortable. A new kind of comfortable, of course, one that sat just to the left of the end of the world, but comfortable nonetheless.

Martin was, in the most complete sense of the word, perfect. He was so caring and generous and offered to do pretty much everything, since Jon was nearly incapacitated since the Lonely and had to use his wheelchair nearly constantly. They managed to live what could have been called a normal life for at least two weeks.

And then Jon managed to work himself into a panic over the fact that he hadn’t been on testosterone for three weeks, and locked himself in the bathroom to sit and cry.

“Jon? You in there?” Martin asked, gently knocking on the door. “Er, I mean, of course you’re in there, but are you alright? You, er, you’ve kind of been in there for quite a while…”

“Y—” He sighed. “No. I just—I didn’t—”

“Oh, you didn’t get to bring any testosterone with you, did you? Shit, Jon, sorry. I thought there was something off, you’ve been really moody. How many milliliters are you on? You can use some of mine.”

And that was that. No need to think about it, no need to worry. Just Jon and Martin, living their lives, going into town to get things from the market, being happy.

He could get used to this.

#original work #text #mine #fanfiction

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composereggwrites · 5 years

Text

Love will not break your Heart (but dismiss your Fears)

Chapter 2: just let me go (we'll meet again soon)

Fandom: The Magnus Archives

Rating: T

Characters/Ships: Martin Blackwood/Jonathan Sims, Georgie Barker/Melanie King, Alice “Daisy” Tonner/Basira Hussain, Gerard Keay, Gertrude Robinson

Additional: Reincarnation AU, Soul Bond, Team as Family, Autistic Jon, Post-Canon Fix-it, Childhood Friends, Hurt/Comfort

They stand in the Panopticon, fire raining down from the sky, as the Eye stares down at them.

Jon takes Martin’s hand in his.

A wedding, a death, a fire, and Tim.

Chapter: 1 | 2 (below)

Ao3: 1 | 2

They stand in the Panopticon, fire raining down from the sky, as the Eye stares down at them.

Jon takes Martin’s hand in his.

“Are you sure you want to do this, Martin?” he asks, one last time, because fear has made a home in his heart. A palace in his bones.

“Jon,” Martin says, looking him in the eyes, so full of determination, filled with warmth, with love. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

“Sap,” he mutters, but a smile creeps onto his face nonetheless. “We’ve already left the message for the girls, and well… This is really it, isn’t it?”

“Got cold feet?” Martin asks with a laugh.

“Always,” he snorts. “You’ve felt them when we’ve slept. You’re the space heater between the two of us.”

Heart beating in his chest, Jon takes Martin’s hands. The world is crumbling in every direction. A year of this hell has been far too long. Searching, aching for answers, for a way to fix the devastation he has wrought-- no, the devastation Jonah Magnus used him to usher into the world.

Jonah Magnus, who, like the rest of the institute, is no more than a pile of ash at their feet now. Martin had been quite happy to have the honor of setting that blaze.

It’s touching, in a way. Finding the answer on how to set them both free, and Martin chooses to do it for him. No more ash on Jonathan’s hands.

(He’s more than a little fragile, at the end of the world, but he could’ve been the one to do it. The one to bring Magnus to the ground. That he didn’t have to means more than he can express with words. Martin has always been looking out for him, even when he was too much a fool to realize).

The Web’s strings hang heavy in the air around them, coated with the remnants of their old life, of their meeting. But the Mother of Puppets doesn’t have control of all these ties. Jon’s body is linked to everything now, the perfect conduit of fear. The lynch-pin in this hellscape. Take him out, and the rest crumbles. The issue is in managing to kill a near-immortal Archive.

Martin has always been his anchor. He never needed that rib, Jon gets that now. And this is something they can use. Here.

“Martin, I love you,” Jon starts. “You keep me grounded. When I start to fall apart, you hold me together. Even as I dealt with the end of the world rather badly, you drew me back out of my shell. I promise to be at your side forever more, I promise to return the favor. You are not just a caretaker, you deserve to be taken care of, and I will be there for you. I am here, with you, as we stand, united.”

