#but jon just thinks martin was serious when he said the only thing that brought them together was the trauma

[hauntedhotel]

Kinda obsessed with the difference between Martin's perspective during the apocalypse and Jon’s.

It's the difference between "I know you might hate me right now" and "I love you, I always will, and I know you love me"

It's the difference between Jon not being able to trust anyone, not even himself, but never for a second doubting that Martin loves him and Martin never being sure Jon’s feelings for him won't change.

It's the difference between Jon not always being loved perfectly and Martin having never been loved before.

It's Jon spending the entire apocalypse telling every monster they come across that Martin is his boyfriend, have you met Martin, this is his boyfriend Martin, his anchor, his last tie to humanity, his reason to still be hoping for a better ending. It's Martin telling his Lonely-self that if it comes down to it he'll ask Jon to destroy him and not being sure whether Jon will say no.

Even the jealousy, which is slightly played for laughs, still comes down to Jon being like "aw my boyfriend's getting all possessive 🥰" whereas deep down Martin has never let go of the idea that under different circumstances Jon could do better.

They're more emotionally open with each other during the apocalypse than they are for the years leading up to it, and they still don't stop misunderstanding each other.

[bananonbinary]

Time for a Salty Meta Post about Martin!

people who’ve followed this blog for a bit know that spending six hours combing through text for some goddamn sources is my specialty, so i compiled every time jon ever talked about martin’s work in season 1. which for the record, he stopped complaining about all the way back in episode 26, where he was angry that martin of all people got hurt.

things jon gets mad at martin for:

not being able to find records that don’t exist

not being able to find someone based only on a first name

the Dog

not wearing trousers in his off-hours

being the one that got caught up in the jane prentiss thing

mag 004 and mag 012 both have jon taking potshots at martin over research that was proven accurate by outside sources

things jon has never once complained about:

martin not understanding the filing system and just putting stuff away at random

martin being clumsy, constantly ruining things, spilling tea everywhere everyday, etc

martin turning in incompetent, poorly-edited, or badly formatted reports

martin not understanding the terminology used, skills expected, etc., and generally being extremely new to the field

please for the love of god stop making martin the silly bumbling idiot who can’t do anything right just because he doesn’t have a formal education. there’s zero evidence for it in the text, and it’s really weird to act like a 4 year degree would outweigh the *10 years* of job experience he has, not just in academia, but in the institute itself by season one. my boy has worked there longer than ANY of the rest of the main cast. screw you guys.

tl;dr: martin is never once shown to be bad at his job, jon pretty much only ever gets mad at him for the really stupid first impression and also not finding stuff that no one else was able to find either. after martin got hurt, jon talks about his research basically the same way he talks about tim’s or sasha’s work.

fucking proof under the cut:

(i didnt include the s1 finale or martin’s statement bc that’s just...two entire episodes of them talking to each other, but there isn’t really any notable Martin Complaints in either of them imo)

I swear, if he’s brought another dog in here, I’m going to peel him.

[pre-launch trailer]

.

Well, technically three, but I don’t count Martin as he’s unlikely to contribute anything but delays.

[...] Alongside this Tim, Sasha and, yes, I suppose, Martin will be doing some supplementary investigation to see what details may be missing from what we have.

[MAG001 Anglerfish]

.

Martin couldn’t find any records of Ex Altiora as a title in existent catalogues of esoteric or similar literature, so I assigned Sasha to double-check. Still nothing.

[MAG004 Pageturner]

.

I had Martin conduct a follow-up interview with Mr. Woodward last week, but it was unenlightening. Apparently there have been no further bags at number 93 and in the intervening years he has largely discounted many of the stranger aspects of his experience. I wasn’t expecting much, as time generally makes people inclined to forget what they would rather not believe, but at least it got Martin out of the Institute for an afternoon, which is always a welcome relief.

[MAG005 Thrown Away]

.

Martin was unable to find the exact date the original house was built but the earliest records he could find list it as being bought by Walter Fielding in 1891.

[...]

We cannot prove any connection, but Martin unearthed a report on an Agnes Montague, who was found dead in her Sheffield flat on the evening of November 23rd 2006, the same day Mr. Lensik claims to have uprooted the tree.

[MAG008 Burned Out]

.

According to Martin, who was here when they took this statement, it was at this point in writing that Mr. Herbert announced he needed some sleep before continuing. He was shown to the break room where he went to sleep on the couch. He did not awaken; unfortunately succumbing to the lung cancer right there. Martin says the staff had been aware of how serious Mr. Herbert’s condition was, and had advised him to seek medical aid prior to giving his statement, but were told rather bluntly by the old man that he would not wait another second to state his case. I can’t decide whether this lends more or less credibility to his tale.

[MAG010 Vampire Killer]

.

“Veepalach” might also be a mishearing of the Polish word “wypalać”, according to Martin, which means to cauterize or brand. Admittedly, if Martin speaks Polish in the same way he “speaks Latin,” then he might be talking nonsense again, but I’ve looked it up and it appears to check out.

[MAG012 First Aid]

.

I sent Martin to look into this ‘Angela’ character - not that I want him to get chopped up, of course, but someone had to. Apparently, he spent three days looking into every woman named Angela in Bexley over the age of 50. He could not find anyone that matches the admittedly vague description given here, though he informs me that he had some very pleasant chats about jigsaws. Useless ass.

[MAG014 Piecemeal]

.

Martin declined to help with this investigation as he’s “a bit claustrophobic”

[MAG015 Lost John’s Cave]

.

There simply aren’t enough details given in this statement to actually investigate, short of Martin confirming that Mr. Vittery did indeed live at the addresses he provided.

[MAG016 Arachnophobia]

.

Oh, he’s off sick this week. Stomach problems, I think.

Blessed relief if you ask me.

[...]

I asked Martin to try and hunt down Mr. Adekoya himself for a follow-up, but have been informed that he passed away in 2006. 

[MAG017 The Boneturner’s Tale]

.

MARTIN

Well, I need to tell someone what happened, and you can vouch for the soundness of my mind, can’t you?

ARCHIVIST

…

That is beside the point.

[MAG022 Colony]

.

Martin! Good lord man, if you’re going to be staying in the Archives, at least have the decency to put some trousers on!

[MAG023 Schwartzwald]

.

Martin found one other thing while combing through police reports for the Hither Green area. About a month after this statement was given, on May 15th, 2015, police were called out to once again investigate the chapel.

[MAG025 Growing Dark]

.

I know, but it would have to have been Martin, wouldn’t it? I mean, anything goes wrong around here, it always seems to happen to him. Anyway, we’re getting off topic. Why didn’t you report this?

[MAG026 A Distortion]

.

Martin made contact with the son, Marcus McKenzie, but he declined to talk to us, saying that he’d “already made his statement.”

[MAG027 A Sturdy Lock]

.

Tim and Martin had a bit more luck investigating Tom Haan, though only really enough to confirm that he seems to have completely vanished following his departure from Aver Meats on the 12th of July.

[MAG030 Killing Floor]

.

Martin’s research would seem to indicate the place employed a reasonable number of international staff they preferred to keep off the books

[...]

TIM

Ah well, that’s actually what he was asking, huh! Um, apparently Martin, uh, took delivery of a couple of items last week addressed to you. Did he not mention it?

ARCHIVIST

No, he… Oh, yes, actually. I completely forgot. He said he put it in my desk drawer, hold on.

[MAG036 Taken Ill]

[voiceless-terror]

#6 for the kiss prompts?

this was an ‘im sorry’ kiss, and i picked jonmartin! some safehouse fic cause we can’t stay away from it, apparently. this begins a little angsty but ends on an entirely fluffy note.

Three days in, Jon gets hungry.

He tries to hide it, but Martin knows the signs. As much as he professed to stay away from Jon over the last year, he still spent his fair share of time in the Archives, looking for statements and keeping an eye out. Jon would pace the halls, attempt conversation with Basira or Melanie only to be shot down, scratch at his arms and bite his nails. Martin wanted nothing more than to usher him to his seat, fix him a cup of tea and hand him a statement but he never did, of course, fleeing the basement whenever the impulse got too strong. 

The past three days at Daisy’s cottage have been like some sort of waking dream, each of them tiptoeing around the other, pretending Jon didn’t sleep on his shoulder the train ride up, pretending Martin didn’t hold his hand the entire way. Jon rambles about everything but the institute, shooting him shy smiles and lingering in the doorway before he leaves a room. Martin makes them tea and goes through the cupboards, telling Jon of any interesting finds. They’ve spent more time together these last couple of days than they have in the past two years. But they haven’t talked about….them. This, whatever it is that they’re doing. They’re living together, but acknowledgment of the situation would disturb the delicate peace they’ve made, and Martin’s not in a place to take any sort of rejection, perceived or otherwise. 

So when Jon shuts the door to the bedroom that afternoon, Martin’s naturally worried. He woke up bleary-eyed and irritable, barely touching his toast and speaking in short, clipped tones. Martin’s mind automatically goes through every action from the past few days, searching for something he’d done wrong, something he’d said, when he noticed Jon’s hands itched at the sleeve of his jumper. His eyes looked somewhere past Martin, as if struggling to focus. 

He needs a statement.

So Martin stamped down the urge to nervously chatter and instead remained silent, watching as Jon mumbled something unintelligible and rose from his seat, retreating to the bedroom. He’ll come out when he’s ready, Martin reassures himself, moving to clear the table. He doesn’t hear the murmurings of a statement just yet, but still, he doesn’t want to bother him. Maybe he’s trying to hold off. They hadn’t brought many statements with them in their rush to leave the institute. Jon’s been so reluctant to speak of such things, and Martin doesn’t want to push. 

But then it’s past noon and Martin’s starting to get hungry- Jon must be, too, since he barely touched his breakfast. He knows Jon has other, more pressing hungers to deal with, and he’s not going to fault him for it, but he’d still rather he eat three meals a day. He has to keep his strength up, and maybe a bit of company would help distract him.

So he knocks on the door, despite his trepidation. “Jon? I’m going to fix lunch, did you want anything?” No answer. He opens the door a crack, more out of worry than anything, and peers into the dark room. “Jon?”

Jon’s in front of the bed, the satchel of statements emptied beside him and papers strewn across the floor. His eyes scan the pages in his hand hungrily, as if searching for his next meal. That’s what he’s doing and he doesn’t want you to see this, his mind helpfully supplies and yet still he speaks, he can’t help it.

“Jon, I was just going to-”

“Not hungry.” The words are startlingly severe, and Jon doesn’t even raise his eyes from the page. Martin bristles.

“Alright, but you should really-”

This time he does look up, and the glare leveled at him is surprisingly reminiscent of earlier days in the archives, when Martin would interrupt a statement or exist near him a little too loudly. “I said I’m not hungry.”

Time to go. “Fine.” Irritation drips into the word and he takes a step back from the doorway.

“Close the door.” He does. Slams it, actually. He’s not hungry anymore.  For the first time the house feels big and empty, despite the cozy quarters. 

He grabs his coat from the couch, deciding to go for a walk. It’s not as temperate a day as it could’ve been- it’s getting colder, and the two sunny days they had beforehand seem now more miraculous than a regular occurrence. He wanders aimlessly in the fields, not willing to commit to the hour walk to the village, and too moody to visit the cows he knows are only a mile off.  As much as he wants to lose himself in solitude, he resists. Back with Peter, he would hold on to every perceived slight and tell himself it’s better this way. Without people. That way, you can’t get hurt. It numbed the loss, and it’s so, so tempting to fall back on. But the voice that urged him to take Jon’s hand is louder now, and it tells him this will pass. Jon’s not truly angry with him, he doesn’t have to stay away. It’s this voice he listens to now.

It helps that his feet kind of hurt, too. 

By the time that he comes back, it’s starting to drizzle. He shakes out his coat and hangs it on the back of a chair, heading towards the kitchen to put the kettle on. The door’s still closed, but he can hear no noise behind it. He loses himself in the routine motions of making tea, humming under his breath. He’s so wrapped up in his task that he doesn’t hear the door creak open or register Jon’s presence until he turns around and finds the man within a foot of him.

“Christ Jon!” He yelps, the mug in his hand just barely remaining steady. “You scared me-”

“I wanted to apologize.” The words sound almost grave, and Jon’s gazing up at him an intense look of contrition. He looks better, the circles under his eyes slightly faded and his face not quite so gaunt. He’s eaten, then. “For...hiding away like that, and snapping at you. I shouldn’t have done that.” He fidgets on his feet for a moment before moving even closer, directly into Martin’s space. Jon has to crane his neck to look up at him, and still maintains that intense eye contact. “I’m sorry.” Martin’s heart is hammering in his chest and he watches, eyes wide, as Jon awkwardly gets on his toes and leans forward, putting his hand on Martin’s chest to balance himself. Not without some strain, he reaches up and kisses him.

It’s a tiny, dry peck on the cheek, lingering just too long as Jon struggles to maintain his balance. He falls back on his feet and looks up at Martin anxiously.  Martin, who’s still holding a cup of tea in one hand and a spoon in the other. Jonathan Sims kissed him. 

“W-Was that alright?” he asks, a squeak to his voice in stark contrast to the deep gravity of the words before. Jonathan Sims kissed him and has now asked if it was alright. 

Martin blinks owlishly. “Y-Yes? I mean, yes. That was fine. And, uh, apology accepted. Yes.”

They stare at each other for a few moments before Martin comes to his senses, gesturing to the cup in his hand. “Tea?”

Jon takes a few steps back, an unreadable expression on his face as he wobbles into a kitchen chair. “Um, yes, please.”

That exchange taken care of, Martin makes him a cup and sits down across from him. Jon’s now refusing to meet his eyes, cheeks red as he stares into his cup of tea like it holds the answers to the universe. Martin can still feel the burn of the hand on his chest, the soft pressure of Jon’s lips on his cheek. He wonders if it was a one time thing. The irrational part of him thinks it's just how Jon apologizes. You know it’s not, the more rational part says. But neither part seems to be controlling his mouth as he starts to speak.

“Next time I’ll bend down.” He stares at the table, willing himself to shut up as he outwardly takes a calm sip of his tea.

“W-What?”

“Should you, uh, feel the need to do that...again. I’ll make it easier on you.” He taps at his cheek and hazards a glance at Jon, who’s gone rigid in his seat. He’s staring at Martin uncomprehendingly, though there’s the hint of a smile on his lips.

“T-That would be very, er, appreciated,” Jon replies in a strange, businesslike fashion. “Should I feel the need.”

Martin nods, his heart going into overdrive. They both take a sip of their tea. 

“And if you-” Jon continues, face going even redder. “If you ever felt the need yourself, I could-” He tilts his head and shoulders up awkwardly in a weird little pantomime, as if leaning up to an invisible kiss. “-make it easier too?”

Martin lets out a strangled little sound. “Yeah. That, uh, sounds good.”

“Good.”

They finish their tea in silence. Jon looks away every time Martin attempts to make eye contact, and the hint of a smile has turned into a full-blown grin, though it's leveled at the table instead of him. Ridiculous, planning the logistics of their kisses like they don’t sleep in the same bed and wake up entangled. They’ve got a lot of things to talk about and work on, some more serious than others. But for now, should Martin feel the need, he can clear the dishes from the table and kiss Jon on the forehead before he walks them to the sink.  

And he does just that.

ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30882518

[bluejayblueskies]

Could you do "things you said at 1 am" for MarTim? Romantic or platonic is good. I'm loving all these prompt fics so much!

warning for some discussion of canon-typical worms

.

Tim sets the box of Martin’s things at the foot of the cot in document storage and makes a show of shaking out his arms and hands, even though it really hadn’t been that heavy. Mostly clothes and toiletries and other necessary amenities—though Tim had snuck in a small faux-leather notebook and a picture frame depicting a family he assumed to be Martin’s standing in front of the sea. Martin couldn’t have been more than five in the picture, but Tim recognized his auburn curls and button nose.

 If Martin’s going to be stuck in the Archives for the foreseeable future, he may as well have something personal to keep him company, Tim figures. So, he’d packed it away, gathered the rest of the items on the list Martin had provided him with, and brought it all back to the Archives. Sasha was already gone by the time he arrived, and Jon’s office door was shut, though a thin line of light escaped from below it.

 He’s been working later and later, Tim’s noticed. And if the cot already tucked away in document storage is anything to go by, he’s also been spending less and less time at his flat.

 “There we are,” Tim says, flashing Martin a warm smile. “You’re all set to live in the company of hundreds of years’ worth of dusty documents. Not exactly bedtime stories—unless you prefer the spooky sort—but, you know…”

 Tim trails off with a small shrug. There’s an ache beneath it, one that grows stronger when Martin curls in on himself slightly and says, “Better than the worms.”

 “Yeah,” Tim says, and some of it leaks out—a guilt so thick it hurts his teeth. Two weeks, and he hadn’t even thought to check on Martin.

“We would have come,” Tim finds himself saying, quiet yet too-loud in the space between them. “If we’d have known, we would have come.”

 “I know,” Martin says, his words ragged around the edges. “It- it’s okay.”

 “No,” Tim says, surprised at the conviction in his voice. “It’s not. You were trapped for two weeks by a worm-infested woman and- and we just took her word that you were out sick.” Tim feels revulsion bubbling up within him, a sickening nausea. “I texted her. I thought it was you, and I- I was sending her the things I would send you, little jokes and pictures I thought you’d like and offering to come over. But every time, you said no. Said you didn’t want me to get sick, and it was such a you thing to say that I just accepted it! After a week, I should have just come by, if only to see if you needed- Christ, groceries or something.”

 Martin hugs his arms tighter to himself. “I’m glad you didn’t,” he says, barely more than a whisper. “I- I don’t know what would have happened if you did.”

 Tim knows that Martin’s right. He’d probably be dead. Or worse. Still, he can’t shake the feeling that if he’d just cared enough to check in, Martin wouldn’t have that scared, haunted look on his face that he’s trying very hard to hide. “Yeah,” Tim says, that same guilt laced into his words. “You’re probably right. Doesn’t make it better, though.”

 Martin just nods. For a moment, they stand there in silence. Tim doesn’t know what to do, how to make it better. He hadn’t been there for Martin when he’d been trapped and alone and terrified, but he’s here now. He’s here, but he’s never been good at comforting people, at smoothing the pain from someone’s face or knowing the right words to chase away fear and sadness.

 So, eventually, Tim shrugs off his jacket, folds it on top of the box, and says, “You know, I have some playing cards stashed away in my desk, as well as quite an impressive selection of crisps and chocolates. I have to tell you, though—I’ve never lost a match of Go Fish.”

 Martin’s eyes when they meet Tim’s are wide with surprise. “What?”

 Tim shrugs and smiles, a practiced motion that keeps him grounded even when pain and sadness threaten to tear him apart. He hopes it does the same for Martin. “Thought we’d make a night of it. A good old-fashioned sleepover, if you will.”

 “Why—?” Martin cuts off, shakes his head once. When he speaks again, his voice is cracked down the middle. “You- you don’t have to stay, Tim. I’ll be fine.”

 “I know,” Tim says, a bit of that guilt pushing into the edges of his words again despite his best efforts to keep it hidden. He lets it take over, for just a moment, and says, “I thought you might not want to be alone. And I’ve been told that I’m excellent company.”

 Martin lets out a small, shaky laugh. “Do they?” he says, humored, and something warm spreads through Tim’s chest, nestling next to his heart. “I- I suppose… I’d like that.” He nods hesitantly and repeats, “I’d like that.”

 Tim flashes Martin another grin before heading off to retrieve the cards.

 They stay up late, into the very early morning even as exhaustion drags Tim’s eyelids down with every passing hour. Tim’s always liked spending time with Martin—on Friday nights at the pub or on the occasional movie night or even just in passing, taking a moment to chat at Martin’s desk before moving on to his own work. He finds himself moving closer and closer to Martin as the night wears on until their thighs are pressed together as they lean against the wall, the cards laying forgotten on the floor in front of them as they just talk. About frivolous things, like the kinds of flowers Tim likes and Martin’s favorite pastries. About personal things, like Martin’s visits to his mother in the home and Tim’s brief affair with Sasha.

 The clock rolls over into single digits, and Martin says, quietly, “I lied on my CV.��

 Tim looks over at him. His hands are fidgeting in his lap, but his mouth is set into a thin, determined line, like he’d been working himself up to this for a very long time. Martin must sense Tim’s eyes on him because he continues unprompted, “I- I mentioned that my mother is in a home, and- and she’s been unwell for quite some time, so I had to drop out of school when I was 17 to support us. Didn’t have time or the qualifications for a degree, but I needed the money, and- and nowhere was hiring, so I- I faked my credentials. Said I had a master’s in business or English or history—anything that might get me a job that paid enough to support us. For some reason, my lie about parapsychology got me an interview with Elias, and then… he hired me.” Martin sucks in a small, shaky breath. “I- I’m only 29.”

 Tim’s reeling a bit. He doesn’t really know what to say—what can he say? Eventually, what comes out is, “You’ve been here since you were 22? Without a degree?” He turns so he can face Martin fully and says, completely serious, “Martin, that’s amazing.”

 Martin flushes a bright crimson. “I- I don’t really think it’s- I mean, it’s not really something that I earned—”

 Tim puts his hand on Martin’s knee, and Martin’s mouth snaps shut. “To jump straight into an academic job without any prior knowledge? Yeah, maybe it’s not conventional, but it doesn’t negate the fact that you’re just as good a researcher as me and Sasha.”

 Martin’s flush grows deeper, and he mumbles, “Yeah, I- I guess.”

 Martin’s hands begin to twist around each other again, an uncomfortable gesture, and after a moment’s hesitation, Tim takes one of Martin’s hands in his, trying to offer support and reassurance in the brush of his fingers against Martin’s. He hears the way Martin’s breath hitches as he does so, and affection curls in his stomach. “I’m glad you told me,” Tim says sincerely. “And I hope you know that I’m not going to tell anybody, not unless you want me to.”

 Martin shakes his head firmly. “No, I- I really don’t want to be fired. I, er. I kind of need this job.” He lets out a small noise that could almost be a groan if it weren’t so laced with nerves. “Christ, if Jon found out. After the dog incident, I- I think he’d just fire me on the spot.”

 “Or maybe,” Tim says, “it might finally convince him to stop berating you for every little mistake.”

 “Tim,” Martin says, pleading.

 “I’m not going to tell him,” Tim says softly, squeezing Martin’s hand once more to firmly convey his point. “I promise.”

 The tension in Martin’s shoulders bleeds out, and he sighs heavily. “Thank you. For- for everything, I suppose.” He pauses a moment before saying, quieter, “For- for this. For staying with me.”

 Tim knocks his shoulder against Martin’s and then makes the split-second decision to leave it there, pressed against Martin’s. “Yeah, of course,” he says lightly. “We’re friends.”

 “Friends,” Martin echoes, like the word’s unfamiliar on his tongue. After a moment, he squeezes Tim’s hand in return and leans more firmly into Tim’s side. His curls brush against the shell of Tim’s ear, and Tim has the sudden desire to feel Martin’s lips against him, ghosting across his jawline and light against his temple. For a moment, he considers asking—taking Martin’s hand and raising it to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to Martin’s knuckles and his palm and the inside of his wrist.

 He doesn’t. Instead, he gives Martin a wide smile and says, “I like you, Martin. Me and Sasha and- and even Jon, I bet, underneath all that prickliness.” He gives in to his desires, just a bit, and lets his free hand come up to the side of Martin’s face, tucking a stray curl behind his ear. “How could we not?”

 Martin’s cheek is hot beneath Tim’s hand, and he can feel the motion of Martin’s jaw as he says, quietly, “I… I like you too.”

 “Flatterer,” Tim says. He loves the way Martin’s smile at that feels against his palm.

 They go to sleep soon after, Martin flat on his back on the cot and Tim sprawled on top of him despite Martin’s protests that we’re not both going to fit, Tim, the cot’s not really built for two. Tim can feel the motion of Martin’s chest as he breathes; he wants to curl up into Martin’s side and stay there forever.

 “Goodnight,” Tim mumbles, sleep already overtaking him. Maybe that’s why he lets his lips brush against Martin’s cheek as he says it, a slight enough motion that he doesn’t know if Martin feels it.

 He’s not awake for long enough to know for sure. But with the feeling of Martin beneath him, soft and warm and safe, he doesn’t really mind either way.

[athina-blaine]

MoMM Chapter 4 - The Storm, Part 1 (Preview #1)

(Note: this is not the finalized draft; anything featured is subject to edits or deletion!)

Chapter 3: The Empty Corridors

“To be honest, I’m not entirely sure I deserve that. Your friendship. After everything I’ve done since…”

“Of course you do. Listen to yourself; it’s not like you wanted to frighten me.” An inch of space sat between their hands. “Is this …? Um. Is this okay …?”

The winds continued to howl, and Martin's hand lay limp on the bed sheets. His face grew hot, and he started pulling back. Stupid idea. But then Jon slid his hand closer until their fingers brushed. Emboldened, Martin wrapped his hand around Jon's, his burn scar grazing the soft skin of Martin's palm.

He squeezed gently.

“No one deserves to be lonely, Jon.”

Jon had no response, staring out to the storm that continued knocking on their windows. He stared, and he let Martin hold his hand.

Chapter 4 - The Storm, Part 1

Martin was an optimist. He had to be. Anything else would have been utterly unbearable.

That being said, he was… relatively confident things would get better. Jon had confided in him the terrible secret of Magnus Manor and the truth of this hellish storm. The Lonely. And understanding a problem meant you were one step closer to solving it, right? It meant one step closer to getting out of the cursed estate you’d found yourself trapped in.

Most importantly, though, the two of them were talking again. Above all else, that gave him hope.

 Jon was waiting for him in the foyer the next morning. His nose was buried in a book, but when Martin approached, he looked up, and Martin liked to think he looked pleased.

“Good morning,” Martin said, hoping he didn’t sound too flustered.

“You as well. Would ... would you be amenable to sharing some morning tea? If ... if you're still offering ...”

“Y-yes, of course.” So yesterday hadn’t been a fluke; Jon wasn’t going to leave him alone again. “That sounds great. Um. English Breakfast, then?”

Jon smiled, nodded, and fetched them both a pot and one cup apiece. The porcelain warmed Martin’s aching fingers, a refreshing respite from the chill that crept so subtly through the halls.

They drank, and they talked about very little. Martin’s tongue burned with questions (–what’s it like living with these entities? How do they manifest? Will we get out of here soon?–), but he restrained himself; the age lining Jon’s face had soothed as he sipped his tea,  and when he asked Martin how he’d slept, there was a shy twist to his mouth.

Right now, Martin wanted to enjoy himself. Enjoy Jon and a warm cup of morning tea. There would be plenty of time to agonise later.

In the meantime, he’d just need to keep busy. Now was as good a time as any to give cleaning the manor another chance. Masochistic, maybe. Impossible, certainly. But at least this time he didn’t have to worry about being reprimanded. Probably.

One of the many study rooms that littered the estate would be a good place to start. Small as it was, its sooty fireplace and dusty couch was enough of a time sink for his purposes.

He was in the middle of battling a particularly stubborn stain when the door opened and Jon peered inside. Despite everything, Martin couldn’t help his trill of anxiety, made all the worse when Jon kissed his teeth.

“Must I iterate that it’s not necessary for you to – ”

“I want to.” It was still such a shock to just see Jon, to have them talking, that the words came out in a breathless, jumbled mess. “I promise. I-I like cleaning, honest. It keeps my mind off … you know, things.”

Jon paused mid-stride. For a moment, Martin thought he was going to be chased off anyway, and then he’d have to actually beg to clean, because the thought of spending another minute with nothing to do but contemplate their situation– 

“I–” Sighing, Jon brought a hand to the bridge of his nose. “Fine. Yes, fine, if you insist. So long as you understand that it is absolutely not an expectation of you.”

Martin’s shoulders sagged with relief. Another hurdle crossed.

He’d just convinced himself to relax and finally let his mind wander, soothed by the familiar, tediousness of cleaning a fireplace, when Jon unclasped his cloak, lying it over the sofa. 

“What are you doing?”

“Assisting you, obviously. Having you clean it in my stead when I’m the one responsible for it falling into disrepair doesn’t bear thinking about.”

Doesn’t bear thinking about. What didn’t bear thinking about was a man of Jon���s stature doing menial work like this in the first place. But Martin was hardly about to refuse his help … or his company, so freely given. “Um. Thank you. You don’t have to be so hard on yourself, though. There’s literally no way you could have kept this place clean all by yourself.”

“I appreciate the reassurance, but the point is moot.”

Well, if Jon wanted to roll up his sleeves and work at a grimy fireplace, Martin wasn’t about to stop him. When Jon literally rolled up his sleeves, he bit back a smile. The skin of his forearms was paler than that of his hands and face, smooth and free of blemishes. When was the last time he’d enjoyed a bit of sunshine without his shirt buttoned up to the chin?

Not that Martin had any business considering a thing like that in the first place. God, his face was burning again.

“I hate cleaning,” Jon murmured as he dunked the spare cloth in the water bucket. “Nothing ever stays clean.”

“Yeah. Gotta do it, though. Oh, you should keep your elbow up. You won’t tire out your arm as quickly.”

“Oh. Yes, I see.” Jon sighed. “Perhaps the fault lies with me. I’ve never been particularly good at domesticity, after all. The rare times my grandmother was home, the only thing we talked about was how untidy my room was.”

Martin’s ears perked. The opportunity to learn more about Jon and his past? It was too enticing to resist. “Your gram wasn’t home much, then?”

“Not often. She was the matriarch of our family, so important business kept her in the capital most days.”

Oh. How … odd. Martin didn’t know anything about how noble families handled representing themselves, but … “I figured your mom or dad would take care of that sort of thing after a while. Did your gram just enjoy the work?”

“Both of my parents passed when I was a child.”

Martin’s stomach plunged to his feet. What a stupid blunder to make. “I’m … I’m so sorry.” 

“It was a long time ago,” Jon said, waving him away. “I was barely more than a baby at the time. I simply don’t remember enough of them to mourn their loss.”

Martin wasn’t sure if that made it worse. For all that Martin mourned the absence of his father, at least he had fleeting memories of warm hands and a deep voice to prove he’d existed at all. That he’d had a father once. “Still, that must have been … a bit lonely.” 

“Not at all. I always had my governess’ supervision. She provided the structure and discipline I required.” Jon laughed, a wistful, breathy thing, and lowered his head. “I was … a rather troublesome child.”

That did even less to make Martin feel better, because he suddenly had this image, unbidden, of a little boy with big eyes and gangly knees, head hanging as his grandmother told him off in clipped tones, before leaving once again to the bustling capital. No hugs, or gentle forehead kisses. Just a scolding about his messy bedroom.

I’m sure you were wonderful, he wanted to say. I’m sure you deserved better than that. 

But he was probably just projecting again.

“I’ve always liked cleaning,” Martin said, instead. “Makes me feel useful. My mum, she’s … she’s been sick most of my life. Nothing too serious,” Martin added quickly as Jon turned his head. “She just gets tired a lot. You know, hard to stay upright most of the time. There wasn’t a lot I could do to make her feel better, but keeping things clean helped.”

“I … I’m sorry to hear your mother is ill.”

“We were really lucky, actually. We lived in the same town as a really good doctor. He was really generous with us, but eventually … I-I couldn’t keep up with the bills running the farm all by myself, especially after our last goat died. We had to sell a few years ago, and I had to find work in the city.” Even after all this time, his throat tangled at the memory of leaving his childhood home. “Managed to land a really good job at the lord’s castle, so I always had money to send home. Every month. Haven’t been late once, yet. Until …”

“… Until now.”

Martin opened his mouth, because, well, he wasn’t late yet. There was still time for Martin to send his letter: about a week or so. That was plenty of time. But he refrained, because saying as much to Jon felt … dangerous. Like he was tempting fate. 

Things were going to work out. They had to. The storm was going to clear, they were going to get out of here, and then … 

“Your devotion to your mother is admirable,” said Jon.

Warmth ballooned in Martin’s stomach, spreading to the tips of his ears. It was an absurd thing to receive praise for (oh, you love your mother, really going above and beyond), but … well, it was still nice to hear, every once in a while. Or at all. “Thank you.”

It took most of the morning, but, with their combined efforts, they managed to restore the fireplace to an off-colour white. Martin stepped back, basking in the glow of a job well done. Jon, however, didn’t appear quite as chuffed as Martin felt. Rolling out his wrists, the man collapsed onto the couch, kicking up a cloud of dust in the process and triggering an intense coughing fit.

“Break time?” Martin asked, taking a much more gentle seat. His only answer was more coughing. Poor thing looked utterly done with the whole enterprise, if the curl of his nose was any indication. “So, what do you do for fun around here?”

“Fun?”

“Yeah. Unless you really intend to help me clean this room all day?”

Jon laughed, turning away sheepishly.  “I … yes, um … Well, this and that, I suppose. Reading, mostly. I’ve always had a penchant for it, and I’ve yet to make my way through the library. Um. Music, although it’s been quite some time since the gramophone worked. I took to baking for a time. I like to think I’d gotten rather good at it.”

“Wait, so you did bake that bread? When I first got here?” Martin thought back on it, how crispy the crust was, the soft and tasty inner dough, how fresh it had been. Martin couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten fresh bread. “That’s seriously amazing.”

“It’s hardly a complex task. But … yes, thank you.” Martin wasn’t sure if it was the haze of the dust, but Jon’s face looked a bit darker, a bit flushed. But then, the good humor in Jon’s eyes fell away. “And then there was the garden, of course. It was … well. A disaster, to put it mildly.”

“What happened?”

“Well, I killed everything, didn’t I?” Jon’s eyes dropped to his lap, shoulders sinking. “Not a single bulb flourished under my care. I … I eventually figured it was more merciful to give up than keep trying.”

“Oh, I’m sure it’s not that bad.” Would be better to start with anything but roses, he wanted to suggest. You’re just setting yourself up to fail. But that would certainly come across as annoyingly patronising. “Maybe I can lend a hand?”

“Pardon?”

Wait. No. What business did Martin have making an offer like that? It wasn’t as if he knew any better about keeping things alive. But something about the resigned nature of Jon’s tone tore at him; his mouth had fallen open of its own accord. 

“I-I mean … Well, it might be fun, yeah?” Martin tried. “Personally, I’ve always wanted to learn how to garden.” 

“Is that so?”

Martin nodded, intending on leaving it there, but Jon was watching him, waiting. Oh.

“W-Well, uh, when I was a kid,” Martin said, face warming, “I’d always dreamed of having a, um, like a little cottage? That I owned? With a great big plot of land in the middle of a forest somewhere. Would get married, settle down, grow flowers and all kinds of food together. It’s … it’s a bit silly.”

“Not at all,” Jon said, eyes softening, and Martin’s heart fluttered something fierce. “I think that’s lovely.”

He smiled, hoping it didn’t come out as a grimace, because it had been a long, long time since he’d indulged in that particular fantasy. It just wasn’t feasible, these days, having a little cottage of his own or … or finding someone who’d want to marry him when he’s never even had a serious relationship before.

“Thank you, though, for your offer,” Jon said, cutting through Martin’s thoughts. “I’ll … be sure to consider it.”

The tight knot in Martin’s stomach unwound just a bit. “‘Course.”

By that point, the dust had become utterly unbearable, and they were forced to evacuate.

.

The brass of the door handle glimmered under the lamplight, rusted with age and disuse. How long had Martin been standing here, knees locked and shivering beneath the thick chill? Ages, by now. Griffiths was going to have his skin peeled for shirking his responsibilities like this, and the head butler would be perfectly within his rights.

But every time Martin tried to remind himself, that he still had so much work to do –

“… Hello?”

That voice. Still out there, somewhere behind the old door. Distant, but not beyond Martin’s reach. If Martin had already been here for ages, then that voice …

Wasn’t anyone coming for them?

If he opened the door, he could just take a quick look. Call out, see who needed help –

“And what do you think you’re doing, young man?”

Martin yanked his hand back, hand burnt on the molten brass.

“M-Mum?”

“I always knew you’d leave for good someday. I could see it in your eyes, you know. You couldn’t bear to take care of your poor, sick mother, and now you’re off to traipse about the countryside with some invert.”

“I didn’t leave.” Tight pressure strangled Martin’s throat, the back of his eyes burning. “I’d never do that. Where are you? I’m coming, I-I’ll find you–”

“And what, pray tell, would be the point of that?”

“Mum, please, just tell me where you are, I’m coming–”

“You’ve always been a wretched liar.”

.

Martin lurched upright, sucking painful gasps through his aching teeth, his sleep shirt sticking to his sweaty skin. No light permeated the windows— he may as well have been in a tomb, for all that he could see.

Jon was out there somewhere. Alone. As was his mother.

I’m coming back to you. I’ll find a way out of here. I’m doing everything I can– 

Liar.

Martin curled up onto his side, wrapping trembling arms around himself. Even though there was no one else to hear him, no one to stifle himself for, he drove his teeth into his lip until his mouth filled with the dull taste of copper.

Check out the Monster of Magnus Manor here!

[bibliocratic]

tim and jon

part of a series of archive polycule oneshots (minor cws and mentions in the tags - ask if you would like anything added. these cws are explained in more detail in the ANs on A03)

“Would you hurry up?” Jon hisses at him, his eyes scattering skittishly to dart and interrogate every night-echoed noise. His expression is bow-strung and embroiled in a hundred outcomes where they get caught, and he furiously shakes his head when Tim indicates through rough and basic mime the next stage of this impeccably-organised plan. There is a flurry of disagreement about who gets to take the starring role in the next part, performed entirely through gestures and whispers before Jon, snapping a ‘fine, fine’, takes the leg-up Tim’s offering. There’s a medley of ‘shit’ and ‘woahwoahwoah’ as both of them adjust to balance and Jon clings to the wall for a moment, psyching himself up prior to shimmying his lanky body worm-like through the open letterbox-shaped window.

There is a clattering, a worrying thump. Tim winces, and cautiously calls out “Boss?” as loud as he dares.

He gets a seething cats-hiss of “Keep it down!” so he presumes Jon’s not too badly damaged.

A minute or so later, Jon is opening the lock from the inside to let Tim into the building. His jumper is rumpled, his hair and face caked with dust like a talc bottle’s gone off in his face.

“Bit grubby there,” Tim grins. Jon gives him a look that promises untold violence and an unmarked grave if he doesn’t behave himself. Tim mimes zipping his lips shut before passing Jon the spare torch.

Despite Jon’s protestations, this outing was his idea. The security tapes and records are in here somewhere, the owner was cagey enough that it’s practically a given, and if they can use them to prove a case of a possible active entity, well, a little sneaking around can’t hurt. Jon had avoided calling it exactly what it was (‘It’s just some looking around’ / ‘It’s trespassing, boss’ / ‘It’s harmless, we’ll be in and out, we’re not really stealing anything valuable’ / ‘It’s breaking and entering and trespassing on private property’) so much so that Tim had laughed, declared it a case of Schrödinger’s illegal and told Jon he’d buy them both some gloves for their night-time ‘looking around’.

Moving further into the property, the flashlights they’ve brought arc with echoes of illumination a split second slow, like the dragging light of a Bonfire sparkler, eventually casting over to a metallic-walled office tucked off to the side. This place looks like a pre-fab, out on an industrial estate somewhere, and from contents inside, has spent the last few years being a motorcycle showroom. Gleaming structures are displayed proudly and buffed to shining in lines, the large open-plan room interspersed with load-bearing pillars. Off near the end, there’s the accessories part of the space, with metal shelving and stands and racks where helmets and gloves and leathers are clustered.

The office is locked.  Jon wordlessly pushes the torch over to Tim, who holds both it and his own pointed at the lock, and pulls out a black rectangular carry case. Kneeling down, he unzips it with a quiet tug, revealing its contents as an honest-to-god lockpicking kit.

“Are you serious?” Tim expels in a high breath, his mouth curved high in delight.

“Childhood hobby,” is the only thing Jon will say, and any further questions are refuted with a ‘I am trying to concentrate’ or a stone-wall silence. Tim files all a hundred and one of his follow-up questions for a later time. He’s half tempted to snap a photo for Sasha, but then remembers with a guilty jolt that that would probably be a bad idea if anyone catches them.

The office is no better than their archives, and Jon is visibly disappointed at the lack of an easy job. Stowing away his kit back into his pockets, they settle into a routine after a few muttered back-and-forth suggestions. Tim takes the paper-drowned desk, the stuffed layers of the in-tray and the desk drawers, while Jon braves the rattling filing cabinets taller than he is.

For the most part, they work in silence, which means it’s a surprise when, after a few moments rifling, Jon says in a painfully faux-casual way:

“So. You and um. You and Martin.”

“Hmm?” Tim replies. His eyes flick over several receipts, a few carbon-copies of CBT papers and full licenses.  He tries to separate some, only to find that they’ve started to stick together, and he sighs with irritation.

Jon remains quiet. Tim turns to look at him, and he’s still got his hands in the stomach of the highest and dustiest filing cabinet, obviously no longer looking with the entirety of his attention but still trying to keep up the charade.

“Was there a point you wanted to make, or…?”

Jon pulls his hands out and swings his face around, and Tim can’t read his expression.

“At the… At the Institute party. You seemed… close.”

No closer than usual, Tim had thought. Martin’s efforts hadn’t been enough to completely vanish his anxieties over the socialisation. He’d stuck close to the other three all night, tugging at his new jacket at intervals, running his fingers over the fabric to settle himself. He’d avoided the alcohol entirely, and had picked at the snack foods. Tim had been as free with his affections with Sasha as usual, casual touches to her hip, the small of her back, calling her ‘babe’ and ‘love’. Sasha had pressed a kiss to Jon’s cheek and dragged him over by the hand to their merry band when he’d arrived later than the rest of them. Tim and Martin hadn’t touched because Martin had confessed earlier that he’d prefer if they didn’t, not in this setting, not where other people could see or comment or judge, and so Tim respected that and kept his distance. Apart from once, when they were sat off to the side on plastic-backed chairs pulled out of some store cupboard somewhere, unnoticed by anyone else. Sasha had been drawn into conversation with Rosie about something political, and Jon had been extricating himself from talking to Elias after being summoned over to meet a few of their investors, and Martin had nudged Tim’s hand with the back of his own and murmured ‘Thanks. For, um, convincing me to come’ and then he’d glanced around before leaning in and kissing him demurely before moving back, his cheeks clawed with pink.  Tim had felt a bit like a firecracker going off.

“You’re a bit late for any juicy office gossip,” Tim replies slowly, uncertain of where this conversation is going. “I mean, it’s not a new development.”

Perhaps Jon had seen him and Martin, although it wasn’t a crime, what they did, wasn’t inappropriate for work. He’d assumed Sasha would have told him, on the nights when Jon stayed at hers. Martin doesn’t tell anyone about them, but Martin doesn’t tell anyone about a lot of things, and they’ve spoken about his insecurities and fears both unfounded and painfully historical. Tim doesn’t mind Martin’s reticence, doesn’t mind the slow-building thing between them. Martin pretends not to smile at his jokes and beats him at Mario Kart every time and oversalts his chips and undercooks his eggs and finishes Tim’s onion bhajis when he’s ordered too much and scolds him for forgetting about the bins again and has started to kiss him for the first time like this isn’t something he’s going to lose. Martin hasn’t said he loves him, and that’s alright. Tim’s pretty sure he’s been gone for Martin for months now.

“Does he know?”

Jon’s follow-up is flint-strike, whiplash-corded. He’s set his jaw and his mouth in a tight line that looks like a wound in the unsettled torchlight.

“What do you mean?” Tim asks nonplussed, and if anything, Jon winches his body tighter and says, almost impatiently.

“Does Martin know about Sasha?”

“What about her?”

“About you and Sasha?”

“I mean… yes?”

“And does Sasha know about you and Martin?”

“Have you talked to her about this?”

“Well, no. I wanted to ask you first.”

Comprehension rocks him tidal with a sudden drenching wave.

“Christ, Jon!” Tim hisses out, and Jon gestures him to be quieter and it’s only with real effort that he manages: “Of course she knows. They both know about each other – I’m not a complete bastard!”

“I didn’t say that!” Jon counters defensive. A coil of embarrassment has begun to wind its way through his tone.

“Is that what you think? That I’ve, what, started seeing Martin on the side and just… what, haven’t told Sasha about it? That you’ve uncovered some sort of sordid little office scandal? The fuck, Jon!”

“Keep your voice down!”

“You’re the one who wanted to have this conversation right now,” Tim snaps back.

“I – ” Jon huffs, irritated with himself. The torchlight makes his expression stretch, take on more weight. “That wasn’t what I meant, and I didn’t intend it to come across that way.”

“What way did you intend it to come across then?”

“It – it doesn’t matter.”

“Well, it sounded a lot like you were a second away from accusing me of cheating on either one or both of them, so no, actually, I do want you to give me an explanation. Like, right now…. Is this some jealousy thing, with Sasha?”

“What? No! No, Sasha can, Sasha can date who she likes. It doesn’t bother me that you two are together as well.”

“So, what, Jon? What’s the problem?”

“I…” Jon makes an aggrieved noise. “I’m not explaining myself well.”

“You can say that again.”

Jon breathes hard. He fiddles with his fingers and Tim waits, making Jon be the one to speak first. Because for all Jon’s protesting that he didn’t mean it like that, Tim’s hurt,  slighted by the idea that Jon might think that of him, might read callousness or deception into his actions so easily.

“I don’t think that of you,” Jon says eventually. “I know – you wouldn’t hurt Sasha and you wouldn’t hurt Martin. I didn’t think you were cheating. I just… I didn’t know that you and Martin… I thought that you and Sasha, not that you were exclusive, but that … and then I saw you with Martin and I wanted to make sure, because I don’t… so, I get that Sasha, she likes you and she likes me and that’s – I get that. But I don’t understand how you – what, you were with Sasha, and then you just… what, started dating Martin? How does that work? How are you with one person, and then you meet another and then you want to be with them as well?”

Tim does not have time to teach Jon Polyamory 101, considering they’re in the middle of something that, pretty euphemisms aside, is definitely a crime. If Jon was better at communicating, this was something he might have been able to broach with Sasha, or with Tim at literally any time other than right now.

Jon’s intensity is misplaced. He’s always been good at that, reflecting the inward out to something he feels he can tackle. Tim privately thinks that Jon’s had these little boxes in his head of what he understands poly to be, and that Martin’s involvement has jostled them out of alignment. That Jon might not be as monogamous as he’s previously considered himself to be and is having to work through all the baggage which comes with personal growth.

Tim’s seen the way Jon looks at Martin when he thinks no-one is looking.

“Jon,” he says, and he does well to strip the irritation from his voice. “Me and Sasha, we talked about it, early on when we first started seeing each other. About the whole exclusive thing. And like adults, we came to the agreement that we were happy for the other person to be in a different relationship if they felt drawn to be so, as long as all parties were informed and consented to the arrangements. And then, this thing with Martin came along… and I told Sasha about it, and she suggested I try seeing if he’d be interested. And luckily, you know, he was, and the three of us have talked about the logistics of it all, and it’s working out. I’m not sure what you’re finding difficult to understand.”

“So… Sasha and Martin are together too?”

“Nah. They’re, um – how did they put it… ‘incompatible in a few key areas’. But they love each other in their own way, and they’re happy, and that’s all there is to it.”

Jon ruminates on this for a bit before he seems to mentally prepare himself for another question.

“And how did you feel, when Sasha started seeing me?”

“Er. Fine. Questioned her taste in men a bit, but…” Jon’s face is a picture at that moment. “I’m joking! I was fine about it. Is… is that was this is about?”

“It’s… not exactly…” Jon looks at the dust on his shoes, rubs at a grubby spot on his face that he’d missed with his sleeve. “When she told you that she wanted to see me, it didn’t… it didn’t make you feel, I don’t know, hurt? That you weren’t enough for her?”

Tim loves Jon dearly but god, he can be an idiot.

“It doesn’t work like - Look. You’re not – it’s not about one person being ‘enough’, yeah? It’s not a finite resource, kay, people can love their friends and pets and family and partners and it’s not… it’s not going to run out or anything daft like that. When Sasha started seeing you, and going to pub quizzes with you, or when she’d be at mine one night and then she’d leave in the morning to go on one of your museum jaunts or whatever…. You being there didn’t reduce how she felt about me, or make our relationship any less meaningful. And when you’re with Sasha, you don’t feel she cares about you less because I’m in the picture, right?”

“No.”

“Exactly. She loves you differently, not less. And the same when me and Martin got together.”

“I… I understand,” Jon says slowly.

“Then, what about this is bothering you exactly?” Tim says, and his voice has quietened now.

“Sasha wouldn’t feel… hurt. If I wanted to, um, hypothetically see someone else. She wouldn’t think that I – I wasn’t happy, or that I wanted more than what we had together, or that she wasn’t… enough for me. And if I did see someone else, they wouldn’t feel like I was, I dunno, messing them around?”

“Jon,” Tim says. “I think this is a conversation you should really be having with our girlfriend, yeah? But… personally, I wouldn’t worry. Wanting to date another person isn’t bad. You just need to be honest and communicate.”

There is a long pause.

“Thanks, Tim.” Jon looks tired, mulling over things, but his face is plastered over with something like relief compared to his earlier tension. “I do – er. I do appreciate you. Talking to me about… about all this.”

“Don’t get soft on me, boss,” Tim says, and he gives Jon a wink. A deliberate gesture that says ‘it’s alright’. “I know I’m a delight to be around.”

Jon relaxes and his expression flint-sparks into a small smirk.

“Whatever Sasha and Martin have been telling you, you’re absolutely not that charming.”

“Please. I’m a catch. Irresistible.”

“I seem to be immune.”

“You sure about that?” Tim teases and Jon rolls his eyes and gives him a put-on look-over.

“You aren’t my type.”

“It’d be different then, if I was, say, a winsome-looking redhead?” Tim says. “If I looked like I’d fallen backwards into a tragically retro clothes shop. Would that, perhaps, be a little bit more your type, boss?”

It’s too dark to see if Jon’s complexion has flared with embarrassment.

“Where are you going with this, Tim?”

“Nowhere!” Tim sing-songs and turns his attention back to the desk. One of the drawers is stuck and he yanks at it before it opens with a complaining screech. “Nowhere at all.”

Jon doesn’t respond. For a few moments, they sink back into their search.

“He’s seemed happier recently,” Jon says after five minutes or so. “You’re good for him.”

“You could be too,” Tim says.

“Well. Ahem.” Jon has definitely gone a different colour at that thought.

And then his face hardens. He clicks off the torch sharply, and he's yanking Tim forwards by the arm, tugged him next to him into the cramped space next to one of the filing cabinets. Tim would have yelped, but Jon gives a sharp 'shhh', and grabs at Tim's torch to press it off as he pulls them both down crouching. For a moment, there's nothing but breathing, Tim trying to ask Jon what's wrong with his limited movement and Jon equally communicating that he needs to shut up immediately.

Then Tim hears the noises outside.

He thought they'd have more time. The doors to the office and the main building aren't locked, and they won't be able to get out now, not without facing whatever is out there that the statement giver warned them about.

"What'll we do, boss?" he whispers to Jon, the words threaded onto one breath.

"Plan B?" Jon suggests. He passes his torch to Tim, and goes for the inside of his bag again, bringing out the items Tim had argued repeatedly for bringing and Jon had repeatedly shot down.

Tim grins despite himself.

"Plan B," he affirms, and helps Jon light the firework.

[ieattaperecorders]

Tendon, Heel

Considerations of injury, and the possibility of death. Discussion between the Archivist and Martin Blackwood, in situ.

(Because sometimes fanfiction is for making characters talk more explicitly about their thoughts and fears than you expect or even want them to in canon.)

Read on Ao3

They'd watched Basira walk towards the tower until she'd disappeared.

Martin had asked, because he was a glutton for punishment, how it was possible that they were headed towards the same tower from the same place but going two different directions. Jon had replied that she was on a different path now. When Martin asked what that even meant, he'd only said it "meant what it meant." Literally, symbolically, they were one and the same.

It really wasn't fair to be mad at Jon for giving him frustrating answers when frustrating answers were all that there were. Martin knew that.