Martin is already tearing up, as his hands shake in Jon’s grasp. “Jon,” he says, with a waver in his voice. “I love you. I know, it was a long time coming. Back when we were both researchers, I thought I could ignore this little crush, because that’s what it was. But you’re so kind, underneath that abrasive exterior. You pretended that nothing could get to you, that you at most tolerated the people around you, but I could see through that.”

He takes a shuddering breath. “I’m with you, until the end of time. I tie myself to you like I’ve done a hundred thousand times before, in less words. In actions. Every step we take together has brought us here, bound to each other at the end of the world, and I wouldn’t do this any other way.”

The strings around them pull taught, smash them together. Jon clings to Martin. Holds him tight as the web holds them tighter. It hurts, the Eye observing this, burning through them as he clings for dear life, but observation just makes it real. The Web tries to resist, but Jon pulls harder, pulls the strings of his own design, and lets them bind.

A thousand stars scream in the sky, but the roar of the still-burning fire is louder. The pounding of his heart in his ears louder still. Or maybe that’s Martin’s. He can’t really tell anymore, as their hearts beat to the same tune, in the same time.

As the pain dies down, he can feel Martin, there in his chest. An ache subdued by his presence at his side. A new hole carved and filled with love, with his anchor.

Jon laughs, hysterical, for just a second. Tears on his cheeks until Martin puts his hands on his shoulders, steadying him.

“Ready for the next step?” Martin asks, worry flooding his voice, and oh, he can feel that in his heart. All the concern for him, bubbling over the edges of the pot. It makes him gasp, legs trembling, and all he can do is grip Martin back. It’s all he can do to not drown in the Tsunami of Martin, the whirlpool with them both at the center.

“Give--Give me a second, yeah?” he whispers. “Don’t tell me when.”

“Oh,” Martin replies, no doubt feeling the outpouring of gratitude. “Yeah, alright.”

They hold each other. Letting the waves of emotion crash down, drowning out the fear, out the pain. Held close together. This is what matters.

Then--

Pain.

Sharp, biting pain. Driven into his chest.

Blood meets his lips as he coughs, his own sharpened rib embedded in his heart, by Martin’s trembling hand.

As Jonathan Sims falls, he holds Martin’s hand, and wishes he could muster the energy to wipe those tears away.

“Don’t worry,” he whispers, as the door in his mind becomes a vacuum, sucking all the fear out of him, waves of love and safety and peace replacing the frostbite of terror. “We’ll meet again, yeah?”

Martin nods. He sits down by Jon, and kisses him, ignoring the iron taste. Ignoring the poison that he takes from Jon’s mouth.

The fire closes in, and consumes them. But there is no fear. No pain.

The world bends.

Good cows stand in a field, and no Eye bears down from the sky. No people scream in terror on that day.

Four bodies are found dead in The Magnus Institute, and the world dreams of a year that never happened. A year of fear and pain burying itself deep in their hearts.

A year that will never come to pass.

And Jonathan Barker-King wakes up.

---

Jonathan has always been an odd child.

Georgie and Melanie knew this when adopting him.

But that doesn’t change the fact that one night, when he’s twelve years old, Melanie can feel him shaking her awake.

She rolls over, facing him. “Mm, what is it?” she murmurs, knowing the shaky hands as someone who is afraid.

Jon’s voice is heavy, edged with static, and Melanie wishes she could see his face, as he says, “There will be fire. We need to leave.”

That gets her out of bed, kicking Georgie awake.

“Mel, what’s wrong?” her wonderful, sleepy wife groans.

“Up up up, now! Phone Basira, tell her we don’t know how much time we all have, but we need to go.” She tries to keep her voice level, urgent but hushed.

It gets Georgie up, at least. Springing to her feet. “I’ll get the emergency bags. Fuck. Alright. Guess it couldn’t last forever.”

Melanie makes sure she’s holding Jon’s hand, as she leads him back to his room, digging out the always-packed travel bag hidden there. Filled with clothes and food and money, and for him, some books he’s shoved into it. “Pack up your laptop and anything else you want that will fit, alright?” she says, soft.

“Got it, mom,” he replies. “Go take care of what you need to. I’ll be out in five minutes. That’s the plan, yeah?”

She nods at him. “Very intelligent, you are.”