They moved on. With each step, the heat of the furnace faded from the air and the sounds of metal grew distant. Jon had let his hand slip back into Martin's and his pace was slower, eyes fixed on the tower. For his own part, Martin tried not to look at it - it had a habit of holding his gaze in a way that felt non-metaphorical.

They'd walked in silence for a while when Jon abruptly cried out, his bandaged leg folding in on him. Luckily Martin had enough foresight to walk on the side of Jon's injury, so when he stumbled Jon leaned hard into him rather than falling flat on his face.

"Easy! Easy," he said, "here, sit down - -"

Jon grunted what might have been a response, teeth grit, face tight with pain. He took long, slow breaths as Martin eased him to the ground.

"S'alright," he finally managed. "Just took an odd step."

"Let me see your leg. I knew you shouldn't be walking yet." Martin sighed. "Just ‘have to stretch it out' like hell."

"That's not - - I thought it was healing." Jon reluctantly peeled up the tattered fabric of his pant leg. "It was healing, it has been. You saw the state that it was in before."

Martin didn't respond beyond a quiet hmm noise. Carefully, he pulled the blood-soaked bandages back, exposing the wound to the air.

Jon wasn't wrong, really. The mess that . . . that the thing that used to be Daisy had made of him was healing, far faster than would have been possible if natural laws meant anything. It was worlds better than what he had first bandaged up. But there was now scarring that was painful to look at, and the central spot where her teeth had dug in was still a deep, inflamed red.

"I think . . ." Jon's eyes got a distant look to them, one Martin recognized by now. "I think . . . it might not ever heal. Not completely, anyway."

"What do you mean?"

"She was able to hurt me. Harm me. Something lasting," he sighed. "Something I can't easily recover from."

Martin frowned, looking at the center of his wound. He felt a twist in his chest. "It's . . . just going to stay like this?"

"Probably? It isn't - - I can walk on it fine. It hurts, but nothing serious. Just stepped at an odd angle and got caught by surprise."

"Well. I don't know how nightmare-magic healing works." Martin said, tossing the old bandages aside. "But I don't imagine a fresh bandage would hurt. And there are probably things out here that can smell blood or something, so . . . hold still for a moment, yeah?"

Jon nodded, and Martin pulled what he needed out of the pack, settling into the acts of first aid. He cleaned the area around the wound and taped down some fresh gauze. He'd just about finished his work when he felt something - a hand moving gently though his hair - and glanced up. Jon was looking at him with affection, reaching over to pet his head. Martin smiled back, brought Jon's hand down to his face and kissed it.

"I don't know if first aid makes any difference anymore," he said. "But it's something, right?"

"It does make a difference, I think. Not the physical bandaging, but the fact that you wanted to help me. That you tried," Jon looked at Martin intently. "I think it would be far worse now if you hadn't."

You tried. It makes a difference. Martin swallowed and let out a soft laugh.

"This is how it is now, huh? Dream logic. Putting a metaphorical bandage on a metaphorical injury on a metaphorical leg."

Jon smiled wryly. "I can assure you that the pain is very real."

Martin's expression must have changed, because Jon frowned and shook his head.

"It's not bad, though," he said, beginning to stand. "It'll feel better once I've had more chance to walk it off, and I think I'm ready to move on."

Oh, definitely not, no chance that he was going to allow that. Martin crossed his legs. "Well, I'm not. So how about you try resting it off for a bit instead, hmm?"

". . . Fine."

Jon sounded immensely put-upon as he sat back down. But the tension in his face lessened as he took weight off his leg, and he released a long, slow breath. Martin felt quietly vindicated.

"I really did get used to the idea that nothing here could hurt you," he said after a pause. "Not like this, anyway."

"Mmm." Jon traced his fingers over the edge of the bandage.

"Was it just Daisy?" Martin glanced uneasily around them, looking for signs of movement. "I mean . . . are there other things out here that could do that?"

"I'm not sure. Mostly not, I think. I don't know what will happen when we reach Elias, so it's possible he can. The Powers are infinitely greater, of course, but they have me where they want me already." Jon's eyes went glassy again, and Martin felt the hair on his neck stand up. "When Basira asked if - if she could kill me, I Knew the answer was no. But in hindsight I'm sort of glad she didn't try? It wouldn't have been fatal, but it might have been enough to hurt. Coming from her."

"Is there - - " Martin wasn't sure if he wanted to know the answer, but he had to ask. "Anything that can kill you? I mean . . . permanently?"

Jon blinked at him. It was a deliberate act, a gesture of surprise, as Jon never blinked anymore unless he was thinking about it.

Martin blinked back. "What?"

". . . You don't know?" Jon asked.

Martin should have been more annoyed by the question, really, but he was so sincere. There was a look of innocent bafflement on his face, ridiculous against the backdrop of darkened skies and scorched earth and a face that always seemed set in shadow regardless of the lighting.

"No, Jon," he let out a small huff, fondly nudging his arm. "There's a great number of things I don't know, as you seem to keep forgetting."

"Ah. Right."

"Look . . . I'm trying to keep a stiff upper lip and all, but it really, really wasn't fun seeing that back there," Martin said, "and I'm not sure how many more surprises like that I can take. So if there's something dangerous that I don't know about, something that could really, permanently kill you, I want to know before it's coming up behind us and - -"

"It's not - I mean - -" Jon let out a small breath of laughter, "I think I'm looking at him."

Martin stopped mid-sentence. Even realizing how absurd it looked, he couldn't keep himself from turning around - as if there would be something behind him, something else for Jon to be talking about. He turned back. Jon was still looking at him.

"What - - you mean me?" he sputtered.

Jon nodded.

"How? How is that even possible?"

"Same reason Daisy could hurt me." Jon shrugged, mildly. "Same reason Basira could kill Daisy. Maybe even the reason your bandage helped as much as it did."

"I . . . ." Martin tried to process what he was hearing. He felt lightheaded. "Oh, Jon . . . ."

Jon held out a hand and Martin took it, squeezing as tightly as he could.

"Because I love you." Jon clarified, unnecessarily.

"God . . . yeah, okay." Martin took a deep breath. "Well, uh, geez. I won't. In case that needs to be said!"

"I'm not worried about that."

"Okay, good!" Martin's laugh was anxious and too loud, his head was still spinning. "Wait . . . why - why didn't you tell me this earlier?"

"I didn't really Know until recently." Jon shrugged again. "I've been trying to, ah, give you privacy? . . . Not Look too hard. It wasn't until all this happened that I put it together."

Martin furrowed his brow. "But you thought I knew?"

"On some level, Basira knew she could kill Daisy before I told her. I thought this might be the same," he picked at the tattered edge of his pant leg. "I assumed you hadn't wanted to bring it up. Or you thought I knew already, since . . . ." he made a vague gesture with his free hand.

"Right . . . ."

"It wouldn't fix things." Jon said softly. "I was telling Basira the truth when I said that," he frowned in that intent way he did when he was trying hard to be clear. "I can't Know the future. But you don't need precognition to know what will happen if a glass vase is dropped from a ten story building. You just need to know how fragile the vase is, and how hard the concrete is.

"I - I'm not quite sure what my death would do," he continued. "Maybe it would be no different than the death of any other avatar. Either way, the entities would remain here. . ." he looked up at Martin, something searching in his face, desperate to be believed. "I would tell you if it would fix things, I wouldn't hide that from you. I know I've changed but I'm not a - - that is, i-if I knew a way back I would take it, even if - -"

"Hey. Hey. . . I know." Martin reached with his other hand, brushing it over Jon's shoulder. Quiet and careful. "I know."

Jon pressed himself into Martin, spindly arms clinging, head tucked under his chin. One of Martin's hands ended up crossing Jon's back, the other went on the back of his head, soft hair under his palm. He closed his eyes and breathed. Allowed the feeling of Jon shifting gently in his arms to block out everything else.

"I know you want to fix this as much as I do," he said when he was ready to speak again. "That's why we're both out here. And even if I can harm you, I never would. You know that, right?"

"Mmm." Jon held him close. There was no hint of hesitation or wariness in him, but his response still felt troublingly uncertain.

 "Jon. You do know that, don't you?" He pressed. "I mean . . . lower-case ‘know,' yeah, but I'd hope you wouldn't need mind reading to figure that one out."

"I do know," Jon said. "But . . . what if I was like Daisy?"

Martin's grip on Jon tightened, he felt his stomach twist. "Oh, God," he said. "We're doing this, huh?

"We don't have to." Jon's voice was soft.

"No, no . . . let's . . . God, let's talk about it." Martin took a heavy breath. "Fuck. Would you - would you want me to? Do you want me to -" he winced, afraid of the answer "-make a promise like Basira did?"

He kept a hand on the back of Jon's head, it allowed him hold him close without looking him in the face. While he talked, Jon reached a hand across Martin's arm and gently stroked down it. The gesture was jarringly comforting against the content of the conversation.

"Honestly . . . I don't know." Jon sighed. "I should say yes. That's what I should want, but truly I don't know what I want anymore. I - I think -" his thumb drew thoughtful circles across Martin's bicep. "If it came to that, if I was that far gone, I'd wish for you to decide. Do what you think is right."

"No. Jon, no." Martin shook his head, "you can't put that on me. Not that."

"I think I might have to?" Jon pulled back, meeting Martin's gaze. "I don't understand my feelings lately. There are times I'll look around at everything, all the horror and nightmares and pain, and - -" he swallowed, but didn't look away, "and it will seem so right and so perfect. Then I'll see you, and - and I'll see the terror and sorrow in your face. And I'll remember, and come back to myself - -"

"Jon . . . ."

"I trust you," Jon's voice cracked on trust. "In a way that I can't trust myself. I can't trust my own mind. But I trust you. I - I need this to be your decision."

Martin looked at Jon for a long time, silently, until a gossamer-silk certainty rang in him. His mouth formed a hard line. When he spoke his voice was tight, calm, and iron-edged.

"Fine," he said. "If it's my decision, then I decide not to. You said yourself it wouldn't fix anything, wouldn't - wouldn't make anything better, so I can't see the point. And I don't - I don't want to."

Jon nodded and sagged back into him, resumed petting his arm. He couldn't tell if Jon was relieved or resigned. Maybe he was just glad to have the choice made, the uncertainty removed.

"We've got a plan, one that will fix things," Martin said firmly. "Go to the tower, kill Elias. Settle it all that way."

"Right. . . ."

The tone was familar. Filled with doubt he wasn't speaking of, but couldn't quite keep to himself.

"You don't need to say it." Martin sighed. "I know you don't think it'll fix things, killing Elias. But . . . you don't Know it won't, right? So it might work."

". . . Right." Agreement without conviction, more damning than an argument.

"If it doesn't, we'll figure something else out," he said firmly. "If he can dream-logic his way into this situation, we can dream logic our way out. We just have to not give up."

"Maybe." It wasn't full agreement, but the concession sounded earnest and that was something. "It's clear by now even if I could theoretically Know anything, there's a great deal I manage to miss."

Martin didn't even try to keep the sardonic lilt from his voice. "Like assuming that nothing can hurt you up until you find out the hard way?"

"Like that." Jon's hands kneaded the fabric of Martin's shirt. He smirked without humor. "It's . . . strange, you know. In a sense I'm so powerful, but I don't feel it. Not in the places that matter. I can Know the most intimate horrors of this world, but not a way to repair it. I can destroy whomever I please, but I can't . . . can't save a - a - single person who's trapped here. . . ." he trailed off, voice shaking.

Martin squeezed Jon a notch tighter. "You can protect me. You've been doing that."

"That's true . . . I'm glad of that, at least." Jon took a deep breath and pulled back, keeping their hands linked. "You're still vulnerable in many ways, Martin. But you're quite possibly the only thing in this world that could end me. And I include myself in that."

"Yourse - - wait, you don't mean - "

"No one gets that escape in this place," he said grimly. "Not unless it's part of some nightmare tableau, and then not permanently. You and I are no different there. No . . . my fate is in your hands. From a certain perspective, you might be the most powerful being in this world."

"Hmm."

"How does it feel?" Jon asked. "Being powerful?"

Martin considered for a moment.

 ". . . Bad," he said decisively. Jon squeezed his hands, a sad smile on his face.

"Yes," he sighed. "Yes, it does."

[thehopefulsnowflake]

And again here are more theories and opinions about the magnus archives from my brother

The corruption is one of the "four horsemen"

War and conquest are the military ghosts, and the desolation

Famine and pestilence is the buggy bois

Death is the end, duh

The corruption is colonisation basically

Elias is against having a cat, because they are too powerful, he was very serious about this

Centipedes have a masochistic foot fetish, millipedes have a normal one, don't ask

The woman in Dead Woman Walking is just a Zombie

Is the Woman a victim of the Book of Death from MAG 70

Georgie is a ghosty hunty person

Georgie and Melanie don't seem to be afraid of anything

The Italian mountain troops would have known they were being fucked with

More undead

Reminded him sort of the Meat Men

Also reminded him of the buried on the London underground

The mysterious firing squad intrigued him, did all the men that went up the mountain come back to kill him?

Basira is Drax from gotg

She'll randomly appear and no one will know she's there until she speaks

The chuckle brothers origin story, he means Breekon and Hope

Didn't think the circus had anything to do with the stranger

Breekon and Hope are taxidermy

So they're with the stranger

The Stranger is just everything that doesn't fall under something else

The circus was it's own thing

The cult of the lightless flame is it's own thing

The people's Church of the devine host is it's own thing

The circus is just full of people who you don't know, if you do know them that's sad... He was kinda rambling at this point

Is Sarah Baldwin capable of being bored

Why was she working with Melanie?

Do you just take a liking to ghost people

Did you take them over before of after they were eaten.

The Buried is called The London underground

Is it the Fairchild's? Thinks they're about isolation

Thinks it might be a book

The pit could be an Antlion

Thought that the young woman who was eaten by the pit turned into Gertrude

The young man could be, Gerry, Martin, Salesa, young Jon, Elias.

Thinks The stranger is vanilla in terms of gods and monsters.

The stranger is the least interesting.

Thinks all the Stranger wants to do is just summon a god

For some reason he thinks the Dark should be doing more to stop them, because Rayner wouldn't want that to happen

Martin will rap battle the archive to victory, via poetry from Leitners books

The stranger could just be Lego

He's horny for Rayner, his words not mine

Mr. Sandman brought him a dream

Thinks that the Dark at least can get to their gods dimension but choose not to.

If you make everywhere dark does their god appear?

He asked what would happen if two factions tried to summon their god at the same time what would happen

Thinks that all the Avatars /Entities do the same thing.

Breekon and hope have never killed anyone

Maxwell Rayner is a time travelling shadow demon

Mr sandman is like an angry sandy from Rotg

He made this episode unnecessarily kinky

They're just summoning gods

The stranger is remarkably being left alone

Thinks there is no fighting between factions

If anything they're aided

Is the Fairchild's entity already here

Are they working with the other factions

Says he knows whats going to happen because he "knows how these things go"

The Beholding is already on this side and if another God is summoned then it will be booted

Elias killed Gertrude because she was trying to defeat the Beholding and if it was defeated he would turn into the same thing as below the Library in Alexandria

There were three versions of the unknowing that he thought of

Destroying the concept of identity, the unknowing destroys the concept of personality, individuality, and identity. Turning them into Stranger worshipping entities

The angler fish was the thing in the basement at the Taxidermy shop

Stranger just means it couldn't get any stranger

Or it's deliberate parodies of humans

Breekon and Hope were normal people

Salesa, the chuckle brothers, the meat man, the skin walkers, the taxidermist, the manquien, Not-Sasha, the architects, the circus and to some extent the witches are part of the stranger

Magnus is a stranger that took over Elias

He also thinks Elias is just Magnus who found out how to stick around for a while

But Elias isn't the archive god like he first thought

The twisted detergent is Michael's new entity

Michael is like Loki if he didn't have a brother

The stranger is the big bad

Jon is an idiot, he's a bit slow

His second theory for the unknowing is that It's just going to destroy all knowledge revolving the Elder gods, hence the unknowing, the one he thought the least likely

And third, It somehow increases their powers so that the few people that would recognise them, no longer do. Levelling up in short. Thinks it would work for every entity

Doesn't think The Unknowing would be that big of a shift

The circus and the stranger were different because the Circus dealt with the "Freak show"

Thinks Rayner isn't dead

Dust devils

Dirt zombies

Has only made the connection between the Underground, the pit and the dust storm

Was the kid in the car Michael

Was Michael always the Spiral but just really liked working with Gertrude

Michael is the Spiral, he doesn't worship anything

Elias took Gertrude from him, now he's after revenge

Jon should go chill with everyone at the Archive

Jon should have a sword

While you were busy not having a paranoid breakdown I studied the blade

Michael has a crush on Gertrude

He has a granny kink, he is obsessed with making it all kink related

Michael originally gave his powers away to be with Gertrude

Michael took on this form because he could blend in or brag

He's a monster with a thing for Gertrude

Michael wasn't the same Michael as in the tape

Just trying to trick everyone

Lynne Hammond was lying, goes in line with the church of the lightless flame but it didn't happen

Maybe she heard something similar but it didn't actually happen to her, she was just trying to get some money

He actually feels bad for Tim

Tim should run

John Smith was half telling the truth.

People are in the tunnel's but it's not a government conspiracy

Tim doesn't deserve this

You can tell Basira is used to dealing with idiots

Liked that it cut out when Robin Lennox said let me start again, it's like the archive was trying to make it stop

Thinks the archive doesn't care what is being read to it, someone should read it the Lord of the Ringd

The archive is recording the tape recorders not Elias

Get the dog out

Michael was the crying man, he wanted the dog out

He doesn't want to hurt the dog

"Gertrude why did you leave me? I'll get you one day Elias" based on his Michael granny kink theory

Brian Finlinson was the most coherent in terms of links

Thinks that the spiders were actually there, hiding whenever anyone came around

Lynne is lying, John Smith is half telling the truth, Robin Lennox saw Michael having a breakdown, Brian Finlinson was telling the truth

He didn't remember Peter Lukas ever being mentioned before

Already shipping Peter and Elias

Michael is very sensitive

The Fairchild's and the Lukas' are working together

They don't seem to have an interest in the conflict going on between everyone else

The Fairchild's were in aerospace and Lukas was the ships

Still cthulhu

Even space had a cthulhu vibe

The depth of the ocean or the isolation of space

The Lukas and the archive are working together

There are some of these guys that don't want the entities on this side

Likes the power, doesn't want the full on entities here

The Lukas and the Fairchild's are the cthulhus

They're somewhat working with the archive/the beholding

Is Elias actually a Lukas? Decided yes because he and Peter are married

How much do the Lukas have to do with the Beholding

What sort of arrangement do they have?

Nikola was supposed to be part of the circus but there is a difference between the facimalies and the circus

Thinks that the archive burning down would have no downsides for the Beholding.

They'll summon a god and gazing upon it will kill everyone, everyone dies.

As he was now halfway through the series he explained who he thought was in each of these factions

The beholding, Elias, Martin, Tim, basira, daisy, sims, melanie, sasha, Rosie, Gertrude, leitner. Sasha is caught in a time loop...

The stranger, everyone, has no limits, The maniquein, the taxidermy, the circus, skin walkers, grifters bone, breekon and Hope,  angler fish

The desolation, the cult of the lightless flame, Jims pims aka Jude Perry, Agnes,

People's Church of the divine host, Rayner, Rayner have something to do with the German crypt, Rayner Is also not dead

The diggy boys, the buried, Maggie and Gordon from the dump, dig dude from Dig, whatever was going on with the pit, and the dust storm.

Meat, no recurring. The haans that's it.

Buggy boys, spiders, Jane prentiss

Michael, the twisting deceit, the twisting deceit just is Michael, didn't exist before him

The leitners, the witches are using the books, Gérard, Mike crew,

Cthulhu collective, the lukas', the Fairchild's. Both are just isolation, the Fairchild's are all about being alone, the only time the Lukas have turned up are being alone either in space or at sea

The witches, Mary Keay, puzzle witch, have big crossover with the Leitners, they just have some of leitners books

Trevor is his own entity, is he part of the desease and corruption group

The architects, smirke, smirkes apprentice.

Jared is his own thing. Just found a self help book

It's a giant celestial orgy!

Also Came up with a random spinoff comedy again

Slowly the archive collects strange people

Michael, who is mourning Gertrude... Loudly

They found a worm in the tunnel left over from Prentiss

The worm loves gooseberries

That's Elias, we're not sure what he is

Thats the Admiral, it is a cat.... It runs the place

Rayner is sat in the corner giggling

Leitner started a microbrewery in the basement

Serves bud leitner, you can't get leitner than this

[moodykylo]

TMA prompts you say??? i am here!!! if you don't like this, let me know and i can try again, but!! what about Jon in a VERY bad mood, and the assistants are angry with him about it, but it turns out Elias is burying him in work even though he's already sick :( if you'd like me to try again, let me know!!

Hi! Thanks for the prompt! I apologize if this is OOC at all? I feel like it is, but! I hope you enjoy regardless!

Warning! There are slight spoilers for around season 2?

Tim was not happy with Jon right now. Well, nowadays, he was never happy with his boss, but today he was fuming. Jon was more irritable and pissed off than usual, and Tim didn’t even think that was possible, it seemed to him that the other always had a perpetual stick up his ass.

Today, Jon was insufferable. Tim had gone to give Jon his research, only for him to snap at him for entering before knocking, Tim of course, scoffed and made a remark, Jon, who usually rolled his eyes and shook his head instead yelled at him again, snatching the work out of his hand and immediately dismissing him.

Tim marched out of Jon’s office and sat at his desk with a huff of anger. Martin looked over to him, brows furrowed in concern and question. Tim looked over to Jon’s office scowling. “He’s being a dick.” He sighed, slumping in his chair.

Martin frowned, gaze shifting between the closed door to Jon’s office and to Tim typing angrily on his computer. He sighed, hoping that he could figure out what was wrong when he brought Jon his morning tea. Speaking of, what time was it? Martin checked the time on his computer, immediately getting out of his seat upon seeing he was running late already.

He went to the breakroom and put water in the kettle, letting it boil as he set up 4 separate mugs, one for Tim, another for Sasha, then Jon, and then himself. He knew the way everyone liked their tea, he’d learned after trying to provide comfort in small ways, mostly because Jon wouldn’t accept any other gesture of concern.

Martin hummed a half-remembered tune as he poured the hot water over the tea bags, starting the handoff, saving Jon’s office for last. When Martin gave Tim his tea, the other man stopped him before he could even step foot towards the archivist’s office.

“I’m warning you he’s in a horrid mood,” Tim said voice low and serious. “Good luck in the lion’s den.” He said sardonically, resuming his typing on the computer.

Martin just shook his head strolling over to the heavy door that was engraved with “Head Archivist” in silver lettering. He knocked timidly, before entering. Immediately freezing under Jon’s gaze. His eyes were narrowed in scrutiny, his brown eyes appearing almost icy and glare sharp. If looks could kill Martin would be dead where he stood.

Martin was now regretting not listening to Tim. He couldn’t remember a time he’d ever seen Jon look so angry. Martin tried not to maintain eye contact, but he’d noticed something else in Jon’s glower; pure exhaustion.

Martin should’ve known better than to poke the sleeping bear with a stick, but his tongue betrayed him and before he knew it, he was asking “Jon? You alright? You look absolutely spent.”

Jon’s scowl only deepened at this. “What do you want Martin?” Jon spat, each syllable filled with venom, his jaw tight and clenched. His hand was hovering over his tape recorder, the pause button pushed down.

Martin swallowed, chest now tight with anxiety. “Oh r-right, um, I brought you t-tea?” He stammered, hands shaking as he put the mug on Jon’s desk. As he did so his eyes scanned the stacks of papers and statements scattered haphazardly around the small office.

“Next time don’t interrupt me, I’m rather busy. Now, if you’ll excuse me.” Jon replied bitterly, glaring daggers at Martin, grabbing the statement he was working on.

“Right. Sorry.” Martin replied timidly, rushing out of the office, the door closing in time with the click of the play button on the tape recorder. The deep timbre of Jon’s voice resuming, taking on the edge that it usually did when he read statements. If Martin hadn’t been so freaked out he might’ve noticed the slight raspiness in the words.

Tim looked over to where Martin was standing, shaking his head with a sigh. “I told you he was in a mood,” Tim remarked. Martin only shook his head.

“I’ve never seen him like that. He was…” Martin paused, searching for the right word to explain the pure fury he’d seen in the other man’s eyes. “Seething.” he completed.

Tim only sighed. “He’s just an ass. What I wouldn’t do to give him a piece of my mind.” Tim scoffed.

“I-I don’t know why but I’m worried about him.” Martin stuttered. “There was something else there… exhaustion maybe? I-I don’t know but I think he’s working too hard.” He fretted.

Tim only laughed at this. “You worry too much Marto, the new position’s probably just gotten to his head,” Tim snarked. “You’ve got it bad for him don’t you.” he teased, grinning when Martin flushed in embarrassment.

“I-I do not! He... I just... I-” Martin rambled.

“Relax! I’m just pulling your leg.” Tim laughed. “I’m just pissed at him. Who does he think is? Yelling at all of us. Pompous idiot.” He rolled his eyes. “Elias should’ve never given him that position.” Tim explained.

“Excuse me, Mr. Stoker?” Elias’ voice suddenly broke out, and Tim felt himself pale.

“Oh, boss! What are you doing down here?” Tim stammered, no longer suave.

“Just coming to deliver more statements to the head archivist, or rather the man “I should’ve never given this position to.” Isn’t that right?” Elias replied smugly.

Martin shifted uncomfortably on his feet, clearing his throat before speaking. “S-sorry! Um.” Martin squeaked.

Tim’s confidence returned as quickly as it had disappeared. “Well, he can’t seem to keep his ego in check, yelling at us over the smallest of errors.” Tim grumbled.

Elias hummed in response. “Well, perhaps you should keep your judgment to yourself, Timothy.” Elias chastised.

“Sure thing.” Tim replied, unafraid. He resumed typing on his computer as Elias walked over to Jon’s office.

Martin sat back at his desk anxiously, keeping an eye on the small window of Jon’s office, trying to see what was going on.

Elias knocked on the office door and walked in, a complacent smile on his face. He was testing his archivist, pushing him beyond his limits. He had been piling more and more work onto Jon, seeing how he would respond, how his work would be affected. Call him cruel, but he was just trying to unlock Jon’s potential. So far, he was becoming more successful than Gertrude.

Jon looked up at the door, expecting another interruption from Martin, he quickly paused the tape recorder on his desk, scolding words already at the tip of his tongue. When he saw that it was in fact, not Martin at his door but Elias Bouchard, his stomach dropped. Elias had more statements, fuck. Jon ran a hand through his greying hair. He just wanted to go home, it was getting harder to concentrate on the words etched in ink on the parchment.

“Hello, Jon,” Elias spoke, his voice holding a sinister edge. “How are the statements coming along?” His smug smile did not falter for a moment.

Jon swallowed thickly as Elias’ gaze burned right through him. “Elias,” Jon acknowledged the greeting. “They’re uh- excuse me-” Jon stopped mid-sentence to cough painfully into his arm. He cleared his throat before speaking again. “Apologies, I’m about halfway through the stack.” he rasped pitifully.

Elias made a hum of understanding. “Good. I do hope you’ll complete these before you leave for the day.”

Jon sighed. “Of course,” he replied weakly, clearing his throat again.

Elias looked Jon over again, the Cheshire grin on his face never falling. “Oh, and Jon?” he said, walking over to the door.

Jon looked at him expectantly, eyes half-lidded, with an eyebrow raised.

“You have quite the fever, do be sure to keep it under control.” Elias said nonchalantly before leaving the small office, leaving Jon alone, mouth agape.

Jon had known of Elias’ omniscience, but not that it was at the level. God, he needed a lie down.

[rest-upon-the-morning-light]

JonMartin fic

So I’m trying to get back into fic writing, especially for TMA, and have a multi chapter fic planned but wanted to start with a smaller one shot style fic to warm up. It’s been an age since I’ve written anything, much less something that wasn’t just reader based or smut lmao. I’ve added trigger warnings but if I missed any do let me know! 

Any feedback would be great and if you like this, please send me prompts! Happy to write anything from fluff to smut, just as long as its TMA based :D 

So! Here is my cute fluff JonMartin fic! Enjoy~ 

Everybody Wants To Be A Cat 

Word Count: 2240 

Trigger Warnings: Mentions of Animal Abuse, but nothing to graphic. Anxiety. Self Worth Issues. Season 1 Jon being Season 1 Jon. Season 1 Martin being Season 1 Martin.

Fandom: The Magnus Archive

Pairings: Jonathan Sims/Martin Blackwood 

Summary: Martin was certain of two things. One, he had an enormous crush on his boss. Two, his boss hated him. Who knew a one eyed beast of an alley cat would bring them closer?

Martin Blackwood has two problems.

Problem number one. He was absolutely certain he was more than a little bit in love with his boss.

Problem number two. His was absolutely certain said boss hated him.

 Well, hated was probably a strong word. Hated implied that Jon thought of him at all, and it was far more likely that Jon thought of him very little throughout his day. Except, of course, when Martin did something wrong. Then those piercing eyes of his would be solely fixed on him whilst he shouted about how inept Martin was or how stupid his mistake had been.

It hurt, those moments. It hurt that the only time Jon ever truly seemed to see Martin was when he was angry at him. Not when Martin did an amazing follow up on a statement. Not when he’d created a great rapport with a statement giver or their family. Not when he brought Jon tea. Just when he did something wrong.

It was a running theme in this annoyance Martin called his life.

He still couldn’t help these feelings though. Jon was an arse half the time that much was true. It infuriated Tim to know end when Jon would lash out at Martin. “He has no right Martin. Mistake or not he’s your boss, he’s supposed to help you, not act like a massive dick all the time”

It was harder for Tim and Sasha in a way. They’d been Jon’s equal for a long time, working together. Moving to the Archive was always going to be a bit of a challenge. To have friend become boss. Especially for Sasha, who everyone thought was going to be become Head Archivist. But neither had held any real resentment over Jon for the change. After all, it wasn’t his choice, it was Elias’s.

But Jon’s sudden shift from rude but mostly recluse and occasionally friendly colleague to rude very recluse and stick constantly up arse boss was harder than any of them expected.

Martin could understand. It was big position and Jon seemed like the type to take everything he did very seriously. This meant holding everything in the archive to a high standard. His assistance included.

So yes, Jon was awful to him a lot of the time. But he was passionate. He cared. For all his blustering that none of this was real, Martin could see how much he empathised with the people who had given those statements. How he looked like he’d personally failed them when a follow up revealed they had died not longer after they’d come to visit the institute.

His crush probably wasn’t the most healthy but sue him! He liked being a bit in love. He liked having inspiration for his poetry. He enjoyed the fluttery feeling in his stomach when he came into work.

He just wished Jon didn’t quite hate. No. Didn’t quite dislike him so much.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is a cat that has been hiding the alleyway behind the Institute for several days now.

Martin noticed the poor thing when he’d been taking out some rubbish that accumulated in the Archive. Usually that sort of thing wasn’t his job, but he’d been done for the day anyway and he liked to be useful, even if no one really noticed.

It was a mangy young thing. Light brown fur matted, one eye seemed to be damaged and it hissed every time Martin so much as approached it.

He couldn’t just leave it though. Poor thing needed help. It was out here, lonely, forgotten, damaged by the people that probably at one point said they’d love and protect it.

Was he projecting onto a stray cat now? God this was a new level of sad.

So he did what someone in his position did best. He researched.

 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

There is a surprising number of places to buy cat supplies near the Institute and the workers in the shop were incredibly helpful with his questions.

Approach slowly. Don’t try to touch or hold the cat. Leave out food and water. He’d also bought a small plastic hut and shoved a warm blanket inside for the large cat. He didn’t know what breed it was. Just that it was grumpy and hurt.

It didn’t take a great deal away from his own funds either. His job paid well enough and he didn’t exactly go out with people very often, buying expensive drinks or tickets to shows.

His special treat was usually some sugar drenched coffee.

He couldn’t see any physical injuries on the cat, apart from its eye, so he put some treats in the hut, left out the food and water, then left.

He came back everyday with more supplies to keep the large growling cat comfortable. Every day that passed the cat came a little bit closer to him. He grinned at that. Hoping one day it would come close enough to pet.

He’d read somewhere that when cats blink, once and slow, it was a sign that they trusted you. Martin waited for that day with bated breath.

Tim and Sasha were a little bit suspicious as to where he was going on his lunch breaks. He told them he just taking a long walk, getting some fresh air away from the dusty old archives but he knew it wasn’t the best lie.

Lying for the sake of his job was one thing. Lying to his friends for no good reason was another.

It wasn’t like he doing anything bad. It was more that he wanted this for himself. He wasn’t even too sure why. Part of him wondered if he was worried the cat would somehow take some natural liking to either one of them or both. He didn’t want to lose all his hard work.

Or, if he was being more honest with himself, he didn’t want the cat to abandon him for someone better.

Yeah. New level of pathetic had been reached.

But one lunch, a few weeks after he’d first spotted the broken but massive feline, that the lying and the ill feeling became absolutely worth it.

Because the cat approached him.

Martin didn’t move a single muscle. He was sat on a small wooden box in the alley. Far enough away as to not frighten the poor thing, but close enough that the cat could make contact if it wanted to.

And today it did.

He held his breath the closer it got, keeping eye contact with its good eye the whole time. It paused for a moment, right in the front of his bent legs, before it let out a small mirp noise and butted its head against his knee.

“Oh hello” Martin laughed, chest feeling lighter than it had in an exceptionally long time.

He reached out his hand slowly to pet its head and let out another sign of relief when the one eyed cat let him.

“Well” he began

“I can’t very well keep calling you cat or beast in my head, you’ll need a name”.

It didn’t acknowledge his words in any way, just continued to let him scratch behind its ears and watched him with its one working eye. He could almost imagine its thoughts.

“Silly Martin, just come up with one already. Stop wasting time”.

He let out a soft chuckle at the thought, a name ready on his lips.

“Jon” he smiled gently.

“I think I’ll call you Jon”.

 ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 It went well after that. Martin made plans to keep the cat. It would help the dreariness of his lonely flat, and he was lucky his landlord allowed pets in his building.

He couldn’t afford proper insurance but the workers at the pet shop knew an emergency vet that wasn’t too expensive, so he could get Cat Jon’s eye checked out soon.

Giddy as he was with his newfound friend, he didn’t realise that he’d been less subtle than usual about where he was going on his break.

It was one grey, wet Wednesday that it all came to ahead.

He’d been sitting crossed legged on the ground, his coat below him as a sort of makeshift blanket to keep his trousers dry, when Human Jon found them.

He hadn’t even noticed Jon had followed him until the backdoor that led the alley burst open with a bang that echoed down the narrow way.

“Martin” shouted Jon, looking at some papers in his hand.

“I need you to take your lunch late and follow up on this report. You made several errors in your research that, frankly, a child could spot. I don’t know what you’re doing out here but if you have time to sit around then –“

Jon’s rant was cut short as he finally looked up to the picture that greeted him.

Cat Jon had leaped into his arms from the loud noise, clinging to Martin’s bright yellow sweater.

Martin froze, cat in arms as Jon stared at him with a look of equal shock.

“Oh” began Jon softly

“Sorry” Martin practically shouted.

“I – eh – this is, well um, a cat, I found? A few weeks ago, actually. I’ve been sort of taking care of it? Getting it food and water and um” he gestured to the plastic hut and blanket he’d laid out.

“He was hurt you see. Only one eye and really badly taken care of. Abandoned, I recon. So I’ve been out here on lunches making sure he’s, um, that he’s okay? Is that..is that alright?” he trailed off nervously.

He couldn’t look at Jon. It wasn’t exactly something to be ashamed of, taking care of a stray cat. But he could imagine Jon being the sort of serious no nonsense person who would see it as a waste of time, his lunch break or not. God would this make his relationship worse? Would Jon scold him for it? Did it make him seem more pathetic than before? Christ, was that even possible?

He didn’t notice the movement until Jon was sat beside him on the floor.

Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, sat on a dirty alley floor with Martin K Blackwood.

He watched with bated breath as Human Jon reached his hand out to Cat Jon and let out a small sound of relief when Cat Jon didn’t bite, scratch or run away.

“You poor thing” murmured Jon, eyes only on his (unknowing) cat counterpart.

“What have they done to you? Well, you look better now than you probably did before. Thank to our Martin here”.

Martin couldn’t help but blush deeply at that. Hot all over his face. He couldn’t handle this. Jon being all, all soft and gentle and calling him “our” Martin.

“You’ve been taking care of him then?” Jon looked up at Martin now. Eyes soft and kind for once. It nearly took all of Martins brain power to respond after receiving such a look.

“Yes” he began.

“Like I said, I found him a few weeks ago. Planning on taking him back to mine soon, get him out of the cold properly”.

Jon nodded, eyes never leaving Martins, hand firmly petting the cat in Martins arms.

“I’m sorry, about the work” Martin nervously bit his lip.

“I’ve been really worried about him so I rushed it to get out here on time. It’s no excuse and I know you don’t exactly think highly of my work in the first place. I’ll make sure I stay late tonight so I can catch up”

“Martin” interrupted Jon, eye straying on the bitten lip, a slight flush to his cheeks.

“I’m the one who should be sorry. I haven’t been fair to you these past few months. It’s been unprofessional at best and, well, and downright cruel at worst”

“Your job is stressful” Martin tried to defend

“And we both know I’m not exactly at the same standard at the others”

“Still” Jon continued.

“It’s my job to help you, not, berate you at every mistake. You came from the library, not research, so you have different skill set and – well, its been hard for us all. Not fair of me to put all that blame on you. God knows Tim could stand to be a bit more professional at times” Jon grumbled out the last part, a small pout to his lips.

Martin laughed at that, smiling wider than he could last remember.

“Tim just likes to keep you human, I think” he winked and watched with fascination as the flush came back to Jon’s dark cheeks.

Cat Jon leap out of his arms after that, toddling off to who knows where.

“Well” Martin began, getting up from his cross legged position on the floor.

“We still have time for lunch, we could, um, maybe eat together? If that’s okay I mean! You could help me figure out a name for him?” “You don’t have one already?” replied Jon, surprise in his voice “Uhhh not any suitable ones, no” Martin laughed awkwardly.

He couldn’t exactly say he’d name the poor blighter after Jon. He doubted Jon would take it as a compliment and he didn’t want to ruin whatever fragile peace they’d stumbled onto.

He held out his hand to help Jon off the floor. Jon eyed it, before bringing his own hand up and placing it into Martins larger ones. Martin pulled him up and held back a small gasp as Jon shot forward quicker than intended, his smaller hand landing on Martin chest.

Jon looked up at him, a small shy smile gracing his lips.

“Beautiful” Martin couldn’t help but think, face and ears bright red.

Jon pulled back, coughing every so slightly into his fist.

“Yes, well, I’ve named a cat or two in my time, it won’t be too hard” “Oh?” teased Martin

“What about Magnus? We did find him here” Jon shook his head at that, crinkling his nose slightly.

“Absolutely not, something more dignified. The Captain maybe?” “Captain?” countered Martin

“The Captain” continued Jon as they began to head back inside

“I suppose the one eye does give him a bit of a pirate look” Martin couldn’t help by laugh slightly as he said it.

“Yes” Jon laughed back

“Dignified but still fitting his nature” And off they went, back into the Institute. Unaware of any monstrous eyes watching them as they simply watched each other. A new, wonderful feeling developing between them.

Neither noticed that they still held each others hands as they made their way to the break room.

And if they spoke of cat names, and toys and flushed deeply when they did notice the hands still entwined, well.

Those moments were only for them.

[dragonslaved]

Raise Your Glass

fandom: the magnus archives chapters: 1/? word count:   2238 language: english

summary:  tim is a streamer and jon is his moderator do not look at me

read on ao3

“Don’t forget to like and subscribe!”

There is a tasteful five seconds of music jingle before the video cuts. Jon sighs, rubbing at the bridge of his nose where his glasses sit. It’s one thing to moderate the streams, but there is a different kind of hell to editing them for a youtube VOD upload. Tim, thankfully, always makes sure to record a bit of additional off-stream footage to have at the beginning and end of each video for Jon to patch in, but it’s still a pain. Cutting out footage is easy enough, particularly for highlight cuts. But the four to five hours of raw recording is hard to edit, particularly when those watching the VODs can’t see the commentary made of the chat.

How he got talked into this is beyond himself. Something about Martin already working multiple jobs so he can only moderate a few nights a week. Tim, of course, has other things going on handling his own promotions and PR. Sasha took one look at what Tim was doing and decided she wanted nothing to do with it. It may have been smart on her part, if not for the fact he knows she’s doing some occasional tech work for Melanie’s crew.

Jon goes through these same mental conversations with himself every week when he’s collecting all the ‘Best Of’ clips together and splicing them into something resembling a coherent narrative.

But in Tim’s defense, the man is very good at reacting. Perhaps that was why his channel was doing well. Tim’s got the natural charisma and personality to draw in an audience, he’s interactive with the viewers, highly reactive to whatever’s happening in the game. It works. And Jon is, for better or worse, not a bad moderator for the chat.

No, the arrangement sadly, unfortunately, worked out very well for them both. A good following on the streams, and a moderate viewership on the video uploads later. And Jon did take some joy in adding a few personal editing touches to surprise even those who had been present for the stream watching playbacks. An occasional bit of text highlighting something, or an artful zoom in on something Tim missed that made the game harder for him for having looked it over.

Jon thinks fondly back to that half year Tim had considered being an influencer instead. It was a different kind of long-term work, but then again photos did not exactly get Tim’s personality through. No, video was best. And unscripted video was the purest, most distilled Tim an audience could want.

“-on?”

Tim pulled one earphone off, and Jon nearly jumped out of his skin.

“Jon. Been calling for a couple minutes now. You’re really in the zone, aren’t you?”

“Yes,” he stammers, pulling the headphones off completely and resting them around his neck. “S-sorry, what is it?”

“Just checking how it’s going. Brought some coffee if you need it. I know it was a longer one, but I appreciate the work.”

Jon looks from him, to the mug in his hand and takes it with a quiet, “Ah.” A test sip and it’s still much too hot. “Thank you, it, um. Just about finished. Should be ready to upload in the morning at the usual time.”

“Thanks, mate.” Tim’s smile down at him could brighten the world. Maybe just Jon’s; he has to avert his eyes back to the program before his face heats up as much as the coffee in his hands. “You aren’t putting in snarky commentary in the text again, are you?”

“Would you be mad if I was?” Maybe a little too-hot-coffee is worth hiding the sly grin on his own face.

“I’d say go for it. Just be a little kind this time?”

“Maybe you should play something that isn’t a horror game next time.”

“I can’t help it. People love it, it’s what they vote for.”

“Oh, they do. But imagine the shock they’d have seeing you play something competently. Like a strategy puzzle game.”

Tim leans over his shoulder to look at the editing so far, hand on his other shoulder. “It’s not as engaging for the viewers though. People like watching someone be bad at a game.”

“Perhaps.” Tim’s always been one for casual contact, but it still makes Jon a little nervous. Not in a bad way, but in that way he hopes Tim never feels how hot his face gets. “But sometimes watching someone be exceptional at a game is worth a lot too.”

“Maybe… Wait.” Jon watches Tim slide the preview cursor back over a section, then over it forward again. “Are you kidding me?! I missed that key?”

So maybe Jon does see some joy in watching Tim be bad at things. He doesn’t try to hide the smile this time.

“You did.”

“You could have at least SAID something at the time! I wandered for an hour before moving on!”

“I take a more hands off backstage approach to moderating. It’s why you like me doing it.”

“God- Of all the-” Tim cuts himself off, watching the twenty seconds of footage again a few more times. It’s clear to anyone that knows him that Tim is memorizing the spot. Likely to do it again on his own time and do it properly.

That was something to be admired about Tim. Sure, he’ll put on an act and goof a bit for streams. But when he really cared about doing something well, he always put in the effort. The man could be determinedly serious about anything he really put his mind to. He usually succeeded.

But for the sake of Tim’s pride… “Would you like me to cut this bit out?” It’s tentative, an offer if Tim would rather Jon not include some of his more egregious mistakes. Tim only sighs.

“No. No… Leave it in. It’s fair to point out, and it’ll be funny in a few days.”

“So you’re saying it’s not funny yet.” “No. Not yet,” but even Tim can’t hide the smile in his tone. At least the man’s always had a good humor about himself. “Hey, Jon.”

He’d been distracted watching Timothy’s eyes and the way the monitor light hits those dark warm brown hues just so. “Hm?”

“I think we just hit a milestone last stream. What, something like two years now? What do you say we go out tonight and celebrate?”

“Oh. Um. I mean, we can, sure. I can meet you. The usual place?”

“Yeah. Bring your group while you’re at it.”

Jon stops the instinctive jolt. “Sure. I can. Bring them when we’re finished.” He forgets Tim knows about that.

“Great!” Tim gives a firm clap on the shoulder of Jon’s he’d been leaning on. “Can’t wait.”

The next morning comes with a loud and unignorable hangover. The curtains have, by some blessing, been pulled closed around the flat. Tim no doubt having some sympathy. Jon doesn’t always drink quite that heavily, but it was celebration and after a show. His group had only encouraged it, that much he remembered.

Well. His friends were likely assholes to his waking mind right now. No, the only friend Jon has right now is a hot cup of coffee at this hour of the morning. The warm bed calls to him, but he had made promises.

“Oh, coffee,” he coos over a sip as he sits at the table. “If I hadn’t promised Tim I’d work, we would not be meeting at this time. Just you and me and the algorithm this morning.”

The number of emails is alarming. All new subscribers or followers to the channel itself. There shouldn’t be such a surge after an off day. Had someone promo’d him while they were out last night? Well. This was part of Jon’s half of the job, figuring out where all this came from and determining if it was worth it to pursue further or not. A sip of coffee down and he gets to work.

“What… Is this.”

He adjusts his glasses, squinting at the screen and through the migraine. “Tim didn’t stream last night, we were at the pub…”

Contrary to what Jon knew, there was a history showing Tim had streamed for at least an hour last night with a fair amount of viewers at the time. Right around the time they were at the pub…

“What did you do.”

A couple quick clicks into the video history and there is absolutely a video from last night. The preview image alone has Tim in the pub, the camera facing a small crowd and some lights. His finger hesitates. What happened last night. What did they do.

Play.

The camera is shaky and trying to focus on Tim’s face. He was always a little - no, a lot - excitable when he drinks out. It eventually finds his face and settles in a steady shot, a crowd behind him and the lights are stage lights. “Hey, guys! So a surprise stream while we’re out. See, me and Jon came out to celebrate two years of the channel! They’re about to start, hold on.”

He moves his face out of the frame to show a small indoor stage with the lights focusing down and Jon can feel a sense of dread creeping up from his gut.

“Tell me we didn’t….”

The video keeps going, the chat wondering what’s going on, Tim almost never streams outdoors or anything like this. Question mark emojis fill the chat as Jon watches his drunken self climb on stage, flannel shirt and hair loose, guitar being strapped around him.

“Oh god.”

His last-night-self greets the crowd and thanks them for the short notice allowance of his group to play. Oh god, he must have been so drunk to agree to this. His band mates clambering up behind him and setting up. It’s only a few minutes before they start playing. Jon thinks for just a moment that maybe the chat doesn’t realize. Maybe they think Tim is just sharing a local band or something. The question marks continue until someone figures it out.

“Holy shit is that jsmod???”

It fills up. The whole chat fills up with shock and confused emojis. It goes so fast Jon can’t quite catch all the comments. And then it’s genuine support and excitement. No one had any idea Jon, the strict, quiet moderator, was the lead in a band.

Oh god, it was one of their more boisterous songs.

“That’s Jon! That’s his band! Haha, god it’s good to hear him sing again. Think we can keep them going for a bit, I’ll keep the stream going for now!”

Tim sounds entirely too giddy with this turn of events. And true to his word, the crowd somehow kept them on stage performing for a little under an hour. The video ends with Tim brightly thanking chat for joining on the surprise stream, and Jon has his head in his arms, tugging at his hair.

He may not recover his dignity from this.

“Go~od morning, boss!” Tim’s voice carries through the haze of irritation and fogginess with the tone of someone who committed crimes the night before and absolutely does not care.

Jon’s own voice comes through his pile of arms and oversized hoodie and hair, “I’m not your boss.” He can just faintly hear the sound of another cup of coffee being poured behind him, and then the quiet steps of Tim coming to sit next to him.

“You may as well be my manager with all the work you do behind the scenes handling my things.”

“If I were your manager, I’d fire you.”

The beat of silence falls between them heavy and expectant.

“Why-”

“The stream, last night, Tim!” Jon nearly explodes with it, his head shooting up and arms out, nearly hitting Tim in the face. “Why did you do that!”

For his benefit, Tim almost looks sorry.

“I… You said I could.”

“... What.”

“I asked if you were going to go play, and you said yes since the gang was there. I asked if I could stream it and you said yes.”

“I never would have agreed to that.”

“You did, though.”

The worst part about it is Jon cannot remember it. Jon, drunk, is a bit unpredictable at best. He may very well have agreed and he would never remember. God damn him.

“Fine. Fine, then this is me, sober, telling you now. If I, any time in the future, try to say it’s all right to film me playing: do not listen to me then. I am saying now do not film me.”

Tim’s eyes are focused intently on him. Really taking that in before nodding and voice gentle, “All right, Jon. Whatever you like.”

“Thank you, Tim. This isn’t going in the compilation by the way.”

“Nope, of course not! Not if you don’t want it.”

Jon runs a hand through his hair, looking at the analytics. “...That said. It did get you quite a record viewers for a surprise stream.”

“Oh yeah?” Tim finally gets up to lean in and look. Gives a low whistle. “Didn’t realize we’d done that well.”

“Hit a new milestone of subs as well.”

Tim gives his shoulder a gentle nudge with a crooked grin. “Sure I can’t talk you into letting your sets become a regular spot?”

“Tim.”

“All right! It was just a question.”

[haberdashing]

i want you to straighten out my tomorrow (3/?)

The last thing Jon remembers is working into the night in the Archives in early 2016. Now he’s in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, Scotland, with Martin Blackwood as his only companion. Obviously Jon’s missed something along the way here…

Inspired by beloved of jon, though it can be read separately.

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3

on AO3

Martin took a deep breath and released it slowly before speaking again.

“So.” Martin tapped his fork against his plate, which made a noise that got on Jon’s nerves a bit, but he’d just taken a big bite of his pancake to show his following through on his part of their makeshift deal so he couldn’t exactly complain about it. “I guess I’ll start from here, and from what brought us here, and sort of, er, work backwards? I mean, I imagine you’ve got enough questions about what’s going on now without me bringing up a load of other weird things for you to wonder about.”

Jon nodded silently. Martin certainly wasn’t wrong about that bit; Jon had plenty of questions waiting to be asked already.

“Daisy didn’t actually give us the key to this place; I suppose that’s as good a place to start as any. There were hunters at the Institute when we left, and she was busy, er, fighting them off, so we didn’t get to say goodbye or anything--though I don’t know if I would have, I never really knew Daisy that well. But Basira--she works for the Institute now too, but before all that she and Daisy were cops together, they’re, they’re close--she was able to give us the keys, said she thought Daisy would approve.”

There was a lot to process there, unsurprisingly. Now there were two Institute employees Martin had brought up that Jon didn’t know rather than just one; the use of “hunters” seemed a bit odd, made Jon wonder what they were hunting for, whether Hunt was a fear to be capitalized like Eye and Web; all sorts of interpersonal relationship stuff could be teased out there, if one had a mind to do so, which Jon didn’t especially at the moment.

What was at the front of Jon’s mind, though, was that evidently there had been some danger at the Institute, whether because of these “hunters” (”Hunters”?) or for some other reason, and of the three other people working there that Jon cared about, the only one whose safety was assured was the one sitting in front of him.

(Elias didn’t count. Jon tolerated Elias well enough, and he was glad the man had trusted him with an opportunity by promoting him to Head Archivist even if he felt like he was just flailing around playing pretend half the time, but he didn’t care about Elias, not like he did about the rest of his crew.)

Jon swallowed the last of his current bite of food before Martin could start up again. “What about Tim and Sasha?”

Martin furrowed his brow, confusion evident on his face--the word “adorable” sprung to Jon’s mind, unbidden--so Jon elaborated further.