And then she dashes, grabbing her own bags and the keys, tossing them all in the trunk of the car. Important documents, keepsakes she knows they wouldn’t be able to bear losing, anything irreplaceable. From the the meowing coming from the back seat, it sounds like Georgie had managed to catch The Admiral and bundle him into the cat carrier, too. The stubborn old cat refused to die of old age or illness, but Desolation’s flames might be enough to do the trick, and none of them would want to risk it.

There’s sounds from the house next door, and that reassures her that Daisy and Basira are up now, no doubt going through the same protocol they’d set in place for just this event. Hopefully it’s a fluke, but they can’t take that chance.

If it’s the past coming back to haunt them, with fire and flames, then they can’t afford to wait.

In ten minutes Georgie is at the wheel, and the car roars to life. Basira is getting the last of the Hussain-Tonner bags in their car, Martin bundled away in the back no doubt.

“Can I say goodbye?” Jon whispers, and Melanie sighs.

“Sorry, kiddo, but we gotta go.” She reaches out, holding his hand between the seats, as they peel out, headed far away.

He’s quiet, solemn. After five minutes of quiet, he sighs. “That’s alright. I’ll see him again, someday.”

“Yeah, no doubt about that,” she whispers back.

The next morning, their houses are on the news, as they watch in their hotel room, a hundred miles away. A fire, a roaring blaze, arson. But no bodies to be found.

“It was Jude, no doubt,” whispers Georgie, while Jon is fast asleep.

She nods. “Guess we tested our luck too long, staying in one place like that. If Jon hadn’t… Known. Then we might’ve been dead by now.”

“I’m worried,” Georgie sighs. “About him, about Martin. They-- We’re right, yeah? They saved the world together, and it involved a soulbond. They were both absolutely miserable before they saw each other that first time.”

Leaning her head on her wife, Melanie says, “Yeah, but… We’ll just have to make do, for now. Keep an eye out on them both. I think it might be a good idea to keep them separate, no contact, otherwise they’ll be sneaking out to the car some day and meeting each other halfway.”

Georgie snorts. “That’s absolutely something this Jon here would do. We’ve really spoiled him, huh?”

“From what I understand, we’ve been parenting just fine,” she says back, a roll of her unseeing eyes. “It’s his grandma who gave him all that childhood trauma last time. And a Leitner, what the fuck? How do you let an eight year old get his hands on one of those?”

That gets a full blown laugh. “Yeah, alright, you’re right. We’ve probably fucked him up somehow, but he’s not nearly as fucked up as when either of us first met him. Man, he needed some intensive therapy.”

---

Tim Stoker looks at the new-hire one time, and after the thought of I’m going to flirt with him so much passes through his head, another pops in of, wait that’d be weird--

Why?

He stares. Jonathan, the name tag reads, and why is that so familiar?

“Welcome aboard the library crew, my man!” He says out loud, giving a casual grin. “What’s a pretty boy such as yourself doing here?”

“You’re quite the flirt, Tim,” he says back with a laugh. “Sorry, not in the market right now. I’m not really… I’m not interested, mostly.”

He holds up his hands. “Hey, all cool, no worries, Jonny-boy.”

That gets a snort. “Call me Jon, nothing like that, please.”

“Got it, boss. Still haven’t answered my question,” he says.

“Oh, well…” Jon takes out a pen from his pocket, and twists it around his fingers, spinning to and fro. “I’m going to be working down in the archives, mostly. Gertrude’s taking me on as an… Well, an intern, I guess? Assistant? It pays decent, and it’s my chosen field, so… It’s a good chance.”

Tim nods. Opportunistic. Not many people get to work with good ole’ Gerty. “She works in the paranormal department yeah? That oughta be fun.”

“Parapsychology, specifically,” he says back. “With a focus currently in the not-apocalypse. Lots of info on that still to be gathered.”

“So you’re interested in spooky stuff, awesome!” Tim laughs. “You gotta tell me all the weird things. We should do a scary movie night sometime together.”

Jon stares at him, as if trying to piece together some mysterious puzzle. With big eyes, intense eyes, meeting his, looking into him, in a way that he hasn’t felt since--since--

A nasty migraine is forming in the back of Tim’s head.

Jon looks away.

“Sure, why not? You're off shift now, though, right? You should get to your class.”

“How did you--?” he starts to ask, but Jon has already descended the stairs into the archives.