“You haven’t mentioned what happened to Tim and Sasha during all of this. Are they alright?”

And then Jon watched Martin’s face slowly fall, could practically see the gears turning as Martin tried to figure out a tactful response, and he wasn’t the best at reading facial expressions but figuring out this one wasn’t exactly rocket science.

“Were they together in the end, at least?”

Martin shook his head, loose curls flying everywhere as he did so, one of them settling in between his eyes in a place that didn’t look like it’d be comfortable or even easy to ignore, but Martin made no attempt to brush it away. “Sorry?”

“I just... they were always so close to each other. If they’re... gone... I just hope they were side by side when their time came.”

“Oh.” Martin bit his lip for a moment. “No, uh, they- it wasn’t just now, during that attack on the Institute--we lost Tim a little over a year ago, now, and Sasha... was about a year before that.”

Jon let out a long breath as he felt his insides turn cold. Two of his closest companions were dead and gone, and he didn’t even remember it happening.

“Actually, this- this may sound weird, but can you... describe Sasha for me?”

Jon let out a huff. “You work more closely with her than I do.”

“Humor me, please?”

Martin’s request did sound weird, but... but not as weird as Jon would have expected, when he thought about it. It was a piece of this massive puzzle, that much was clear, and Jon had a feeling that somewhere, just out of his reach, was the rest of it, and he’d be able to put all the pieces together eventually.

“She’s... short. Shorter than me. Blonde hair, usually in a bob, sometimes with a headband. Has a thing for costume jewelry...”

Martin let out a soft sigh and shook his head again, though that one strand of curly hair remained in place between his eyes. (Some distant part of Jon wanted to reach out and brush it away; the more rational part of Jon didn’t dare, wouldn’t even mention the loose curl unless it came up naturally.) “Yeah, that’s, that’s about what I figured... still, it was worth a shot.”

“What was worth a shot?”

Martin bit down on his bottom lip again, hard, enough that Jon wondered if it would leave a mark.

“Why did you ask about Sasha? Were you hoping I’d say something different?”

“I... yes, I did, it’s just... Jon, eat.”

Jon stared down at his half-full plate, huffing a little before going along with Martin’s request and having another bite.

“Okay, so, with Sasha... when she died-” And Martin paused for a brief moment there, looking away from Jon, and his voice sounded a little shakier when he started up again. “She was, was replaced by the thing that killed her. It took her place and changed all of our memories so we thought she was always like that, that nothing was wrong. I thought maybe since you forgot all that, your memories might still be of the real Sasha, but... no, that’s the one I remember too, and that’s not her. That’s the thing that took her place.”

“It changed our memories, and we couldn’t even tell.” Jon’s voice was calm, but his mind was anything but as he contemplated the implications of that statement.

“Yeah, we didn’t even know she was dead until- until the thing that replaced her went after you. I still don’t know what she actually looked like. I think Melanie remembered the real Sasha, but we never really got a chance to sit down and talk about it...”

A third name Jon didn’t recognize there--good Lord, how much turnover did Institute staff have these days?--but that wasn’t what caught Jon’s attention most.

“So there’s no way to know if our memories are real or just, just changed or made up by supernatural beings messing with us?”

“Well, apparently tape recorders are just old enough that they don’t change, something about the difference between analog and digital? Think that’s why the statements record fine on them, too. The, the real ones, I mean.”

Jon let out a long sight. “And I don’t suppose you’ve got tape recording of all or... any of the things you’ve been talking about?”

“No, Jon, I wasn’t exactly able to bring the whole Archives with us when we went on the run, sorry.”

The phrase “on the run” caught Jon attention briefly--that sounded like it was more than two hunters they had to worry about, like they were hiding from the authorities on top of all that--but again, Jon’s thoughts drifted elsewhere.

“So there’s no proof. No proof of any of this, even the parts I think I remember. We can’t prove that you’re who you say you are-”

Jon gestured with his butter knife at Martin, and Martin threw his hands up in mock surrender in response. “H-hang on now-”

“Or, or even that I’m who I think I am. For all I know I’m not even Jonathan Sims, for all I know my, my whole life never happened and I just had fake memories that it did implanted because that’s what some supernatural creature wanted-”

Jon’s rambling only trailed off when he noticed that Martin was quietly giggling to himself.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, really, I- sorry, I shouldn’t be laughing, I know this is serious-”

“It is, yes.”

“It’s just- I don’t think this is the first time you’ve had this particular existential crisis before? I, uh, I think the way you put it in one of your tapes was ‘How do you know that you’re the same person who went to sleep?’“

Martin’s impression of Jon’s voice was more accurate than Jon would have expected, though he wasn’t going to actually comment as much out loud.

“Something I said on a tape that I don’t have, that I don’t remember ever making... forgive me if I’m not terribly reassured.”

“A-alright, fair enough. Maybe just- just think of it this way. How much does all of this actually change?”

Jon wrinkled his brow. “I don’t think I follow.”

“Look, I know you know your philosophy well enough. Losing memories of a chunk of your life, finding out that the supernatural can mess with your mind... it’s horrible, I know, believe me, but it doesn’t really open up any new possibilities about the state of the world. It was always possible that- that the world was just some elaborate simulation, or that life just started five seconds ago and all your memories before then are fake, or that everybody besides you is just an object pretending to be a person, or whatever. If you didn’t buy into that kind of thing before, why does this change all that?”

That... was actually a good point, now that Martin brought it up, and Jon thought about it for a moment in silence.

“Please don’t tell me you do buy into that kind of thing regardless-”

“Not particularly, no.”

“Good.”

“So, will you at least try to take the world at face value for a bit unless you’ve got an actual reason to do otherwise?”

“Except for Sasha, of course.”

“Yeah, except for Sasha, I suppose, though I don’t know that she’d come up that much anyway, it’s...” Martin let out a soft sigh. “It’s been a while.”

“...fine. Alright. Until I’ve got a reason to do otherwise, I’ll...” Jon massaged his temple with one hand. “Try to trust my own mind, at least.”

“I’m glad to hear it.” The smile on Martin’s face looked a bit thin, a bit forced, but it was better than nothing, Jon supposed.

“So if that’s what happened to Sasha, what about Tim? Please don’t tell me I’m remembering him wrong, too...”

“No, it wasn’t that. The, the not-Sasha thing went missing around when you went on the run for murder, only popped up again just before we came here.”

“So what happened to Tim, then?”

“Oh, he, uh, blew up a circus to stop it from ending the world.”

Taking a sip of tea while waiting for Martin to respond had definitely been a mistake. Jon gulped his mouthful of tea down fast, the heat making his throat ache, but at least he could respond, and better drinking too fast than choking on the stuff.

“What, and the circus killed him for doing it?”

“No, he... he was inside it when he blew it up.”

Jon didn’t know what to say to that, so he just took another bite of now-lukewarm pancake and let Martin keep speaking.

“You were too, actually. It’s a- it’s complicated, I think I get how you came out the other side now, but I’m surprised you don’t have more scars from that at least...”

“Speaking of which. Where did all these scars come from?”

“Well. Er.” Martin set his silverware aside and scooted his chair closer in to Jon. “A bunch of places, really, but I can go over them one by one...”

First, Martin gestured broadly across Jon’s whole body. “The little- the worm scars. That’s what those are, all over. That’s... Jane Prentiss attacked the Institute--you do know that name, at least?”

“I’m familiar with the files on her, yes.”

“I wish all I knew about her was from those files...” Martin let out a soft but surprisingly sharp laugh before continuing. “So, the worms got to you- you and Tim both, actually. We got rid of them, but not before they dug in enough to leave those scars on the two of you.”

Jon still didn’t remember the incident in question, but even that vague description of it was enough to make him shudder a bit. Worms had dug into his skin. He wasn’t sure what he’d expected to hear, but it... it hadn’t been that, certainly. “What about you? Obviously you didn’t get the same scars...”

“No, I, I got lost in the tunnels when they attacked-”

“The tunnels?”

“Yeah, there’s a whole secret maze of tunnels under the Institute, turns out. That’s where, uh, I found Gertrude’s body. And Michael. And you found Leitner in there, I think? And the, the Panopticon is down there too.”

...there were entirely too many things going on in that statement for Jon to be able to process them all at once. His predecessor’s body, another name he didn’t recognize, a name he knew all too well, and something he knew best as a philosophical concept but apparently was in fact a physical thing somewhere under the Institute?

Jon took a deep breath and slowly let it out before speaking again.

“Alright, that’s one scar then. The hand--you said I ‘sort of’ stuck it in a fireplace?”

“Well it’s, it’s not an entirely accurate description, but...” Martin’s arm darted out, hovering over the scarred hand in question before slowly falling back to his side; Jon’s heartbeat raced as he watched Martin’s arm approach his, and he wasn’t sure if it was out of fear or anxiety or something else. “I wasn’t there for this one but you apparently, uh, shook hands with someone in with the Lightless Flame, someone who’s basically made of molten wax. Jude Perry, is the name.”

The name meant nothing to Jon, but he vaguely remembered reading something about the Lightless Flame before, and he wrinkled his brow in confusion. “Why would I do that?”

Martin’s laugh was a bit fuller this time, less bitter and more genuine. “That is an excellent question."

“...so you don’t know, then.”

“No, but- it’s hard to see, but there’s actually another scar on that same hand? At the time you told us some ridiculous story about cutting yourself on a bread knife, but I heard the truth later. That, that Michael I mentioned, he stabbed you. Didn’t like that you tried to stop him from taking Helen, I think.”

“This being the same Michael that you found in the tunnels.” Jon had half-assumed this Michael was one of the apparently ever-changing archival staff in the Institute that he didn’t remember, but evidently that assumption was a faulty one.

“Yeah, but he’s not just in the tunnels, that time he was in your office--he could go anywhere, just pop out of a yellow door. Still can, sort of, but it’s not Michael now, it’s Helen.”

“The same Helen I tried to stop this Michael from taking?”

“Yeah... well, yes and no. Helen’s not exactly the same as she was...”

Jon sighed. “Alright. Moving on, then. Shoulder scar?” Jon tugged his oversized shirt down a bit, made it so the scar would poke out a bit more.

“Oh that, uh, that was Melanie’s doing-”

“The, the Melanie who remembered the real Sasha?”

“Yeah, that’s the one!”

Jon pinched the bridge of his nose. Either he really needed to stop assuming every name Martin dropped was an Institute employee, or Institute employees seemed to have a nasty habit of injuring him badly enough to give him scars. Or both. With his luck, probably both.

“So what exactly did Melanie do?”

“She stabbed you with, with a scalpel? See, you and Basira were doing surgery on her-”

“I thought you said Basira used to be a cop.” Jon considered adding and not a doctor out loud, but he figured the implication was clear enough.

“Yeah, that’s right. Why?”

“...so, I was doing surgery on Melanie, with a former cop as my assistant-”

“Yeah, to get a ghost bullet out of her leg. But she woke up and freaked out and stabbed you with a nearby scalpel. Honestly, I don’t entirely blame her for that bit, though she definitely took it too far.”

If Martin was telling the truth, he’d been doing amateur surgery, with a fellow non-surgeon as his only assistant, to retrieve a “ghost bullet,” whatever that was... and the patient had woken up mid-surgery and stabbed him?

He’d known these scars would have stories of some kind behind them, but that... God, what could he even say to that?

Well. Only one scar that he knew of left. Might as well wrap things up, see if that left him with any more pieces with which to put together this very strange puzzle.

“So that just leaves the scar on my throat, then, I believe.”

“Er. Right.” Martin looked down at his plate of food; a quick glance revealed that he’d actually eaten less than Jon had at this point, though Jon certainly wasn’t going to nag him about it. “About that.”

“Yes?”

“Just, uh, don’t take this the wrong way...”

“Did you stab me, too?”

“What? No!” Martin’s face flushed at the accusation. “Jesus, Jon, no, I would never...”

“Then who... or what... did?”

“...Daisy did. I don’t know all the details, I don’t think I want to, but I know she brought you somewhere to kill you, and while she obviously didn’t do that, she got far enough to leave that on your neck.”

“...the Daisy whose house we’re staying in.”

“This is one of her safehouses, yeah. I think Basira said she’s got a few of them?”

“And you’re sure we’re safe here.” Half statement, half question.

“...I really hope we’re safe here. Can’t honestly say I’m sure about that, though...”

Jon dropped his silverware, letting it clatter against the plate and the table as he covered his head in his hands.

“Wonderful. Just... just wonderful.”

[voiceless-terror]

For the comfortober!!!! If you'd like to do some of them, might I request "Back to school/work"??? Picturing Jon, after being v sick, or recovering from an injury finally coming back to work, maybe recovered, maybe not?? And the crew just totally fussing over him ??

Here you are! Just in time for day 25.

The situation at hand is not ideal.

He’d been carrying boxes, heavy, cumbersome things that blocked his field of vision as he made his way to Document Storage. Tim had cast a disapproving eye; Jon’s not the most coordinated, he knows that. But the least he could do was carry a few boxes of statements to their proper filing place. 

But he managed to, in Tim’s retelling, ‘completely eat shit’ as his leg came in contact with an errant box, causing the one he was carrying to go flying and Jon to fall unceremoniously on the ground with an audible crack. 

Everything’s a bit blurry after that.

He remembers an intense pain in his ankle- he’s been here before, his bones are not the most stable structures (it’s a shame they’re tasked with holding his body together). But that didn’t make the pain any less. Surprisingly, it was Martin who took charge, showing a competence Jon had never seen applied to his research or his Latin translations. He picked him up, managing to avoid putting any pressure on his ankle and summarily put him in a cab, despite Jon’s many refutations that he was fine. 

He stopped that after Martin shot him a very unimpressed look.

He paid the cab driver and Jon let him- the pain was starting to make his brain foggy and his stomach nauseous. Martin waited the full two hours it took to get him admitted, even letting him fall asleep on his shoulder in one very embarrassing instance that he hopes will never see the light of day. The result of his clumsiness- a broken ankle, a cast, and a set of crutches that he threw into the closet as soon as he got home. He had a cane, that should be fine. 

Martin followed him to the door, making sure he was settled on the couch and fixing him a cup of tea as if Jon were an invalid. Sure, the painkillers he was on did not allow for much thinking, but he could manage to take care of himself. When Martin suggested staying a while, just to make sure he was fine, Jon found himself snapping a “No!” and breaking Martin out of his competent stupor. He shook his head a bit, turning red and letting out a nervous laugh. “I’ll uh, leave you to it then. Let me know if you need anything.” On his way out, he turned to him, face serious. “And don’t even think about coming in tomorrow.” He wasn’t- he’s not a complete idiot.

Okay, maybe he did briefly consider it the next morning. But the soreness had intensified, and he knew he probably wouldn’t be able to make it without breaking another bone.

Getting around was...difficult, to say the least. He spent most of the day on the couch, dry swallowing ibuprofen as the painkillers the hospital prescribed were a bit too strong, despite the ease they provided. God, it was so boring. He wished he had the foresight to bring work home. But his assistants’ texts ignored any query about work, only focusing on well wishes and asking if he ‘needed anything.’ What he needed was to do his job. If he was going to be motionless, he might as well be motionless behind a desk.

The next day, the train ride nearly kills him.

Jon manages to find a seat; people are generally sympathetic when they see a cane and a cast. He should’ve taken a cab, of course, but that seemed a little extravagant. He can manage a few steps.

Probably should’ve brought the crutches as well, but they seemed too unwieldy. When he tried them in his flat they’d put too much pressure under his arms, and he wasn’t sure how to go about adjusting them; he quickly got frustrated and threw them to the side. Patience was never one of his strong suits.

But the pain is unimaginable. By the time he gets into work, he’s huffing and puffing, on the verge of passing out. He’d taken ibuprofen again that morning, but it’s doing very little to help him out. As soon as Rosie catches sight of him, she makes sympathetic cooing noises and attempts to take his bag from him.

“Poor thing,” she says after he refuses for the third time. “Are you sure you don’t need help downstairs?”

Quite sure.

The stairs intensify the aching in his joints and he’s sure every one of his assistants hears the tell-tale thump of his cast landing awkwardly on each step. He’s met with three concerned stares, all tinged with exasperation and disappointment. He’s been eliciting those reactions a lot these days.

“Didn’t Elias approve a week of paid leave?” Sasha asks, immediately attempting to take his bag, just like Rosie. And just like with Rosie, he dodges her arms, letting out an involuntary hiss as he puts pressure on his injury. “Honestly Jon, you should’ve stayed home.”

“And where are your crutches, mister?” Tim’s leaning against the wall, looking for all the world like a disappointed parent. “I happen to know that a cane’s not sufficient when you’re in a cast like that. Not to mention uncomfortable, dragging it all around London. What were you doing, hopping down the street?”

“I had a seat on the train, thank you very much,” he says, attempting to hobble away as fast as he can to take refuge in his office. This was all very overbearing. 

“You took the train-?” Martin’s incredulous voice is cut short by a slammed door.

Peace and quiet. His office has always been a nice place to suffer in private.

Not that it remains so for long.

Martin comes in not minutes later, bearing a cup of tea accompanied by a few biscuits. “You don’t seem like much of a breakfast-type,” Martin surmises correctly, “And you’ll need to eat something with the medication they’ve got you on.” Jon does not mention he’s not currently on said medication. It sits in his pocket, heavy and accusing. Instead, he just grunts, barely deigning to raise his eyes from the work in front of him. The door shuts and Jon nibbles at the food before his stomach tells him this is a bad idea. 

He does eventually (and very reluctantly) call one of them in- he still wants to go through the files from two days prior, but he’s going to need a bit of help to get there. Tim doesn’t help him walk, however, instead pushing his office chair into Document Storage with surprising care, and helps him prop his leg up on a box to keep it elevated. Tim hands him the files one by one, sorting by date- it’s an easy, companionable task. Tim always was one of his favorite researchers to work with; there’s a reason he asked him to join his team. He’s wearing a jumper in a nice, deep blue shade. Jon is not immune to Tim’s charm or looks, but he’s mostly preoccupied with how warm it looks. His own button down and sweater vest are barely doing the job.

After about thirty minutes of this, his leg starts to ache- the stretch is no longer pleasant, and he attempts very gingerly to place his ankle on the ground. Needless to say, it does not work out very well. If the chair had about two more inches, his foot could dangle without putting undue pressure on his joints. Alas, the chair is already at its highest. 

Tim notices his fidgeting, zeroing in on the pain in his face. “Need a break?”

Jon sighs. “I’d rather get this box done, at the very least.”

Tim looks thoughtful at this. “Hold on- give me a sec.” He leaves the room but returns rather quickly, two pillows from the break room couch in tow. “Here- lean on me for a mo’, will you?” Jon manages to get to his feet relatively painlessly, leaning most of his weight on Tim’s shoulders as he puts the pillows down as a cushion, lifting him the desired inches he needs. “Better?” Tim smirks, clearly proud of his achievement.

“Much, thank you,” he admits, just happy to continue working. The throbbing is getting worse with each passing minute. They’re eventually interrupted by Sasha, who announces that she’s gotten takeout for everyone- Indian, Jon’s favorite. Elaborate and unnecessary, but appreciated. 

Ten minutes later and he’s sitting in the break room with the rest of them, picking at his curry. He knows he should eat; his mind registers the hunger, but it's hard to feel through all of the pain. Ibuprofen’s just not going to cut it. With great reluctance, he pulls the bottle of pills out of his pocket, unscrewing the cap. Martin notices.

“About time for your next dosage, I reckon?” he questions innocently. Martin doesn’t know he never took the first one, and Jon would like to keep it that way. He can’t handle any more thoughtfulness and care from the man. So he just nods, swallowing two pills and chasing them with water. If he can manage a few more bites of curry, it should be fine. 

What he didn’t keep in mind is his original reaction to the medication- that strange, loopy feeling that had him leaning on Martin the entire cab ride home. About thirty minutes later, it starts to hit. And all he can think about is Tim’s jumper.

It just looked so warm. Jon wants a jumper like that. Maybe he has a jumper like that? He’ll have to check when he’s home. There’s a lot of stuff in his closet- dumb things, remnants from his college days. Probably a few of Georgie’s jumpers. Maybe Georgie’s jumpers are that warm? But none of them are that nice shade of blue. Jon wants a jumper like that, yeah. In a nice shade of blue. He’s going to ask Tim where he got it from. But he’s got to be discreet. What if Martin overhears? And then Martin gets the jumper? They can’t all wear the same jumper, that’s ridiculous. He’s already going to have to coordinate with Tim, make sure they don’t wear it on the same day. Jon’s a grown man, he can’t go around matching his employees.

He lifts the phone, dialing Tim’s extension. It only rings once before Tim’s cheerful voice answers. “What’s up, bossman? Everything alright?”

“Tim,” he whispers, just in case anyone’s listening. “Tim, I need you to come to my office...immediately.” No, he has to give a reason or he’ll be suspicious. Why would he call Tim into his office? “Reports, Tim. Research. Bring...your research. Yes. Goodbye.” That seemed natural enough.

For some reason, all three of his assistants are at the door. No, that’s not what he wants. Not what he wants at all. “I only need Tim.” He’s still whispering for some reason. “The rest of you go away.”

They don’t, pesky things they are. Tim moves closer, face both concerned and amused. “What’s going on, Jon?” He beckons him closer- he’s so blurry, it’s hard to focus. When he gets within grabbing distance he tugs at his sleeve, forcing him close to his face. “Er, boss-”

“Tim,” Jon’s eyes are wide with urgency. “Tim, I need to know where- where you got your jumper.”

Tim makes a face, somewhere between amused and confused. Jon does not understand what’s difficult about this question. It’s very straightforward. “Um, sorry? My jumper?”

“Yes!” His voice gets louder, though he doesn’t mean it to. “It’s just- it looks so warm. And it’s so soft.” His voice starts to wobble and his eyes water as he runs his thumb across the fabric. It’s a very good jumper. “Such a nice shade of blue.”

“Okay, did you take one too many of those pills? You weren’t like this earlier.” Tim’s got one arm on Jon’s chest, attempting to stop his wandering hands as his eyes search the desk. “I swear to god, if you’ve overdosed-”

“Don’t be stupid, Tim.” Why won’t he let him touch the jumper? Does Tim not want him to be warm? Rather rude. “I only took two today.”

“Wait, seriously?” It’s Martin’s voice he hears next. “Oh, Jon. You must have been in so much pain.”

“Obviously, Martin!” The snap comes as naturally as breathing- Jon’s an old hand at that, after all. “But that’s not the point-”

“Whoa there, buddy. No need to get tetchy.” Tim’s got both of his hands on his shoulders, his eyes now patient and kind. “You’re high as hell, aren’t you? Think you should probably have a rest right about now, yeah?”

Jon can’t help the whine that comes out of his throat. Rest? No, he wants-

“I swear I’ll tell you where I got the jumper. Hell, I’ll even get one for you if I can. But only if you sleep.”

Jon sighs wearily. If I must. “That sounds reasonable. Thank you, Tim.” He allows himself to be led to a couch, limping all the way. Oh, that’s quite nice. Yes, that’ll do. Tim arranges a pillow beneath his head, and Jon hopes it's not the one he sat on before. His stomach growls, and a thought occurs to him; he grabs at Tim’s arm again, forcing him down to his level.

“Jon, I told you I’d-”

“No, that’s not it. I-I threw out some biscuits earlier. Please send my apologies to Martin.” 

Tim’s face is fond. “Will do, boss.”

“And perhaps you could secure me a few more for later.”

A soft snort. “I’m sure I can.”

“Tim, you are invaluable to me.”

“God I wish I had this on tape-”

A soft click sounds from somewhere in the room as if in response. Tim blinks. “Did you hear that?”

Jon doesn’t answer, already halfway towards sleep. 

“Huh. Alright, then.”

ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27715163

[mikiib]

The Magnus Archives: ALIEN AU (Part 3)

    Jon manages to remember to close the door to the Artifacts Room but in his panic does not lock it. Rushing quicker till he reaches the cryochamber room he immediately wakes them all up, yelling at them to get up even as he quickly looks around in paranoia for one of those creatures to pop up- there are 2 entrances to this room by door and he hastily rushes back and forth between them as the others- much more exhausted from having to rush their cryosleep recovery- question his sanity. That is- until Martin notices Jon’s neck and shirt- the entire left side of him seemingly splashed with blood. 

    Melanie at first thinks this is some elaborate joke, asking where Sasha is and when she’s gonna pop out to surprise them before Tim shuts her up- demanding to know where Sasha is if these creatures Jon’s describing are real. Jon says it was Sasha that led him into a trap with that nest of creatures, and Tim grabs the front of Jon’s shirt and slams him against the wall. 

    Tim is basically outraged at the thought that Sasha might not really be Sasha but its Georgie and Martin playing peacemakers as they pull the two apart. Georgie reasons if they really are in danger they need to go to the security surveillance hub- it’s doors can be locked on command from the inside and they all agree this is a smart idea. Nikola is quick to tend to Jon’s wound- remarking that the slash to his throat is similar to that of a barbed mouth- meant to latch on and not be yanked off for whatever reason. Jon is deeply unsettled- considering himself very lucky. Melanie picks up The Admiral- him much more sleepy than the rest to even wake up properly yet. 

    They eventually make their way to the Security room and lock themselves in there. Georgie, not wasting time as she logs into the camera system to find- not only finds the visual feed on the cameras no longer working but the audio as well. Jon turns to Tim and Martin and asks them what could’ve done that, and Tim eventually shoots back that the cameras had to have been entirely destroyed if they no longer are picking up anything. They turn to look at their own cameras location in this room and just that- the whole camera is missing from its place. 

    The room grows silent, a chill rippling across their moods as they begin to realize how serious this whole thing is. Martin then asks if there's any way for them to view the ship otherwise, Tim then points out there are the motion sensors that are all over the ship's floor panels. Only way those are busted is if they to get fully removed from the floor. Turns out they are all intact- aside from the ones in the Artifact Storage. Movement is noted coming from that direction and moving randomly now throughout the ship. 

    Nikola openly ponders just how such creatures could’ve been born on the ship- and asks them that if they are to hunt these creatures down- to bring her the corpse of one to study. She claims that even if they are violent- a dead one will be enough to bring back for proof of their events thus far. 

    They agree to this- not wanting the whole of this ship's damage to be placed on them for any reason. They split up into 2 groups, equipping themselves with some spare pipes and walkie talkies. Melanie and Georgie are Team A and Jon, Tim and Martin are Team B. Nikola is set to feed them information on the creatures locations as well as keeping track of their own. 

    Melanie and Georgie are headed towards the location Jon last said the creatures were, while the boys make their way to the engine room where movement is being tracked. 

    Jon eventually is the first to find a face hugger- it jumps out at him just as Tim bats it away from him.

Scene:

    Jon’s ears were ringing. The squeal of the creature combined with the whistle of the pipe playing back in his mind as he stares up at Tim. He doesn’t even register Martin’s hands pulling him up from the ground from where he fell out of shock until a hand presses against the small of his back to balance him.

    “You saved me,” he breaths, the present seemingly slapping him across the face as Tim snatches Jon’s crowbar from his grasp,” Thank you,” he stutters.

    “Don’t thank me yet-“ Tim steps away from him and stabs the creature from its dazed state,” I’m just fucking pissed,” he brought the weapon up into the air before repeating the action several more times until the creature stopped squirming. Its shrieks nothing but a low hum now as its impaled body is lifted up and examined.  He offers the skewered creature towards Jon, instinctively his hand reaching out to take it. The crowbar now seems to be deteriorating, bending and hissing from the blood that oozed slowly from the creature. He makes a not to see the ship has also started corroding from where the creature was brutally killed only moments prior.

    Acid blood Jon realizes as he tosses the creature's body away from the engines. Taking a moment to examine his hands to see if any had gotten on him. 

    The radio chirps as Martin reports they killed one of the creatures, and all else seems clear from that room. Static comes before Nikolas voice chimes back.

    “No, no, no! That can’t be right! More movement is still detected within that room,” Jon narrows his eye towards the radio and Tim reaches for his own as he cautiously walks through the narrow spaces of the engines, pipe in hand.

    “Where-?” In a flash Tims body is slammed backwards onto the floor from the passageway- his shout muffled and gurgled by some terrible squishing sound. In less than a moment Tims body stops struggling and Jon and Martin are stunned by the scene.

    “Tim!” they simultaneously shout, rushing forward to assist their downed crewmate.

Scene Ends

    Martin calls out for help over the radio and Nikola says she’ll meet them in the observation and medicine room. Jon swears under his breath as he struggles to carry Tim, Martin taking it upon himself to guard them with a fire extinguisher. He reasons it has enough heft it should send them flying like the crowbars. It isn’t until they reach the last stretch that they find another face hugger- going for Martin. 

    He doesn’t think as he swings his weapon, and only knocks it back a bit. He pulls the pin of the fire extinguisher and hoses the creature down- hoping to stun it as his swing didn’t seem to have much effect as he’d hoped. As the fog clears away however they find the creature is very much dead- curled in on itself like a spider. Jon shutters at the thought. They find shelter in the medical room and try not to stare too much at Tim as Nikola makes it to them- no issues that come across on her way. 

    Jon radios Team A their current situation but to no response. His nerves are on fire, as he’s torn to know why Georgie and Melanie aren’t responding and saying by Tims side. Martin tries himself, informing them of the weakness found with the fire extinguisher, and warning them of the blood. Jon didn’t tell Martin about the blood, but it seems he’s perceptive enough to have pieced it together himself.

    Melanie and Georgie however are in their own situation- too busy shutting off the radios to hide from the xenomorph that is currently searching for them. They had spotted it down the hall near the docking bays entrance, and when running away they noticed the creature jump into a vent and hear it chasing after them through them.

    Melanie and Georgie had indeed made it to the artifact storage. Now however were hiding in the office lounge- both crouching behind their respected desks. The creature jumps down from the vents, its forehead looking like a morphed face of Sasha, with a body mixed with that from what they saw on the alien ship and that of a human body. It looked wrong to say the least.

    Melanie- closer to the fire extinguisher grabs it quietly as Georgie goes to sneak towards Melanie's desk- which had a survival knife in it. As she does her pipe hits the floor creating a loud enough echo to catch the Not-Sashas attention. It screams and laughs as it hurdles its way towards Georgie. Melanie- ever quick on her feet pulls the pin and sprays the creature in the face- right before bashing it in the head. It clicks unholy sounds as Georgie grabs the knife and makes a dash for the door. Melanie follows quickly behind her but when she goes to lock the door the creature's tail shoots out and stabs her in the eye.

    She screams in pain and rage before she sprays the creature once more- it’s body not dying but shaking violently in pain from the cold as it jumps into a vent to escape the extinguisher's wrath. Just in time too as Melanie almost collapses from pain of her own bodily injury. Georgie catches her just in time.

    Georgie tells Melanie to head to the Med bay where the others are- equipping Melanie with the knife, but Melanie pleads with her to not leave her alone. Georgie kisses her forehead before pushing her off in the right direction and takes the pipe and swings at the vents opening, grabbing the aliens' attention more than Melanie's running away.  PART 1 PART 2

[soveryanon]

Four months late and with a coffee, ~*MAG160’s review*~ (and the last season 4 proof that I can’t do anything without a deadline.)

- This time, the tiny detail making me love the show even more was: the location (“If nothing else, I’m hoping there’d be some… jurisdiction complications in Scotland, or something?”). We know from MAG050 that Jonah Magnus used to be based in Edinburgh, or was at least operating from there in the 1840s (“Certain uncharitable quarters would have it that your life consists of little but rattling around an Edinburgh townhouse, surrounded by piles of ghostly accounts and lunatic documentation.”); Gertrude had created and hidden the ritual tying her to Agnes in “the middle of a forest, in the Scottish highlands. Furthest place I could find, from anything, and anyone.” (MAG145); the first episode of the series had happened in Old Fishmarket Close in Edinburgh (MAG001). How fitting, then, that the end of the world would be unleashed in Scotland, close to Jonah’s roots, close to the ritual that had been one of Gertrude’s first actions against the Fears, close to the place where the Anglerfish had been taking victims in the first statement Jon ever recorded?

(+ Obligatory “Hm! An Englishman returning from Scotland with a fear of bagpipes and sheep. I’m sure we can all relate…!” (MAG125) snickering reminder. Cross your fingers that the sheep do not get Flesh’d around you, Jon.)

- Obligatory “Oh, Martin, No” because Jon is rubbing off on him (ha) when it comes to saying things that end up biting him in the butt way later:

(MAG079) TIM: Alright, fine. Fine. What do you want? What’s your light at the end of these spooky damn tunnels – and don’t say “everyone happy forever”, because that’s not happening. … Well? MARTIN: I don’t know. I don’t know!! I want to find out what’s going on; I want to save Jon; I want everyone to be fine, and you know what? If we were all happy that wouldn’t actually be the end of the world!

It was a succession of “Everything Is Fine(-ish)”, Martin was happy for at least one week…

(MAG160) MARTIN: Everything alright? ARCHIVIST: Just… making sure it works…! […] MARTIN: Are we… … Are we safe here? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Safe as anywhere else. […] But I think we’re okay. […] MARTIN: You’ll be okay here? ARCHIVIST: I’ll be fine. […] MARTIN: I assume it’s her attempt at a… a–a “varied diet”? Eating your greens, you know? ARCHIVIST: [CHUCKLE] Probably! I’m sure it will work fine.

… so, of course, the world just had to end.

- Fluff first: it took me a long, embarrassing while to understand what was happening in the first scene! I can’t guarantee it but it actually sounds to me like Martin was unloading a load of wood, and had been taking care of it (finding it, moving it, maybe even chopping it outside?!), hence why he perfunctorily asked what Jon had been doing inside (and made clear that he hadn’t gone to the village yet, since he was heading to it at the end of the sequence)?

(MAG160) [CLICK–] [LOAD OF WOOD BEING SET DOWN] MARTIN: Everything alright? […] [BITS OF WOOD BEING PILED UP, ONE BY ONE] MARTIN: You’re unpacked, then? ARCHIVIST: Mm? Oh, yes. [INHALE] Much as I can without any wardrobes to speak of, at least. MARTIN: Yeah, it’s… it’s not exactly the Ritz! […] ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] … Not much in the way of food, is there? MARTIN: Hm? ARCHIVIST: [EXHALE] MARTIN: Oh! N–no, not yet. I was actually gonna head down into the village to go pick something up. ARCHIVIST: Mm. MARTIN: Maybe give Basira a call to check in, ‘cause: Daisy apparently couldn’t pick a safehouse with a signal, so…! […] [ZIPPER PULLED] You’ll be okay here?

I’m not saying that, given how Jon was a bit distracted at the beginning of the episode and minimising how much time he had needed to unpack, and how there was glass shattering towards of the episode so most likely a window breaking, there is every likelihood that Jon had just been spending a lot of time eyeing Martin chopping wood through that window at the beginning of the episode, but. You know.

- Overall, I love how the cosiness and domesticity was so quickly installed amongst Other Serious Stuff, mysteries and the bigger plot: we’re being told/shown that Jon is taking precautions, wants to not use his powers, that Martin is the one heading out to go to the village (and the one leaving again in the second scene – Jon might be avoiding coming into contact with outsiders at all, in case they have “stories” or to avoid Knowing about them?), that Jon was planning to go back to only reading(/listening to) statements, after having taken Peter’s the episode before. So, still trying to not hurt more people, and also planning to rely on the tape recorder like he had done in MAG141-143 (if it clicks on on its own, then something is close), which is why and how we heard the first exchange:

(MAG160) [CLICK–] [LOAD OF WOOD BEING SET DOWN] MARTIN: Everything alright? ARCHIVIST: Just… making sure it works…! [SHUFFLING SOUNDS] MARTIN: I still don’t think we should have brought it. ARCHIVIST: Oh, it’s better than no warning at all. MARTIN: Mm. ARCHIVIST: Especially if I’m trying not to, uh… “see” things, you know? MARTIN: I guess. […] I was actually gonna head down into the village to go pick something up. ARCHIVIST: Mm. MARTIN: Maybe give Basira a call to check in, ‘cause: Daisy apparently couldn’t pick a safehouse with a signal, so…! […] You’ll be okay here? ARCHIVIST: I’ll be fine. […] ARCHIVIST: How was she? MARTIN: Oh, same as last week. ARCHIVIST: Institute still crawling with police? […] MARTIN: Still, she did manage to talk them out of burning the whole place to the ground? Oh, ah! Actually, that reminds me. Hum… [RUSTLING OF PAPERS] ARCHIVIST: Ah! These, these are the… statements. MARTIN: Uh, yes. Basira said last week she’d send some up as soon as the Archives weren’t a crime scene. ARCHIVIST: Yes… MARTIN: And she wasn’t sure which ones you’d read already, so she–she just said she’d send a bunch. [CLATTERING SOUNDS] ARCHIVIST: There’s… tapes in here, as well. D… did she say anything about tapes? MARTIN: She… didn’t mention it? But… I–I didn’t check it until after the call. ARCHIVIST: Mm. MARTIN: I assume it’s her attempt at a… a–a “varied diet”? Eating your greens, you know?

… Implicitly, that first exchange probably wouldn’t have been recorded if Jon hadn’t been checking that the tape recorder was working, which makes us go back to the usual questions of “what are they?”, “why are they only recording some scenes and not others?”, particularly in regards to the tapes that Martin brought back in the second scene.

I also appreciate how their exchanges were still grounded in… material concerns. How everything was installed for the listener to not think for a second that the apocalypse was coming close, given Martin and Jon’s preoccupations? They were still focusing on preventing Jon from harming other people, on food, on the identified people&monsters threatening them (Julia&Trevor, the Not!Them, potentially Daisy, Elias being on the loose again) and on legal matters regarding their involvement in MAG158’s attack (“If nothing else, I’m hoping there’d be some… jurisdiction complications in Scotland, or something?” / “… Does she know who they’re looking to blame?” “They’re not really talking to her about it? Sectioned or not, I guess ex-police only gets you so far.”). I think that this last point was the most impacting for me: food and other characters/threats will still be a concern during the apocalypse… but “legal jurisdictions”, Section 31 and the investigation in the Institute’s attack probably won’t be, and that would be the sign that “society as they know it” is crumbling? That the rules have profoundly changed?

- On that note, YEAH, “TERROR ATTACK” was indeed the way to put it:

(MAG160) ARCHIVIST: Besides, I’m more worried about the other Hunters. Or the… “Sasha”-thing. Last I heard, they still hadn’t found any bodies. [INHALE] A lot of destruction, a lot of blood… [EXHALE] But that’s it. [MORE WOOD SOUNDS] MARTIN: … You think they’re still out there. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: Hopefully a long way out there. […] Institute still crawling with police? MARTIN: I mean, they’ve finished all the interviews? Apparently, they’re calling it a “terror attack”. ARCHIVIST: Doesn’t surprise me. [CHUCKLE] Appropriate, in a way…! MARTIN: Mm. [FOOTSTEPS] ARCHIVIST: … Does she know who they’re looking to blame? MARTIN: They’re not really talking to her about it? Sectioned or not, I guess ex-police only gets you so far. ARCHIVIST: Mm. [SIGH] Does she know if they’ve found the old prison yet? The… Panopticon, Elia– … Magnus’s body. MARTIN: I don’t know how hard they’re looking, to be honest? Basira says a few of them got lost in the tunnels for over a day, and… ARCHIVIST: [CHUCKLE] MARTIN: … it’s not like the promise of an old man’s corpse is much of a motivator. ARCHIVIST: Mm. MARTIN: Still, she did manage to talk them out of burning the whole place to the ground?

* Was this implying that there weren’t any deaths amongst the regular staff? I know that it’s a bit of a moot point given the whole apocalypse-thingy, now, but still, glad for it because… I… really… don’t like… bystanders getting hurt as peripheral casualty when protagonists were the target… in fiction… (Though the staff have been hurt even if they survived, and now everyone is hurting given the circumstances, but, still. I really, really don’t like random deaths when their main point is to give angst to main characters.)

* Trevor&Julia and the Not!Them still on the loose. Given how the Not!Them operates, it’s possible that one of the Hunters hasn’t actually made it, and that we will meet Not!Trevor or Not!Julia in season 5? I’m guessing that they will come back in some shape or form (or Not) next season.

* I love how Section 31 was SO DONE with the Institute – Basira had established that the whole building meant an automatic Section 41 (MAG043) and we saw how Elias was handling police matters with blackmail and the likes (MAG082, MAG092, MAG120, MAG158). I’m surprised that Basira apparently explained Magnus’s deal, since they were searching for the body and the Panopticon? I thought they would avoid explaining it, since Section 31 would be the most likely to go for the kill if they ever found his body? And although Elias wasn’t sure about the consequences, he had still highlighted that killing him would still cause a risk for regular staff and Basira.

* I also love how the default way of destroying the Institute is always “set it on fire”:

(MAG060) ARCHIVIST: [Rosa Meyer] unloaded the van’s normal cargo of filing paper and envelopes, before filling it with several barrels of petrol. She was apprehended just south of Vauxhall Bridge, after she jumped a red light and collided with another car. Luckily the petrol did not ignite, and she was picked up by police as she tried to flee the scene. […] The one detail that still nags at me is that the company the Danilo Kostitch worked for, Paper Unlimited, is the same company that, at the time, supplied most of the stationery to the Magnus Institute. I have a nasty feeling about exactly where she was taking that petrol.

(MAG079) ELIAS: What did you want from him? LEITNER: The files. The ones you took from Gertrude. ELIAS: Planning a little light arson, are we Jurgen? LEITNER: It’s not just the Institute and you know it.

(MAG118) MARTIN: Case… 0071304. Statement of… Ivo Lensik. [BREATHES] [LIGHTER FLICKED ON] All right. [BURNING SOUNDS] [EXHALES DEEPLY] Statement ends, I guess. [PAPER RUSTLING] Hm… Harold Silvana! Number 0020406. Will probably do. [PAPER RUSTLING] [LIGHTER FLICKED ON] Alright then. 0140207, Dylan Anderson. [PAPER RUSTLING] Yeah? Okay~ [LIGHTER FLICKED ON] [EXHALES] There’s plenty more on the pile~ [AGGRESSIVE KNOCKING AND DOORKNOB JOSTLING] ELIAS: [MUFFLED AND DISTANT] Martin! Martin, open the door. MARTIN: Sorry Elias…! I can’t hear you. There’s a door in the way. […] ELIAS: Tell me what you’re doing, and why. MARTIN: I just thought I’d, y’know, drop a couple of ideas in the old suggestion box! Turns out my suggestion is… fire! [LIGHTER ON] ELIAS: And yet you haven’t set the whole Archives alight. So I assume this is… what’s it called… A cry for attention.

(MAG158) ELIAS: What exactly were you hoping to achieve here? Why not come at me directly instead of burning everything first? GERTRUDE: I was rather hoping the fire would occupy you while I did just that. ELIAS: I see…! […] So you burn the place down, use it as cover to reach my body, and then we die together. [CHUCKLE] How… poetic. Doesn’t seem like your style at all. GERTRUDE: I wasn’t actually planning on dying.

(Re: MAG060, I’d already been wondering, before the Jonah Magnus reveal, whether James Wright had somehow been involved in Rosa Meyer’s accident (thus preventing her from reaching the Institute) and/or had sent evidence to the police to incriminate her for the murder, ensuring she wouldn’t get another chance. I… guess that’s what really happened, uh ;;)

… A bit yIPS for the fact that Elias used to get harsh very fast as soon as the Archives were threatened with fire… and in MAG160, it’s now Basira who dissuaded police to burn the place down.

- On my first listen, I got a Big Worry over Basira because:

* “James Wright” had been Head of the Institute from 1973 to 1996, so during 23 years; “Elias Bouchard” had been the new one since 1996, so it’s been… 22 years, almost the same length. If Jonah is body-hopping regularly, we would be close to his next one.

* The weird Elias-Basira bits all through season 4.

* The fact that we haven’t heard Basira since MAG158, when Daisy told her to “go”: we… don’t really know what happened to her afterwards, we didn’t hear how she had interacted with Jon&Martin.

* The fact that Basira hadn’t mentioned the tapes and that Jonah’s statement was amongst the ones she sent to Jon:

(MAG160) ARCHIVIST: Ah! These, these are the… statements. MARTIN: Uh, yes. Basira said last week she’d send some up as soon as the Archives weren’t a crime scene. ARCHIVIST: Yes… MARTIN: And she wasn’t sure which ones you’d read already, so she–she just said she’d send a bunch. [CLATTERING SOUNDS] ARCHIVIST: There’s… tapes in here, as well. D… did she say anything about tapes? MARTIN: She… didn’t mention it? But… I–I didn’t check it until after the call.

… So: I panicked a bit about the idea that Jonah could have hopped into Basira before Jon and Martin left The Lonely, or when they had left for Scotland already?

BUT, on the other hand, it wouldn’t really fit thematically: she is still a character, I feel, we don’t “know” a lot; she spent the entirety of season 4 getting manipulated by Elias and ultimately losing Daisy again; she has a new arc opened (her promise to Daisy that she would find and kill her, in MAG158). It would be a bit too harsh to do Basira dirty like this right now, so I doubt that it’s something that happened (losing both Daisy&Basira like this, while Jon&Martin&Elias are still relevant, would be a bit too obviously imbalanced genders-wise too). But. Still. I got a Big Worry.

- Though: given Daisy’s last words in MAG158, I was assuming we were saying goodbye to her as “Daisy”, but now I’m not even sure? Because, yes, TMA characters often sarcastically joke about things that are upsetting and sad, but it didn’t feel like they were talking about someone they had lost forever as a person here?

(MAG160) MARTIN: Yeah, it’s… it’s not exactly the Ritz! ARCHIVIST: Well, it technically still belongs to Daisy, so… I’m just glad it’s not… some sort of… kill room. MARTIN: Or… [CHUCKLE] Or it is, and she just cleaned it up really well! [CHUCKLE] ARCHIVIST: Uh…! Yes… [CLEARS THROAT] [SILENCE] […] MARTIN: Some-somehow, I don’t think Daisy will be worried about “jurisdictions”…! ARCHIVIST: I– [SIGH] I don’t think she’d come here. [RATTLING SOUND] Doesn’t look like this place has been used for years. MARTIN: [POINTEDLY] And if she does? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … Well. At least, we’ll know where she is.

… I mean, yeah, there was Jon’s blatant discomfort, but: this is not how you would talk about someone who had resisted for months against a Fear that had influenced almost all her life, who tried to get Jon out of his misery pit after he had rescued her from the Coffin, who tried to repair a bridge with Martin, who was firm in front of Jon about the fact that obeying to a Fear’s influence wasn’t worth it, to ultimately succumb to The Hunt again after she had stayed in order to give Jon time to run after Martin who was in danger and possibly to protect Basira?

I really really felt that we were absolutely saying goodbye to her in MAG158, but with Jon&Martin’s exchange in this episode, I’m not quite sure anymore – it would be a bit too heartless and disrespectful if it was the case, to summarise Daisy once again as a violent monster, while she had fought it for months? But: Daisy had already lost herself to The Hunt during The Unknowing, and had been rescued from that state once, plus Basira promised to find and kill her (which sounds like a Last Promise, something you can’t go back on); I doubt they could “get her back” another time, even if the whole paradigm has changed?

I really don’t know ;; If we are indeed saying goodbye to Daisy-as-Daisy, I kind of hope that there will be more sensitive words about her in season 5, because it really didn’t feel like she was absolutely gone, given the way Jon and Martin were talking about her – this was a conversation that could have been had about Daisy in season 3, not after season 4 and all the work she did…? I don’t really feel like it was a “meaningful death” on its own either: it didn’t feel to me like it was a sacrifice she was ultimately choosing to make, but The Hunt taking over her anyway because of the violence and the stress around. It works extremely well as a very sad death – Daisy caught back by her patron after some time, because she couldn’t escape it forever (as she had said), and what mattered was that she allowed us to discover the Real Her during season 4 – but I’m still hoping a bit that she could go out a bit more on her terms, if this isn’t her final disappearance as a sentient being able to choose whether or not to cause harm…?)

- So: unsure about Daisy’s current status; worried over Basira (but overall narrative tends to indicate that she hasn’t been taken over); while Martin…

(MAG158) PETER: But you do serve The Lonely. MARTIN: Oh, I’m getting there, but if this is the final test or something? Then bad luck. The answer’s still “no”.

(MAG159) MARTIN: [DISTANT, VOICE ECHOING] This is where I should be. It feels right. ARCHIVIST: Martin, don’t say that. MARTIN: [DISTANT, VOICE ECHOING] Nothing hurts here. It’s just quiet. Even the fear is gentle here.

(MAG160) MARTIN: … Well, as fun as listening to you monologue is… ARCHIVIST: Hm. MARTIN: … I will give you some privacy. Go for a walk. ARCHIVIST: Let me know if you see any good cows…! MARTIN: Now, obviously I’m going to tell you if I see any good cows…! ARCHIVIST: [AMUSED HUFF] [FOOTSTEPS DEPARTING]

1°) … Somehow, I find it hard to believe that Martin, of all people, wouldn’t want to listen to Jon monologue. But aouch, the fact that he went for self-isolation so spontaneously gives me the impression that The Lonely might have impacted him quite deeply, and that it might come back to relevance in season 5…

2°) Daisy was barely mentioned in this episode and yet, once again, I’M SO SAD ABOUT DAISY, because it feels like everything was a reminder of her ;_; Who used to stay around when Jon was reading statements?

(MAG133) DAISY: You sure? ARCHIVIST: No, uh, it’s, hum. It’s fine. DAISY: It’s just… Basira’s busy. ARCHIVIST: I–I understand. Ho–honestly, er, I’d actually appreciate your insights, er, for this one, just… You know, keep quiet during the statement and that. DAISY: Sure. I, I can do quiet.

(MAG136) MELANIE: Well… uhm. Daisy’s been, erm… I’ve been keeping her company. Er, while… while Basira’s busy. She’s, er… ARCHIVIST: Oh, no, I, uh… I–I know. MELANIE: W–well, I’ve kind of got to… uhm. I’ve got somewhere to be. Do you mind if, if… she hangs around, with… ARCHIVIST: Er… I suppose… Not at all. She’s very welcome. […] DAISY: I didn’t ask her. To do that. ARCHIVIST: I–it–it’s fine. DAISY: [QUICKLY] You’re not babysitting me, alright?! I know that’s what the others think, sometimes, but… that’s not it. I just… don’t like… being on my own if I can help it. You know. Flashbacks, panic attacks, the usual. Just trying to avoid it if I can. ARCHIVIST: I know, Daisy, I–I do. It’s hard. DAISY: Yeah, well. Don’t let me get in your way.

(… And if she had been there, she would have found a way to stop Jon from reading, even if that meant harming him, uh…?)

- Obligatory “GOOD COWS” point:

(MAG160) MARTIN: Cool. … Well, as fun as listening to you monologue is… ARCHIVIST: Hm. MARTIN: … I will give you some privacy. Go for a walk. ARCHIVIST: Let me know if you see any good cows…! MARTIN: Now, obviously I’m going to tell you if I see any good cows…! ARCHIVIST: [AMUSED HUFF]

We know that Martin hadn’t travelled much in his life:

(MAG113) MARTIN: So… how was it? ARCHIVIST: Uh? MARTIN: A–America? And–and China? I’ve, I’ve never really actually… done any, y’know, travelling. MELANIE: It’s not all that. Sometimes you get shot by a ghost. ARCHIVIST: And refuse to give a statement about it. MELANIE: Yup! ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It was… nice, Martin.

So… Eloping to Scotland with Jon might have been his first time seeing actual cows? I love how it already sounded like an inside-joke between Jon&Martin – you feel like there are small stories behind it, that either Martin, Jon or both of them have already cooed about “good cows” in the time they have spent there. Same cute point with:

(MAG160) ARCHIVIST: Anyway, don’t tell me the phone box down there doesn’t appeal to your retro aesthetic…! MARTIN: … It… might. ARCHIVIST: [AMUSED HUFF] MARTIN: Maybe.

It’s adorable that it’s both a nod to Martin’s taste indeed (… and technically Alex’s!):

(MAG039) TIM: Why do you have a second tape recorder, Martin? MARTIN: Oh, um… well, I’ve been using it to record myself. I write poetry and I think the tapes have a sort of… low-fi charm. ARCHIVIST: … I see.