The pain doesn’t go away, as he makes his way through math. It’s all numbers and easy problems. A blur as the teacher speaks, and he can’t focus. There’s something he’s forgetting. A nagging sense at the back of his mind, and he’d ask Sasha, or his roommate Martin for some help, except that seems like a very bad idea right now. He doesn’t know why. But it does.

Crashing onto his bed as soon as he gets back to his dorm is the best idea. Martin will assume he’s been out having fun, and he can sleep this stabbing agony off.

It almost works, too.

Fire, fire, so much fire.

Danny--who is Danny?-- Danny dead. The world a mess. Revolving around him in Stranger ways.

Falling apart.

Sasha is Not Sasha. Jonathan Sims is a Monster.

Martin is a stubborn fool.

The world blurs.

Explosions ring in his ears.

Tim Stoker r e m e m b e r s . . .

Shooting upright with a gasp, Tim stumbles out of bed. It had only been a few hours, but if anything the migraine has gotten worse.

He runs to the toilet, puking up whatever's in his stomach from that morning. Dizzy as another wave of nausea hits.

“Fuck,” he mutters.

There’s a knock on the door, and Martin -- Martin Blackwood, Martin Hussain-Tonner, fucking Martin -- is there, asking if he’s okay, in that kind way he always has.

“Yeah--” his voice cracks. “Yeah, I’ll be fine. Don’t worry. Just some bad food.”

“Alright,” comes the reply. “Let me know if you need some help.”

“Got it,” he croaks. And then he’s alone.

Sitting on the cold tile, he holds his head in his hands, groaning.

He needs to contact someone.

Who?

Jon--? No. Not Jon, not yet. It was Jon’s presence that did this to him, no doubt, but he didn’t seem to actually know Tim.

Gertrude, maybe?

Fuck it, Gertrude it is. He has her number, she’s his boss, after all.

^Hey, Gerty, I think my head just died. Absolutely exploded with pain. Not coming in tomorrow.^

Not the most formal, but she hasn’t minded before.

^Well, I hope you feel better, Tim. Remember to check in if you’re staying out too long. It’ll be a circus here, otherwise, if we’re understaffed.^

“Fuck,” he hisses out again, because she definitely remembers. And she knows what happened.

^Mind filling me in on how the circus is doing?”

^They’re all in bits and pieces. It was quite the display, or so I hear. I have the tapes, if you want to listen to them.^

Of course she does.

^Sure, I’ll grab them on my next shift, sound good?^

^See you then. Feel better, Tim.^

He does.

Looking at Sasha now, it’s bizarre. A deep pit in his stomach, knowing he forgot her, believed the Not!Sasha had been her for so long. It doesn’t sit right.

As he makes his way down the steps to the archive, he finds her following. A few feet before the door, he turns to look at her.

“Need to speak to Gertrude too?”

She blinks, crossing her arms. “If I do, it’s none of your business.”

A snort escapes him. “Learning how to be abrasive from our lovely head archivist?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.

“You know, he wasn’t really that bad. I mean, I totally got killed during the worm thing, so whatever you went through, I guess I still need to find out, but… He was trying his best,” she says, nonchalant as she picks at her fingers.

“Did seeing him give you the worst migraine of two lives too, then?”

“Absolutely. I thought I was dying. Turns out I had!”

They both start to laugh. He bumps his shoulder against her. “God I missed ya, Sash. Things went whack without you there.”

“Did the two lovebirds ever manage to work out their problems?” she asks, rolling her eyes.

“Not before I got exploded! Shit got weird. Honestly, you missed a lot of stuff. I--Well I’d fill you in, but whatever tapes Gertrude has will probably do that for me,” Tim says, gesturing back to the door.

“Listening party?” Sasha suggests, as she steps forward to open it.

“Sure, maybe the trauma of listening to our own deaths will be easier with a friend and some good wine. Gotta be at your place though, cuz Martin doesn’t know.” He steps in with her.

Gertrude looks at them, a box set on the empty chair. “Take it, have fun. I believe it’ll do the job enough to fill you in.”

“Thanks Gerty! We’ll get them back to ya’ when we’re done!” Tim says, giving a wave as Sasha scoops up the box. He can feel her hatred of the nickname, but it’s far too late to stop him from using it now.

They pick up on tape 39, conveniently labeled in order by Gertrude no doubt, for Sasha’s sake.

It’s awful.

She’d been spared the paranoia, the depths Jon had been plunged into.

They stop on tape 50, for the night. It hurts too much to keep going.

---

Jon wakes up from his nightmare.

Shaking, terror coursing through his veins. Memories he can’t remember. He’s not a fool.

Reincarnation was part of what he’d studied, while looking into parapsychology. No conclusive evidence, of course, that’s impossible to get. Almost everything presented as esoteric is false. The most true subjects tend to involve the apocalypse, and even then, it’s not a sure shot.

But they always involve dreams. Dreams of memories. Past lives mean past memories, trying to find their way to the present.

And his dreams have been getting worse.

But that’s ridiculous, right? Utterly ridiculous. He’s being superstitious. Gullible. There’s never been proof of reincarnation adequately presented. To think he had a past life is to give into the folly of the people he criticizes.

(He knows, deep in his soul, that some things are true. He can’t discount everything.

But there’s no need to let this knowledge consume him.)

Jon sighs, sitting up. It wouldn’t do to dwell on this, not when he has a test today that he needs to last-minute cram for.

His phone lights up by his side, though, and he picks it up. Blinking blearily at the screen in confusion before yesterday hits him.

^Hey Jon! Good morning! How are you doing?^

From the contact of Martin!!

A smile spreads over his face, dragging him out of bed and through his morning routine. Food. Toothbrushing. Clothes. Heading out for his class early, instead of almost late for once.

^I’m good, Martin. I have a test today, soon. Going to study for that. How about you?^

The reply comes almost instantly, which drops a small pit in his stomach, because martin’s first text had been two hours before Jon had gotten up.

^I’m good too! Thanks for asking! I’m working on an essay right now, but nothing super important.^

^Well, don’t let me keep you from your work.^ He’d feel bad if he were the reason Martin got a bad grade. It’d be awful.

^Nah, I don’t really need to worry about this class. I’m passing with a 96% right now, and I’m one of the only people who talks in class. Like, during the discussions and all!^

^Teacher’s pet, are you?^

Jon can picture the little laugh Martin does at this, scrunched up nose and crinkled eyes. ^Better than failing, that’s for sure. You’re absolutely someone who sits in the back of the class and does his best to avoid conversation, though, aren’t you?^

He chuckles, smiling. Then he rubs his neck, glancing around as he walks to make sure no one is staring. There’s the usual bustle of people, but no one looking at him. Just leaves falling in the breeze, and the nip of the autumn air. He’s good, so far, but it’d be dangerous to keep this up inside.

(He might not care, because this is Martin. Self-consciousness be damned.)

^Yeah, you’ve got me pinned.^ he says back.

^I hide behind my laptop screen whenever I can, studiously take notes, and never talk to another living soul if I can avoid it.^

^Wow, what a nerd :P^

^Can’t believe my best friend is a nerd :P^

Jon has to take a second to pause, sigh, and roll his eyes, because Martin, please. ^You mean the same friend who would spend hours recounting books he’d read to you in perfect detail? Or the friend who once asked their teacher for more homework because he was bored? That friend?^

^Absolutely.^

^What a shock.^

^I’ve been completely betrayed by your sudden nerdom that has arisen in the past 11 years that I have totally never encountered before.^

That tugs a full-fledged laugh out of Jon, and he has to duck onto a less-used path behind a building to hide for a full minute, because Jonathan Sims does not randomly laugh at his phone in public.

When the coast is clear, he keeps walking, and slips into the building with the ease of someone whose had classes in it for three years already. He navigates to his classroom and takes his (unofficial) seat in the back, pulling out his notes and pretending like he’s studying, not thinking about Martin.

^I feel like I’m not the only nerd in this conversation.” The text sends as a quick reply, and then he follows it up with: ^Also, in class now. Going to study. Chat later?^

^Of course! Let me know when you’re free! See ya :D^

He rubs his face, setting his phone to silent and in his bag, trying to scrub away the blush that must be rising to his cheeks.

Martin is… So Martin.