(S1Q&A, 17’20) ALEX: So, when Jonny originally pitched The Magnus Archives to me, there was a period of testing, where we actually ran a few episodes that will never see the light of day…! And what we were doing is seeing what sounded right. And, part of that was to do with the sound of it – so we did versions of The Archives, uh, without the tape deck, just to test? I didn’t like it. I think that it’s got a sort of low-fi charm. JONNY: [CHUCKLE]

And Jon had remembered!

… So, confirmation that Martin likes and is into old things. … There is a definitive pattern there, because Jon absolutely does fit into the “retro” and “low-fi charm” aesthetic himself, and I’m not sure if Jon was aware that it was a self-burn (or if, like in MAG039 and his “only an idiot would stay in this job”, that was the joke).

- And on the other hand: Jon is Living The Archers Life in the countryside. I still want to Believe that the show became a guilty pleasure for him.

… ;_; I’m randomly sad for Daisy, because it feels right that one of her safehouses would be located in a remote area, without signal, a bit distant from the village nearby…? Was she even able to listen to the radio there? Did she listen to Archers episodes alone there?

(Well. “Alone”. Martin&Jon learned about the safehouse somehow, and I can’t tell which idea I preferred more: that Basira tipped them about it (and it was something she had shared with Daisy, and she told them despite that little secret of theirs), or that Daisy had tipped Jon before MAG158, in case something bad were to happen, because the two of them had this weird little friendship-thing going on…)

- I’m still going to use “Elias” for Jonah out of habit, and I like how different characters now in the known also have their own ways of referring to him? Peter used “Elias” out of habit too:

(MAG158) PETER: What are you doing here, Elias? […] Don’t let him distract you. ELIAS: Peter. PETER: Elias.

(MAG159) PETER: But it’s moored now, and I came on land, at Elias’s request. My crew is out there waiting for a call I think I am now unlikely ever to give them. … I will call him “Elias”, for that’s how I’ve known him for most of our… acquaintance, though I originally met him when he was still “James Wright, Head of the Magnus Institute”.

Martin quickly learned to reconfigure his knowledge and use “Jonah”:

(MAG158) MARTIN: Elias– … Jonah had nothing to do with it.

… Meanwhile: Jon is still stuck on “Elias”, though he’s been shown correcting himself:

(MAG158) ARCHIVIST: Uh– yes. And I’d wager that Elias’s body, uh… BASIRA: Gotta be Jonah Magnus, right? ARCHIVIST: I’d say so.

(MAG160) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Safe as anywhere else. If Elias wanted to find us, I imagine he could, but… I doubt the police will be able to. […] Does she know if they’ve found the old prison yet? The… Panopticon, Elia– … Magnus’s body.

It was a very strange season in the fact that Jon and Elias only interacted directly once, and very quickly (MAG158): in past seasons, we were hearing them regularly (even in season 1, when they directly interacted only twice), and it was implied that they were discussing more often than what the tapes were recording. But in season 4, no additional interaction than MAG158’s is possible given that Elias was in jail and Jon was forbidden from visiting him… though there was a form of communication through different means – Jon read Jonathan Fanshawe’s letter to Jonah because it had “called” to him (and Elias “called” Jon towards the Panopticon; was he the one responsible for that one?), and Jonah’s letter in MAG160.

How long will it take before Jon and Elias come face to face again in season 5? And will Jon still call him “Elias” then, or “Jonah”?

- I had been wondering for so long how Jon was supposed to fit in Beholding’s ritual, as one of its agents! Would Jon keep embracing his powers to the point that pulling in The Eye into the world would seem acceptable for him? (That was my main worry when Oliver gave his statement and told him he had to make a choice: were we supposed to trust Jon when he was telling Basira and the others that his “priorities haven’t changed”, or was she right to be cautious around him? In the end, it was a mix of both given that Jon wasn’t trustworthy (he hid to everyone that he had been taking statements behind their backs) but he still wasn’t keen on bringing the apocalypse, which was cemented later in season 4 when the others made sure that he wouldn’t hurt other people.) Would Elias manage to convince Jon that Beholding was a lesser evil, possibly to “protect” the world against Extinction? (Absolutely not.) Was Elias simply waiting for the right time to blackmail Jon into it doing it, by threatening to hurt Georgie, the assistants or specifically Martin? (No, but my blood ran cold when Jonah mentioned Martin in this statement, since… Martin was outside… alone… and out of reach…, and for a few seconds, I really thought he had been kidnapped and/or hurt and that this would be it.) Given how Elias had a “complicated” relationship to the apocalypse and didn’t seem to be doing much, did he really want Beholding’s ritual, or was he passively sabotaging it…? “The Watcher’s Crown” had been a concern and a frustration from the moment it was first mentioned:

(MAG111) GERRY: She worked out they’d all be happening quite close together. She’d already been doing it a while, and The Unknowing was the next on her list. That and The Watcher’s Crown. ARCHIVIST: The, the what? GERRY: Uh, The Rite of the Watcher’s Crown. It’s what she called the ritual for the Eye. She didn’t tell me much about that one, just that she knew how to take care of it. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH]

(MAG123) BASIRA: Best I can understand it, Beholding, or… The Eye, or whatever you wanna call it, we’re one of the only powers that hasn’t actually taken a shot at our ritual. Yet. And everything out there knows it. ARCHIVIST: … No, I mean, we… we can’t be the only ones, surely? BASIRA: I don’t know. Probably not. But we made a big noise with The Unknowing and… other stuff, and… now they’ve taken notice.

(MAG126) PETER: [LAUGH] Because, behind all his bluster, Elias’s just like all the rest. He’s so preoccupied playing the game, he doesn’t pay attention to the big picture. He managed to convince himself that he could get his ritual off first, which would have made all of this a… bit moot, but that’s not really an option anymore. So it’s down to us. You and me. The dynamic duo.

(MAG135) BASIRA: [DRY SIGH] What was the point? You won’t be getting your ritual off from in here so, what do you need him for?

(MAG137) ARCHIVIST: Ever since I crawled out of that damn coffin, I feel like I’ve been… adrift. Filling in blanks and diving into History, but only…! [EXASPERATED SIGH] The breadcrumbs I’m finding are… stale. Old. … What the hell is The Watcher’s Crown? So far the only mention of it I’ve had is from Gerry, and he didn’t seem to know much about what it actually meant. [PAUSE] And he’s gone now. But if it is the grand ritual of Beholding, then I– … I mean… I need to know about it. Right…? I feel like I’m on a deadline, like I’m running out of time somehow – and I don’t even know where to go! What to look for, o–or… [EXHALE] Just casting around blindly for more clues to just… drop into my lap. Everyone else is… running towards something, or running away, and I… [SIGH] I don’t know what I’m doing.

(MAG138) ELIAS: For all his… many faults, Peter is legitimately trying to stop the end of the world as we know it. MARTIN: So why haven’t you helped him?! ELIAS: My relationship to the apocalypse is more… complicated. MARTIN: [UTTER DISBELIEF] Oh, seriously? ELIAS: Seriously.

And in the end, I’m so satisfied by what was revealed, since it entirely checked out.

* Indeed: before season 4, it had seemed logical to assume that the Institute had been founded in 1818 and that the Beholding faction had been accumulating power ever since, preparing for The Watcher’s Crown, given how The Dark had apparently waited for 300 years before trying again, and The Stranger 230 years. However, in Smirke’s letter to Jonah (MAG138), we learned that Jonah was finalising a Beholding project, which resulted in Smirke’s death. So that was the time of The Watcher’s Crown attempt!

* Elias “My relationship to the apocalypse is more… complicated.” Magnus had already tried his ritual once, and knew now that the others’ were all doomed to fail – unless going for his ritual of them all. That was why. F u c k e r.

* Annabelle had already taunted and/or warned Jon about the fact that reading a statement was a weak point, since he had reached a point where it was impossible for him to stop once he had begun:

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “… I wouldn’t try too hard to stop reading, there’s every likelihood you’ll… just hurt yourself. So just listen. Now – shall we turn the page and try again?” [PAINED SOUND] [PAGE GETTING TURNED] ARCHIVIST: [STRAINED] … Statement of… Jonah Magnus… regarding… Jonathan Sims… the Archivist. … Statement begins. […] “Now. [CHUCKLE] Repeat after me.”

(MAG147, Annabelle Cane) “Of course, that’s not the real crux of the free will question that’s… bothering you at the moment, is it? I think that one probably comes down to whether or not you’re choosing to continue reading this statement out loud. You didn’t mean to, did you? No, I’m sure you told Basira and Melanie that you were going to glance over it and report back. Perhaps they asked you if you were going to record, and you shook your head – “Maybe later”. That sounds like the sort of thing you’d say.

But think about it, Jon: when’s the last time you were able to read a statement quietly to yourself without instinctively hitting record and speaking it aloud? It is just instinct? Habit? Or is it a compulsion – a string pulled by the Ceaseless Watcher or the Mother of Puppets? Or both? I know the summaries have started to confuse you. Where did they come from, when you read a statement fresh? How do you just… sort of know what it’s about, before you even start to read it…? But by then, you’re away: the rollercoaster is dropping and you’ve no real choice but to hold on and hope that… I don’t crash you.”

(What had struck me with Annabelle’s is that, although it was true that Jon had not been interrupted during a statement past season 2, the concept of Jon not being able to glance at a statement without making an official record was fairly recent: he had provided some follow-ups during season 4, having previously done some work using details mentioned in the statements.)

… It might be that Annabelle showed off the trick of Jon being forced to keep reading a statement even though the content was unpleasant precisely to give Elias the idea? Elias knew how to get his completed “Archive”, but I doubt that hijacking Jon through a statement in order to get him to summon the Fears was something he had planned for long, and not something he had devised recently, copying Annabelle.

* + Bonus from Martin, who had absolutely jinxed it / been too On The Nose about it, since he had put out there the idea of an incantation to bring about the end of the world, though crackily:

(MAG144) MARTIN: [LONG INHALE, EXHALE] I believe you. PETER: You don’t still think I’m trying to trick you into a grand ritual? MARTIN: I mean, I’m not about to start chanting stuff for you, but… but the details you’ve given me all seem to check out. So far.

The end of the world happened thanks to someone chanting stuff for someone else, in the end!

- Same feeling with how the episode was framed: we did have clues that ~something was coming~, we knew since MAG121 that we were now in 2018 and that it was conveniently the Institute’s anniversary, Jon himself acknowledged this early in the season…

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: Hm. “Jonah Magnus”… I’ve never really given much thought to him. Not nearly as much as I should have. I suppose I had always hoped there was a chance he was… innocent, in all this. I know, I know; but I had… [SIGH] I had just… hoped that maybe the founding of the Institute was in earnest…! And not simply the foundation stone for all the… terrible things that have happened here. … But no. Whatever is happening now… has its origins two hundred years ago. In the work of an evil man. … [INHALE] Exactly two hundred years, in fact. Don’t think that little detail has evaded me. I don’t know the precise date the Institute was founded, but I do know that it was in 1818. [INHALE] Something’s coming. I know it is. But I just… don’t know what I need to do.

But WOW did Everything highlight Elias’s sense of drama.

* 2018 was indeed relevant, but worse, Asshole Boss Man picked October 18th as the Apocalypse Day, making the statement case a palindrome (#0181810). Knowing this posturing fucker, there is every likelihood that this was the anniversary of the exact date the Institute was founded or something.

* He probably bribed Simon or used Ex Altiora’s Spiral thing just to be able to get the storm rumbling ominously in the background on that day.

* Once again, HE USED TO BE BASED IN EDINBURGH (and confirmed in this letter that the building of the Magnus Institute was constructed or moved into only after his failed Watcher’s Crown attempt, so around the time of Smirke’s death in 1867). He struck when Jon&Martin had precisely taken refuge in Scotland, so the country of his roots.

* I’ll go all-out about the content of his letter, but the sense of self-posturing and dramatisation was through the roof, he probably spent most of the prison vacation thinking about it and about how Jon would probably react to craft the most obnoxious letter ever. Fucker.

* The PUNS. He punned SO MUCH. It’s nothing new (“Don’t forget to keep in touch, Martin. There are so many people in here, but without one’s friends… it does get rather lonely.”, just for one), but he was absolutely insufferable in this one:

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Admittedly, given the advent of The Unknowing, I needn’t have bothered – but what’s the old saying about hindsight? […] Poor Peter. He really should have left well enough alone. […] How is Martin, by the way? He looks well. You will keep an eye on him when all this is over, won’t you?”

(+ “It does tickle me, that in this world of… would-be occult dynasties and ageless monsters, the “Chosen One” is… simply that: someone I chose!” Someone remembered The Tingly, uh.)

* About the Posturing: Elias definitely confirmed to be a Bones Connoisseur, dude, please, you were two centuries late for the Baroque movement.

(MAG092) ELIAS: And it was not out of malice, or because [Jonah Magnus] lacked affection for Barnabas Bennett: he retrieved those bones sadly enough when the time came. Bones that you can still find in my office, if you know where to look.

(MAG127, Jonathan Fanshawe) “… Do I need to tell you what I found, Jonah? Do I need to detail what covered his organs? His bones? The inside of his skin? What clustered together in their dozens, and all turned as one to focus on me as I opened his chest? Their pupils constricting in the light, with irises of every hue and colour. Because whatever it was that did this to him, I know in my heart… that it is your fault.”

(MAG131) JARED: The letters started comin’ in about two years ago. Good white paper, large print. Nice and simple. Dunno who sent them; they were never signed, and I dunno how they kept finding me. […] I don’t blame people for thinking that all bones are the same, most people don’t have much experience – but it’s not true. There are good bones, and there are bad bones, and Regan Hasnain had some very good bones in her. They were solid, healthy, and they jumped at my touch. I didn’t doubt the letters again.

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “Do you know of Alexander Cunningham? He’s been working with the Viceroy of India on the Indus Valley digs, and he’s discovered some quite remarkable things. Burial pits full of burned bones and ash, skulls with markings as though the eyes were removed, and others that seem… buried alive.”

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “[…] though I waited until the worms were in you to pull the lever. I needed to make sure you felt that fear all the way to your bones.”

… Assuming that Jon didn’t leave with it, I’m unfortunately picturing Jonah getting his hands on Jon’s rib just to add it to the secret stash in his office.

- I really loved Jonah’s “little trip down memory lane”, because… it was answering interrogations or suspicions (regarding his past actions), still managed to surprise me in small little things that I hadn’t suspected and hadn’t been hinted but worked perfectly (shoving Helen into a car?!), and was still extremely functional (terrorising Jon and readying him for the final incantation, by reactivating all his old fears and pains). The first part of it was almost a “gift”, in a way, since it… answered and “hooked” us/Jon, but wasn’t really necessary when it came to messing Jon up; but it was, after all, a statement, so it’s only logical that it would begin with some gloating and posturing. Gods, the posturing. Anyway, a… lot of things suddenly rearranged themselves, so I’m just going to follow his words for that one without trying to organise it thematically:

(MAG160) ARCHIVIST: [CLEARS THROAT] Statement of Hazel Rutter, regarding a fire in her childhood home. Original statement given August 9th, 1992…! Audio recording by Jonathan Sims, the Archivist. Statement begins. [PAUSE, PUNCTUATED BY THE CRACKLING OF THE FIRE] “Hello, Jon. [STATIC RISES] Apologies for the deception, but I rather wanted to make sure you started reading, so I thought it best not to announce myself. I’m assuming you’re alone – you always did prefer to read your statements in… private. … I wouldn’t try too hard to stop reading, there’s every likelihood you’ll… just hurt yourself. So just listen. Now – shall we turn the page and try again?” [PAINED SOUND] [PAGE GETTING TURNED] ARCHIVIST: [STRAINED] … Statement of… Jonah Magnus… regarding… Jonathan Sims… the Archivist. … Statement begins.

* The sneakiness was extraordinary because, given the first words, you were meant to be already trying to guess what this statement would be about – we tend to associate “fire” with Desolation, and the very present and physical crackling of the fire in the background… was adding a very ominous touch to this.

* I must admit that before Jon confirmed that it was Jonah’s statement, I didn’t know whether it was him or Annabelle? There was something very carnivorous and cruel in the tone Jon used, which reminded me of her rather than Elias. (And, overall: I felt “Jonah” a bit more than in Ben-as-Elias’s words! It’s probably because of the huge amount of posturing, and the… slowness? of Jon’s reading, rather than Elias’s usual chirpy bitey comments.)

I have to appreciate, also, how this season began, continued and ended… with people saying hello to Jon and/or calling him “Jon” when he was physically unable to answer.

(Season 4 trailer) MARTIN: Hi Jon. [PAUSE] H–how are you? [LIGHT CHUCKLE] … Yeah. Yeah, same here. It’s… it’s bad all over, you know?

(MAG121) OLIVER: Hum… Hello, Jon. Do you… m–mind if I call you Jon? I… I mean. You don’t actually know me, it’s just… well. “Archivist”, it’s so… formal, isn’t it? And I do kind of know you…? Haven’t had much choice, really.

(MAG147, Annabelle Cane) “‘Free will’ is a funny old thing – isn’t it, Jon? Can I call you Jon? I’m going to call you Jon.”

Elias had been spending a loooot of time watching Jon, indeed.

* The struggle in Jon’s throat noises was heart-breaking, we could hear that he was clearly trying to resist… to no avail, and Elia’s little taunt was just the nail on the coffin…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Why does a man seek to destroy the world? It’s a simple enough answer: for immortality, and power […]; to place yourself beyond pain, and death, and fear. It is an awful thing to know about yourself, but the freedom, Jon, the freedom of it all…! I have dedicated my life to handing the world to these Dread Powers, all for my own gain, and I feel… nothing but satisfaction, in that choice. I am to be a king of a ruined world, and I shall never die. I believe there are far more people in this world who’d take that bargain than you would ever guess. And I have beaten all of them.”

* We had learned through Robert Smirke’s letter that Jonah was afraid of dying (MAG138: “I beg you, do not pursue this goal; if only a single lesson may be gleaned from my life of long study, and longer hardship, it is that the fear of Death is natural, and to flee from it will only bring greater misery. Repent of your sins, Jonah. Seek forgiveness. I am certain the Dread Powers cannot take a soul that keeps faith in the Resurrection.”), that absolutely confirms it. Things have changed indeed, and the separations we used to rely on will probably be less relevant, but… still, it’s interesting that this season began with an agent of The End visiting Jon (sent by The Web). Oliver had precisely highlighted that you can’t really escape death (MAG121: “That was it with the old woman too. That was different, though. Way I figure it? She stuck her nose in just about everywhere it wasn’t wanted and stirred up hornets. ‘Till all the precautions in the world couldn’t stop Death from finally catching her.”), I’m curious about whether or not it will be relevant for Jonah too.

* Adding to this: Jon had explained that he had woken up because he was afraid of dying (MAG136: “My memories of the coma are not clear. But I know I made a choice; I made a choice to become… something else. Because I was afraid to die.”), and it was a lingering theme in this season: is it worth it to not die if it relies on harming others? We’ve had various examples of people accepting this deal in their own ways (Helen who chose to “stop feeling guilty” about it, Tova McHugh who justified to herself that she deserved to live more than others…), and others who actively refused it (Daisy who pointed out that it wasn’t worth it, Melanie who had decided to stop any complacency with Beholding even if it would cause her own death, before she found a way out). The beginning of the episode established that Jon was still trying to not use his powers, and the prologue confirmed it once more: after the harm he caused and kept hidden during the first half of season 4, he’s still following the conscious choice to not hurt others at the present. I had felt that MAG138 was implicitly contrasting Jonah and Jon (agreeing to let his friends get consumed for his own gain / wanting to protect the assistants and refusing to lose anyone else); given how Elias was absolutely deadpan about the fact he had embraced the Fears for his own gain, the contrast is definitely cemented.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Of course, this desire did not manifest overnight. When Smirke first gathered our little band – Lukas, Scott and the rest – to discuss and hypothesise on the nature of the things he had learned from Rayner… I felt what I believe we all felt: curiosity, and fear. But as he compiled his taxonomy and codified his theories on the grand rituals, I began to develop a very specific concern. Smirke was still so obsessed with his ideas on balance, even as our fellows began to experiment and fall to the service of their patrons: I began to worry that if one of them successfully attempted their ritual, then I would be as much a victim as any, trapped in the nightmare landscape of a twisted world. At first, I attempted prevention, but the cause seemed hopeless. The only way to ensure I did not suffer the tribulations of what I believed to be… an inevitable transformation, was to bring it about myself. So what began as an experiment… soon became a race. Beyond that, I was getting older, and mortality began to weigh more heavily on my mind. How much in this world is done because we fear death, the last and greatest terror? I convinced Smirke to work on Millbank, leading him to design it as a temple to all the Fears in equilibrium, such that my own modifications to the design of the Panopticon went… unremarked. It – took – years for the dread of the prisoners that passed through to fully suffuse the place, and I was an old man by the time I made my first attempt at The Watcher’s Crown, sat in the centre of that colossal eye, the great ring of cells encircling me like a coronet. It was… flawed, of course, as all Smirke’s rituals were; and none of the inmates survived, as the power I attempted to harness shook the building almost to pieces, and the murky swamp upon which the prison was build consumed it. But it left me a gift: for sat in that watchtower, I could see… everything I turned my mind to. It was a dizzying power; and one I discovered I maintained even as I found vessels to extend my life. [DISTANT RUMBLE OF THUNDER] Of course, I had to make sure the location was kept under my control while I worked on revising my plans, and so I moved the organisation I had founded to assist in my research down to London. And the Institute, as you know it, was born. I’ll not bore you with details of my bodies and failures through those intervening years. Suffice to say I kept busy, both planning my own next attempt, and doing my best to stymie those others who tried versions of their own. Surely, my interpretation of The Watcher’s Crown had been incomplete; there had been some element of the ritual I had overlooked.”

* ! I had felt like season 4 was… really giving the idea that an “old” generation of avatars or people involved with the Powers had been wiped out? The Lightless Flame was almost entirely eradicated by Gertrude, a few recent failed rituals damaged some factions (The Stranger, The Dark, The Flesh), a lot of recurring figures were revealed dead (such as Adelard) or are “officially” dead (Mikaele Salesa…?), Peter was recently eradicated, etc. Simon Fairchild, Jonah and Trevor Herbert (if he has survived) seem to be the oldest; the only ones left seem to be Jared Hopworth (since 1996), Jude Perry (since 1991), Daisy (in whichever state she currently is…), Oliver Banks (“died” and came back after 2015), Annabelle Cane (turned in 2010), Helen-the-Distortion (took over in 2017), Julia Montauk (embraced The Hunt in summer 2010), Jon (Beholding, gradually groomed into avatarhood from late 2015 to early 2018), potentially Martin (Beholding-touched Lonely, late 2017 and 2018). That’s not many, compared to the old guard. But it did fit with both the idea that the apocalypse would be brought around now, and that Jonah had lived it as a “race” against others?

* We don’t know what happened to George Gilbert Scott as an avatar of The Buried in the Magnusverse? He was described in MAG050, but I wonder if he’s still around, given how Elias took great care of finishing off Rayner by sending the police after him. (Technically, we don’t know how Mordechai Lukas ended either… but the Lukases are still prosperous and financing the Institute, so the family and Elias are still in good terms.)

* It’s an implicit correction to Jon’s conclusions that the Institute had never been founded “in earnest” and that Jonah Magnus had always been “an evil man” after reading Jonathan Fanshawe’s letter from 1831 (MAG127): Jonah really taking it to heart to point out that his opinions had changed a bit over the matter of the Fears, uh? Although it was a quick decision: if we’re following our History, Robert Smirke began working on Millbank around 1816. If Jonah was the one who pushed him in that direction for his own plans, it means that he was already planning to bring in Beholding when Albrech had sent him his letter (MAG023) about The Eye’s tomb in the Black Forest. Was it the case, or is the Magnus timeline diverging a bit from our own history (maybe Smirke began working on Millbank later in the Magnusverse), or did Jonah rewrite history a bit there, retrospectively telling himself that he had convinced Smirke to work on Millbank for his own gains? Jonah, at least, let Barnabas Bennett die in 1824, and the way Elias presented it, it had still been a sad choice albeit one made without any hesitation (MAG092: “And it was not out of malice, or because he lacked affection for Barnabas Bennett: he retrieved those bones sadly enough when the time came. […] No, it was because he was curious. Because he had to know, to watch and see it all.”); according to Jonathan Fanshawe’s letter from 1831, he had grown a bit more ruthless towards Albrecht von Closen by then.

* … How old was Jonah when he pushed Smirke to work on Millbank? “I was getting older, and mortality began to weigh more heavily on my mind” would mean old age… but he was still alive in 1867 (Robert Smirke’s letter). He couldn’t have been more than 40 in 1816, and that’s already stretching a lot! So either Real Life’s and Magnus’s Histories diverge as mentioned above, either he was really a Victorian asshole getting worried over his first wrinkles and white hair, gooooods, Jonah, please…

* It… does explain the “Opperior” in the Institute’s logo, if he wanted for more than half his life that Millbank would be contaminated by the fears…………

* I love how he casually explained that The Watcher’s Crown had already happened, when we were panicking about it, and yet! We should have suspected! Since Smirke’s letter mentioned that Jonah was likely working on a Beholding project:

(MAG138, Robert Smirke) “It is telling that of those I have brought into my confidence, it is only you and I who have continued this far without falling to one Power or another, despite all my instruction and work. This is, of course, assuming you have not taken the path of The Eye that I know has called you – called us both – for so long, even since before we began our work on Millbank. […] I am not a fool; I know well enough what this dream is likely to mean, and I warn you again that if you have any remaining ambitions to use our work, to try and wear The Watcher’s Crown, you must abandon them! Not simply for the sake of your own soul, but for that of the world! I have always had the utmost respect for you as a man of dignity, and learning. Do not allow yourself to fall to this madness. […] I am choosing to assume that these manifestations are unintentional, Jonah, and you have not… simply decided to implore a Dark Patron to end the life of an old man. I further find myself supposing that they may emanate from your own intrigues and preparations to culminate those plans which we agreed to abandon so many decades ago! […] The Eye has marked me for something, of this I have no doubt. My… humble hope is that it may be a swift death, an accidental effect of your own researches, which I once again implore you to abandon. It is likely too late for me, but I will not…”

Letter interrupted because He Dead. I’m a bit surprised that Jonah didn’t take credit for his death, so it might have been Beholding just growing more powerful at the time and touching Smirke without even Jonah doing anything purposefully?