Over the past decade Jon had wanted so much to reconnect with his old friend. An ache in his chest, screaming until all he knew was the noise, yearning to find him. Fixated on the missing piece until the misery became background radiation in his life, his new normal. Settled deep in his bones. Uncomfortable weight buried in his skin, just enough to fade into his usual, everyday pain. There, but not the focus.

(Not usually. There were some days, some nights, where the loss of Martin dug its claws in. His body full of hooks and they pulled. As if trying to tug him closer. Back to Martin.

He almost followed it, a few times. Deep in his mind, a haze of the gaping hole, guiding his feet onto an unknown path. But he never went far. Always turned around and walked back home. His moms raised him well, he knows better than to be alone.

College the first year was scary. Terror welling in his throat. New people, new places. Too many unknowns.)

One small, niggling little voice in Jon’s head, a voice filled with the needles of anxiety, had tried to tell him that Martin wouldn’t be the same. That if they ever reunited, Martin wouldn’t care about him. Or maybe, maybe the years had warped his thoughts, his understanding of who his friend was. An idealized image instead of the real person.

But he also remembers Martin fretting over him when Jon fell ill. Spending the night out of worry, sneaking in through his window to bring him medicine at midnight.

He remembers Martin listening as Jon rambled, and then rambling in turn. Jon knows so much about spiders to this day, because Martin had found a book and read all about it to him.

He remembers the poetry, still scrawled in notebooks and on pieces of paper he refused to throw away. Packed into that bag as from the fire they escaped.

That voice in his head never held any real sway.

But it’s nice to be proven right, for a change.

#tma #the magnus archives #jonathan sims #martin blackwood #tim stoker #sasha james #georgie barker #melanie king #jonmartin #what the girlfriends #gelanie #guess who realized they never posted this to tumblr!!!#I forgot #pls subscribe on ao3 #that's so much more reliable than following my tumblr I beg of u

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psychotherapyconsultants · 7 years

Text

When Yoga, Meditation, and Diet Aren’t Enough to Cure Depression

I thought I had it all figured out.

I even had a book title picked out: Whole-ish — On Healing Myself Naturally from Depression and My Messy Path to Well. And I had outlined some of the chapters:

Why restoring your gut health and generating good intestinal bacteria will improve mood

The science behind optimal nutrition and how certain foods reduce inflammation of the brain, while others (sugar) send a message of distress to your immune system, affecting your entire nervous system

How green smoothies help eliminate disease states

The therapeutic faculties of yoga and how it primes our parasympathetic system

Mindfulness meditation and neuroplasticity

And then the floor beneath me dropped out and I fell into a dark, ominous abyss — a life-threatening place that was more frightening than any depressive episode of my past, where the suicidal thoughts were so intense and so constant that I was absolutely sure I wouldn’t be around to celebrate my daughter’s 13th birthday. In the last five months, I have never been so scared for my life, positive that I was going insane and that I was destined to follow the path of my aunt (who was also my godmother), who took her own life.

What started out as a good and right endeavor became a dangerous dance in which I made a few critical mistakes that almost cost me my life.

Doing Everything Right

Two-and-a-half years ago, I was frustrated that I couldn’t get rid of my death thoughts after being on so much medication for so many years. So I dove into the world of integrative and holistic medicine.

I took every saliva, blood, and stool test that exists to measure my cortisol, hormones, gut status, nutrients, and food intolerances.

I transformed my diet and eliminated gluten, sugar, caffeine, and dairy (I’d already cut out alcohol). I did extensive research on which supplements to take and added vitamins B-12, C, D, and E; probiotics; turmeric; omega-3 fatty acids; alpha lipoic acid; amino acids; magnesium; coconut oil; and iron. I drank two green smoothies every day.

I took the eight-week intensive Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) program based on Jon Kabat-Zinn‘s work at the Stress Reduction Clinic at the University of Massachusetts Medical School in Worcester, and started to meditate each day.

I immersed myself in hot yoga, practicing five or six times a week .

I committed myself to helping others, trying to transcend my pain that way, creating two online forums dedicated to people struggling with treatment-resistant depression.

I attached myself to the new science called epigenetics, the study of genetic changes that aren’t caused by a change in DNA sequence. Pamela Peeke, MD, best-selling author of The Hunger Fix, explained it to me this way: “If you can change certain key choices — your diet, how you handle stress, your physical activity — it’s like writing notes in the margin of your genome, and you can flip the switch to support and protect your health.”

Epigenetics is closely related to the concept of neuroplasticity that says we aren’t stuck with the brain that we were born with: We have more room than we think we do to direct our health toward healing and wholeness.

Thinking in Black and White

I wanted to believe more than anything that I could cure myself of my bipolar disorder and my treatment-resistant depression with the right diet, exercise, stress reduction tools, and meditation.

All of my actions over the course of nine months were able to deliver me to a place where the death thoughts ceased.

So I assumed that the medications I had been taking really didn’t do anything but cause or contribute to a host of chronic illnesses I had developed over the course of 10 years: connective tissue issues (Raynaud’s phenomenon), thyroid disease (nodules), a pituitary tumor, inflammatory bowel disease (small intestine bacteria overgrowth, or SIBO), and heart disease.

That’s where I went wrong.

Black-and-white thinking.

Raised in an alcoholic home, I have always struggled to achieve a nuanced perspective.

I stopped working with my psychiatrist because I believed I could naturally heal from my mood disorder with the help of a holistic doctor. An excellent integrative physician, he has successfully guided my general health (all of the conditions mentioned above). But a mood disorder as complex and severe as mine requires psychiatric expertise, which he is without. I began to taper off of my psychotropic medications too aggressively. The tapering coincided with some other stressors.

And I fell into the abyss.

I fell harder than I ever have.

A New Perspective from My Daughter

Resolved to find a non-drug solution, I tried transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS), a non-invasive procedure that stimulates nerve cells in the brain with short magnetic pulses. Approved by the FDA in 2008, TMS involves a large electromagnetic coil that’s placed against your scalp. The coil generates focused pulses that pass through your skull and stimulate the cerebral cortex of your brain, a region that regulates mood.

While I did feel an initial lift from my depression following TMS treatment, my anxiety worsened, creating suicidal thoughts that were even more intense and compulsive — as if there was a very thin veil between life and death, and I didn’t know how long I could muster the self-control to stay on the right side. The series (45 sessions in all) sent me into a dangerous, mixed state of mania and depression — something that can happen if a bipolar person does the treatment without enough of a mood stabilizer.

At one point halfway through the series, I was crying when I picked my daughter up from school. I couldn’t quiet my painful ruminations even when I was with her.

“I feel like you are never going to get better,” she said, starting to cry herself.

She paused and then said, her breathing broken, “I just feel like someone is going to die.”

She began to wail.

As much as I didn’t want her to be right, I knew she was.

My little girl has always been extremely intuitive, and she could feel it in her soul that I was not far away from the grave. Two weeks after she said that, we lost a family member to suicide.

His death forced a new perspective.

Living With a Life-Threatening Illness

I realized I had to do absolutely everything I could to protect my life. In a pursuit to heal myself naturally, I had been flirting too closely with death, and I couldn’t say how long I could survive doing this dance. I was finally ready to accept chronic illnesses and tumors and nasty side effects in order to stay alive.

For the first time since my aunt and godmother took her life 30 years ago, I saw the life-threatening angle of my illness and knew that, while I can certainly improve my symptoms with natural remedies and possibly reduce the amount of medication I need, there is no escaping entirely from my mood disorder.

In the harrowing months since Thanksgiving, I’ve learned three key things that I hope I never forget as long as I’m battling bipolar disorder:

It is absolutely critical to be under the right care.

Medication can be lifesaving and is sometimes necessary.

While we can all hope to heal ourselves in the wider sense of the word, some of us simply can’t cure ourselves entirely of our conditions; at best, we can manage them with a variety of treatments, both natural and traditional.

I returned recently to my former psychiatrist who had managed to keep me stable for 10 years, as well as to my therapist, whom I’ve worked with for nine years. Feeling a little bit like the prodigal son, I thanked her for her excellent care in years past and asked for her help in getting well once more.

We’ll get there, she said.

We’ll get there.

Join Project Hope & Beyond, a new depression community.

Originally posted on Sanity Break at Everyday Health.

from World of Psychology https://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2017/06/15/when-yoga-meditation-and-diet-arent-enough-to-cure-depression/

#World of Psychology

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