* And again!!! It made sense re: the current building of the Institute. We knew that the Institute had been founded in 1818, but Sampson Kempthorne’s letter (MAG050) had mentioned that Jonah was “rattling around an Edinburgh townhouse, surrounded by piles of ghostly accounts and lunatic documentation” in 1841. Breekon, while describing an event that had happened around 1853 (his time serving on the Robert Small), had mentioned that it had been “the first time we saw what would become this place, The Eye’s Pedestal” (MAG128), implying that it wasn’t yet The Eye’s pedestal at the time. That’s because Jonah only moved the Institute to London after his failed Watcher’s Crown attempt, past 1867! And all to protect the Panopticon and his actual body inside of it!

* Just the mention in passing that a huge amount of people died during his attempt, but it’s not really surprising from Elias-Jonah. Though, he was a bit more handson than Peter had credited him for, in the end?

* It’s interesting how the failed rituals impacted avatars differently. Peter almost lost himself; Tom Haan certainly did (as pointed out by Gertrude); Rayner was severely diminished; Simon just kept going after each one (only one attempt amongst many, in the big universe?). Jonah… got a power boost out of it. If the Fears work on a Whatever Feels Right basis, is it because he was so self-centred that he couldn’t even imagine not getting personal gain out of it or something?

* It still makes so much sense that his own way to “not die” was to take hosts: he knew Rayner, and that’s what Rayner was doing, so it worked because he had an example of it working for someone else; it had to work this way for himself, too!

* Really interesting too, that… The Eye was not mentioned in the first part of his statement. We know that The Watcher’s Crown was The Eye’s ritual, but it’s really telling that Jonah didn’t explicitly introduce it as his god: in his mind, he was clearly doing it for himself, for his own interests, for his own survival and gain, and not at all out of devotion or fascination or unwilling service to a patron (though there are clear indications that… he was actually much more Beholding than he was aware).

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “It was not until I met Gertrude Robinson that things began to really come into focus. You see, the role of Archivist has been part of The Beholding for as far back as my research can go. This isn’t uncommon for the Powers: most of the beliefs around them are guesswork and fallible human interpretation, but there are certain… throughlines and consistencies that can be spotted, regardless of the trappings. But Gertrude was unlike any other Archivist. She simply did not care about collecting experiences or compiling the fears of others – she was driven to stop those who served the Powers. More than once, I thought she must secretly be of The Hunt, [RUMBLE OF THUNDER] but there was never that sick joy in her, that thrill of predator and prey. She had simply decided that this was her position in life, and went about it with a practicality that even I found disconcerting at times. I once asked her… what drove her, what had started her down that path. She told me The Desolation had killed her cat…! I don’t know if she was joking and, to be honest, I could never bring myself to look into her mind and find out for sure.”

* So ;; Kinda leaning into the idea that Johann von Württemberg and the creature under Alexandria were indeed Archivists of their times? (And I’m D: all over again about Jonah confirming that he had researched on Beholding, because of what happened to Albrecht von Closen between 1816 and 1831 because of him and the books…)

* Gotta love how he didn’t mention any other Archivist before SHE happened. Gertrude Robinson was That Special, uh. (Well, he had acknowledged that “I suppose we both got a little complacent. Fifty years is a long time!” in MAG158)

* I love how I can absolutely not tell either whether she was messing with him or if it was the truth. She could very well have dedicated a huge amount of her life to fucking over The Lightless Flame in particular because they had murdered her cat, it would have been entirely understandable.

* I love that JONAH was TOO SCARED of Gertrude Robinson to peer into her mind ever. Also:

(MAG159) PETER: Gertrude was the one that scared me. She seemed to have no interest in meeting me whatsoever, something… I appreciated, but there was something in her eyes when she looked at me, as though she was making a calculation and I was an unwanted integer she was deciding whether to remove.

Lonely Eyes, united in their shared fear of the scary old woman.

* That was one of the first moments I remembered that Jon was listening to this with us – and how upsetting it must have been to be reminded of “the Archivist” being a function, when he had been so afraid to have inherited a “mantle” like Michael and others in season 3…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “In any case, Gertrude’s ruthless efficiency in derailing and collapsing rituals threw into stark relief a question that had been bothering me for almost a hundred and fifty years. In the whole span of humanity, why had nobody ever succeeded? Perhaps there were a long line of Gertrude Robinson throughout history, but I found that hard to credit. Could it be then, that there was something in the very concept of the rituals that meant they couldn’t succeed? She was clearly having similar thoughts in that last year, all of which culminated with… the People’s Church. When I saw that she was making no preparations whatsoever to stop it, I realised she was putting into practice a theory – and one she couldn’t afford to be wrong. She was going to wait, and see if the unopposed ritual succeeded, or if it collapsed under its own strain, as mine had all those years ago. Knowing Gertrude, I’m sure she had a backup plan if she had miscalculated; but she had not. The ritual failed. And all at once, I realised what needed to be done. You see… the thing about the Fears is that they can never be truly separated from each other. When does the fear of sudden violence transition into the panic of hunted prey? When does the mask of The Stranger become the deception of The Spiral? Even those that seem to exist in direct opposition rely on each other for their definition as much as “up” relies on “down”. To try and create a world with only The Buried… makes as much sense as trying to conceive a world with only “down”. Every ritual tied itself so closely to a single power as to render itself… impossible. They could bring their patron close, but could not sever it from the others, and eventually it would be violently pulled back to the place next to reality where they dwell.”

* I Did Not Share That Opinion because… honestly, the rituals seemed quite easy to derail? The only thing that surprised me is that Gertrude took care of them on her own, only thanks to a few (sometimes unwilling) allies: Adelard, Gerry, Michael and Jan Kilbride. Even with past taxonomies, there might have been dozens of different cults worshipping different things (Jonah did acknowledge that Beholding&Archivist was an old constant); we got a glimpse of old conflicts in MAG053 (Those Who Sing The Night fighting against the site of an Archive) and MAG117 (The Stranger’s last ritual attempt getting interrupted by what Gertrude interpreted as Slaughter avatars). It sounded logical to me that a lot of these rituals had failed in the past because others had opposed it: they weren’t planning their ritual in a vacuum, but with a dozen of cults opposing yours.

* BUT THE EXPLANATION WAS A “OH SHIT” MOMENT BECAUSE!!! It… made sense, and we had glimpses and hints and we should have guessed that it was the case!!

(MAG080) ARCHIVIST: So the creatures are, what, priests? These books their holy texts? LEITNER: I told you it was an unhelpful analogy. Let’s try another one. Um… Imagine, you are an ant, and you have never before seen a human. Then one day, into your colony, a huge fingernail is thrust, scraping and digging. You flee to another entrance, only to be confronted by a staring eye gazing at you. You climb to the top, trying to find escape and, above you, can see the vast dark shadow of a boot falling upon you. Would that ant be able to construct these things into the form of a single human being? Or would it believe itself to be under attack by three different, equally terrible, but very distinct assailants? ARCHIVIST: So the books, the monsters, they’re part of these beings? Just extensions of them? Fingers being pushed into our world?

(MAG111) GERRY: And when our fears change, so do these things. But it’s not quick. Gertrude reckons they’ve basically been the same since the Industrial Revolution. She and my mum both liked to follow Smirke’s list of fourteen. ARCHIVIST: [DISBELIEVINGLY] Th– I mean, there are a lot more than fourteen things to be afraid of in the world. Where do you draw the line? GERRY: Hmmm. I always think it helps to imagine them like colours. The edges bleed together, and you can talk about little differences: “oh, that’s indigo, that’s more lilac”, but they’re both purple. I mean, I guess there are technically infinite colours, but you group them together into a few big ones. A lot of it’s kind of arbitrary. […] And like colours, some of these powers, they feed into or balance each other. Some really clash, and you just can’t put them together. I mean, you could see them all as just one thing, I guess, but it would be pretty much meaningless, y’know, like… like trying to describe a… shirt by talking about the concept of colour. O–Of course, with these things it’s not a simple spectrum, y’know, it’s more like– ARCHIVIST: An infinite amorphous blob of terror bleeding out in every direction at once. GERRY: Now you’re getting it. ARCHIVIST: Like colours, but if colours hated me.

(MAG137, Wallis Turner) “The crew, hungry for death in their stolen uniforms, at first cried out in joy with each new murder; then, they cried out with expectation; and at last, with what sounded like concern, casting their eyes up into the empty sky as though waiting for something. As fewer and fewer of us remained, I could feel something like panic begin to spread through them. […] The crew… did not… stop me. They simply watched me with expressions of despair, and the deepest disappointment I’ve ever seen.” […] GERTRUDE: Still the anti-climax is fascinating: I can only assume they were supposed to be… bombed at the height of the ritual. Maybe by Japanese aircraft, maybe Allied, maybe… both. I wondered what stopped it: a Japanese radar filled with… spiderwebs; a US destroyer, finding itself suddenly alone in the open ocean? [HUFF] We’ll probably never know.

(MAG143) MANUELA: I… don’t know exactly when it all started to come undone. I think Maxwell first felt the ripples four days before the eclipse was due. [SIGH] It was strange… Like a pause in the hysterical whimpering and fruitless prayers of the sacrifices. And a ripple that was felt through the waters, and the stagnant blood that bound us. A disruption. We would later learn that this was the collapse of the ritual at Hither Green – but it was only the first. […] And as we unveiled our new and absent sun, the sacrifices who remained screamed, and fell in holy agonies, and the world of endless night we had been promised began to pour in, shining out and all around us. It touched and caressed our souls with the soothing fears of night, and I heard Maxwell weeping with joy at what we had done. And then… it stopped. It just… stopped. All at once, that loving embrace was stripped from us, and it began to retreat, to recede back into the place that it had come from. We were so close…! … We were so close…

(MAG151) SIMON: Do you know when the last ritual I attempted was? MARTIN: I… I don’t know, that space station? SIMON: Oh goodness no, that’s the future my boy! But no; it was 1853! The height of the aquarium mania! All over the Empire, people were starting to understand the depths of the terrible unknown below the ocean. And I thought that was a rich vein to be tapped. Even bothered old Halley into helping me design a special diving bell for the ritual. I called it “The Awful Deep” – and between you and me, I was rather proud of myself. MARTIN: … So why didn’t it work? SIMON: Because it… wasn’t a very good idea…? The Fear wasn’t out there, not like I hoped it was. It all sort of… fizzled. Also, a Hunter broke in and destroyed the mechanism, sent me and all my sacrifices plummeting to the bottom of the ocean.

Gertrude had recorded MAG137’s statement in October 2014: a few months before The Dark’s attempt… so it’s probably thanks to this one that she suspected that The Dark would fail on its own…

* And we did, thematically, have many clues during season 4! MAG122 was a very polarising episode when it came to which Fear(s) it was about; MAG126-MAG136 made us wonder if it was the same Spiral avatar “Gabriel” who had been collaborating with Web(?) Neil Lagorio; we (and Gertrude and Martin) felt like Extinction-statements were reminiscent of other Fears; Robert Smirke’s letter in MAG138 had him refuse to admit that his taxonomy wasn’t perfect and didn’t really work; MAG145 had Arthur Nolan complaining about Diego Molina calling their god “Asag” when that aspect encompassed Corruption traits; Jon admitted after reading MAG153’s statement that it was “The Corruption at work, if I had to guess, though with unsettling echoes of a… ‘Fleshliness’”… We had so many moments in which the divisions weren’t really clear, and implicit reminders that Robert Smirke’s taxonomy was one amongst others and certainly far from perfect…

* I wonder if Gertrude felt something, upon learning that… she had sacrificed Jan and Michael (and probably many others) for nothing, and that she could have “just” derailed punctual actions without making many victims… (Though: the bombing in Alexandria was implied to be her doing, and the old Archive wasn’t a current threat. It’s possible that she did that in case Elias-Jonah was planning to use it for Beholding, or to just to try to diminish Beholding… but still, she caused collateral victims quite casually.)

* How ironic, that Gertrude and Elias both understood what was happening thanks to The Dark failing, when Beholding was presented as an opposite power… (And even more ironic for Jonah&Rayner, since it’s through Rayner that Smirke (and therefore Jonah) learned so much about the Powers, and that Rayner was probably Jonah’s direct inspiration when it came to snatching bodies to extend his life…)

* Gertrude took A BIG RISK with the idea that The Dark’s ritual would fail on its own, and I’m really curious about Jonah’s comment that “Knowing Gertrude, I’m sure she had a backup plan if she had miscalculated; but she had not.” => did she really have a backup plan? A way to undo The Dark peering through? I… don’t think that the whole apocalypse at the end of MAG160 can be undone, but that small comment could leave a bit of hope in that regard…? (Unless Gertrude thought she could undo such things, and it’s revealed to not work in season 5.)

* I’m “glad” (ha) that Tim… really didn’t care about stopping The Unknowing in itself, and that his goal was clear:

(MAG117) TIM: … I’m gonna hurt them, though. I’m gonna hurt the things that stole my brother and wrecked my life. I’m the distraction! If it looks like any of the… “circus folk mannequins”, whatever, are gonna see the others, I’m to make the biggest mess I can, draw them away, keep them busy. [SCOFF] I know what it means! They gave it to me because they think I’ll get angry and do something stupid anyway. And they’re probably right. So maybe it’s for the best.

… He did achieve what he wanted in that regard. ;; (I mean, it was heartbreaking, and I’m Constantly Sad About Tim. But at least… he got what he wanted, which was to hurt the Circus and avenge his brother. The ritual would have failed anyway, but there would have still have been mannequins running wild, maybe even Nikola. So. He took them down with him.)

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “The solution, then, is simple: a new ritual must be devised, that will bring through… all the Powers, at once. All Fourteen, as I had hoped I could complete it before any new Powers such as Extinction were able to fully emerge. All under The Eye’s auspices, of course – we mustn’t forget our roots.”

* AHAH for Jonah still going for a “fourteen” categorisation + isolating The Extinction. He was still fairly influenced by Smirke’s taxonomy, and this reflected in his incantation (on the one hand, the neat categorisations don’t work… but he’s using them anyway) (… which is what I’m doing too, but pssh.)

* OH SHIT for the announcement that he was planning THAT. We could have had a bit of hope given that The Watcher’s Crown had failed already, and was doomed to fail anyway… but nop.

* AHAH about the “we mustn’t forget our roots” because Elias-Jonah reaaaally doesn’t sound super-devoted to his patron.

* I wonder if The Extinction will get relevant in season 5 as an “outside of the box” Power, since Elias was adamant about not including it and trying to do his thing before it would become a concern:

(MAG126) PETER: [LAUGH] Because, behind all his bluster, Elias’s just like all the rest. He’s so preoccupied playing the game, he doesn’t pay attention to the big picture. He managed to convince himself that he could get his ritual off first, which would have made all of this a… bit moot, but that’s not really an option anymore.

(MAG138) MARTIN: Yeah, but… if he’s right about… The Extinction, what it is… then why didn’t you say anything before? Why am I only hearing about this now, and why doesn’t Jon know?! ELIAS: In my case, while Peter has talked of it before, it is only very recently that I’ve been forced to admit The Extinction is real.

Was he fearing that it would complicate things too much? Is that an aspect of Fear he didn’t understand? (One bit in the Q&A pointed out that There Could Be More Fears unaccounted for, so I wonder if they’ll get purposefully developed in season 5 as a counter, or if not at all…)

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “And there was only one being that could possibly serve as a lynchpin for this new ritual: the Archivist. A position that had so recently become vacant, thanks to Gertrude’s… ill-timed retirement plans. Because the thing about the Archivist is that… well: it’s a bit of a misnomer. It might, perhaps, be better named “the Archive”. Because you do not administer and preserve the records of fear, Jon – you are a record of fear. Both in mind, as you walk the shuddering dread of each statement; and in body, as the Powers each leave their mark upon you. You are a living chronicle of terror. [CREAKING] Perhaps, then, if I could find an Archivist and have each Power mark them, have them confront each one, and each in turn instil in them a powerful and acute fear for their life, they could be turned into a conduit for the coming of this… nightmare kingdom. … Do you see where I’m going, Jon? It does tickle me, that in this world of… would-be occult dynasties and ageless monsters, the “Chosen One” is… simply that: someone I chose! It’s not in your blood, or your soul, or your… destiny. It’s just in your own, rotten luck.” [THUNDER CLAPPING]

* “Gertrude’s ill-timed retirement plans” is that the name of your own gun, Elias.

* If we’re going with “audio recording by The Archive” at the start of season 5, I’m going to scream.

* Elias’s sense of drama with the background sounds…

* The dehumanisation was THROUGH THE ROOF, and made for a very AOUCH parallel to Peter’s snarky comment to Martin (MAG126: “I’m just saying, that we’d all be better off if your Archivist actually knew how to archive.”). It was just… horrifying already, that he casually admitted that he had been setting up Jon getting hurt and marked? It was the most common hypothesis, we had been screaming with the last ones getting ticked off during season 4, we knew what was to happen when MAG159’s title had been revealed to be “The Last” (the last assistant, the last Fear to mark Jon), we had no doubt that Elias had been pulling strings in that direction… but still, there was something so unsettling about Jonah casually objectifying Jon and mentioning that he needed Jon to be hurt and afraid for his own goals…

* Oh GODS, the fact that Elias casually answered Jon’s questions about being “chosen”…

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Why were we chosen? Agnes was created – crafted with a specific purpose so finely tuned that even a grain of uncertainty threatened the entirety of her being. [CHORTLING] But I’m so full of doubt it feels like there’s no room for anything else, and… I’m sure Martin is the same…! Is there “destiny” here? B–bloodlines and… prophecies, or did we just… stumble into this? Maybe we’re the opposite of Agnes; maybe our doubts are exactly what we need. I–if that’s the case, I’m a… an amazing chosen one. … [LONG EXHALE] Don’t know how that would work, though.

Tim had mentioned that the Fears attacking you was just “bad luck” (MAG117)… and it’s one side of the coin. The flip side, in Jonah’s case, is that no, someone picked you and chose to hurt you. That’s coherent with Elias’s ~paternalistic~ comments about “choices” in MAG092, but really, I do hate (it’s well-done!) how far he goes when it comes to casual victim-blaming, gods.

* How is your hubris today, Jonah. Reminder that characters characterised by their hubris (Leitner, Smirke, Mary…) fell and crashed pretty harshly in TMA, Jonah.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “I’ll admit my options were somewhat limited, but – my God! When you came to me already marked by The Web, I knew it had to be you. I even held out some small hope you had been sent by the Spider as a sort of… implicit blessing on my whole project, and… do you know what? I think it was…!”

* Still refisdhnjerfdujbrefduhejkzfsd over the fact that Jonah went basically “oh, The Web probably approved?” when… from what we can guess of The Web, NO, IT PRECISELY SENT JON TO USE YOU, YOU DUMB VICTORIAN!!

* “What does the Spider want?” is still the eternal question – why did it want/allow this apocalypse to happen? If it wanted to prevent it, it would have had many occasions to prevent Jon from coming into contacts with other Fears, so… What does the Mother want out of it?

* Jon had mentioned that The Web had “touched” him first:

(MAG081) ARCHIVIST: I do not know how many of them there are, or precisely how they separate, but I do know that the Eye – Beholding – was not the first that I encountered in my life. The first was the Spider. The Web. And I have no idea what that might mean. […] The first of the dark powers to touch me, perhaps, but it did not claim me.

… And it just added up to Jonah’s terribleness: just reminding Jon that he had been picked because of the Web-story that had terrorised his youth…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Of course, I had to bide my time, get a measure of you before I began to push; learn how you worked. So I decided I would wait until something came for you, and see how you reacted. Attacks upon the Archives were not uncommon during Gertrude’s tenure, and while she was always prepared… I made sure you would not be. I reasoned if you couldn’t survive a single encounter, you were unlikely to make it through all Fourteen. So when Jane Prentiss attacked, I watched eagerly, one hand on the gas release from the start. You acquitted yourself well enough, so I decided to see how much further you would get – though I waited until the worms were in you to pull the lever. I needed to make sure you felt that fear all the way to your bones.”

* … It explained why he Elias was occasionally almost praising Jon’s survival skills:

(MAG080) LEITNER: And what’s he going to think when he gets back? ELIAS: Well, he was always going to need to fly the nest at some point. Go out and see the world for himself. LEITNER: He might die. ELIAS: It’s always a danger. Almost always.

(MAG092) ARCHIVIST: What do you want? ELIAS: Honestly? To offer some congratulations. You’re doing a lot better than I expected. ARCHIVIST: Feels like all I’ve managed to do is… not die. ELIAS: And believe me, that is a remarkably rare skill.

* Re: the dehumanisation, it was incredible how it sounded like Jonah was talking about a small animal that he had to tame (and… even that, taming it in a bad way). It put such a bittersweet light on their exchanges in season 1? Because back then, it was still obvious that Jon had some respect for him…

* When I had listened to MAG040 for the first time, I had pictured Elias having a coffee, a smoke, another coffee, waiting for it to cool down, before pulling the lever; I mean, how much time would it take for him to reach it in a small Institute? I was already spoiled that he was Bad, back then, but… the fact that Jonah casually admitted that HE had been the one who got to decide whether or not Jon had the “right” to live at the end of MAG039 is another kind of terribleness………

* He was casually insensitive towards Jon’s wounds in MAG040 (comparing them to Swiss Cheese), and I’m not sure if that was a conscious effort to mess with Jon, or just his very natural lack of empathy showing through.

* The only “help” they had gotten against the worms had been provided by Michael, through Sasha, with the tip regarding the fire extinguishers… How much did Jon have to insist for Elias to provide them with some…?

* Not even a mention of Tim, who had gone through hell at the same time as Jon – and it was very telling… that for Jonah, Tim had only been collateral damage, not really mattering.

* There was something incredibly cruel in that “all the way to your bones”, and Jonah was absolutely just reopening old wounds and reactivating Jon’s trauma and terrors, uh…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “The discovery that one of The Stranger’s minions had infiltrated the Institute in the aftermath was certainly a pleasant bonus. Even if that sliver of paranoia, that “vague wrongness” you couldn’t quite place wouldn’t count as a mark… it was only a matter of time before it confronted you in a far more direct, and affecting, manner. Admittedly, given the advent of The Unknowing, I needn’t have bothered – but what’s the old saying about hindsight? More important to me was Sasha’s encounter with The Distortion. If “it” had taken an interest, then I very much wanted it to cross your path. So I found one of its current victims and convinced her to make a statement. … Poor Helen. I actually had to put her in a taxi myself, she was getting so lost on those… narrow London side streets. It worked, though. Between the stabbing, and at least two desperate flights into its door… you’re marked very deep by The Spiral.”

* Again: Fork U, re: “hindsight” joke.

* Not!Sasha had mentioned as soon as MAG040 that Elias had stared at her “funnily”, which was a good indicator that he knew… but I’m surprised that Elias admitted that he had not noticed the moment The Stranger had infiltrated the Institute, before it was too late? He should have known the risk associated with the table, right? The Not!Them had been bound to it for fifteen years at this point!

* Get a double slice of Stranger in your face, Jon.

* ;; Tim wasn’t mentioned at all in Jonah’s statement, and that’s the only mention of Sasha… just as someone who had allowed The Distortion to come closer…

* I DIDN’T EXPECT AT ALL THE BIT ABOUT HELEN!!! FUCK!!! YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO GO “Poor Helen” AT HER, YOU HORRIBLE NASTY MAN!! That was one of the cruellest new things in his statement, the fact that he had sent her to give a statement and shoved her into a taxi, only to nudge Michael towards Jon??? I wonder whether Helen-the-Distortion remembers it: it might get relevant in season 5…? We never saw Elias interact with The Distortion, after all, and he had a very poor opinion of Michael in MAG092.

* Yeah, “marked very deep by The Spiral”, uh. Uh. (Stabbing from MAG047 when Jon tried to save Helen, first flight into the corridors at the end of MAG078, second journey through the corridors at the end of MAG101, small adventure in the corridors in MAG131, another journey through the corridors at the end of MAG143. No wonder Jonah has a hard time keeping track of the amount of times.)

* ;; No mention at all that both Tim and Martin had experienced the Not!Them’s deceptions and that they also went through Michael’s corridors… once again, collaterals who didn’t matter much to him, uh…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Jurgen Leitner was a surprise, of course, and I was forced to… improvise. I had no idea how much Gertrude would have told him, and he could very easily have derailed everything if you learned too much too fast. I… justified it to myself, saying I was going to have to send you out into the world anyway if you were to encounter more of the Powers, but I can’t honestly pretend it wasn’t a… rather rash move.”

* So: it wasn’t necessarily that Elias didn’t want Leitner to tell Jon about the Institute being a temple to Beholding and Elias being bad (which Leitner did tell Jon), but about Gertrude’s own conclusions regarding Elias being in fact “Jonah Magnus”, and the rituals not working. So once again… Gertrude withholding information and not sharing it all actually worked in the world’s disfavour – Leitner was still concerned about The Unknowing, when the priority should have lain elsewhere…

* Confirmation, once again, that Elias had indeed no idea about Leitner living in the tunnels back then. We still don’t know if he truly has trouble seeing down there, or if it was solely A Disappearance protecting Leitner from his sight…

* Funny thing is that Elias has been pretty consistent about the fact that Leitner was a bit of a mistake:

(MAG092) ELIAS: So. For the avoidance of any doubt. I killed Gertrude Robinson because she intended to destroy the Archives. And I killed Jurgen Leitner because he was… an unnecessary complication. Likely to tell Jon too much, too early.

(MAG102) ELIAS: I have been trying to give you the information you need. ARCHIVIST: Sure, when you’re not bashing its head in with a pipe. ELIAS: Leitner was… I will admit I possibly… overreacted to his sudden re-emergence.

(MAG108) PETER: Oh. That doesn’t sound like the Elias I know. He killed people himself? MARTIN: I mean, I wasn’t, I wasn’t there, but that’s what he said…? And I did see the body. Er, bodies. PETER: Elias Bouchard, getting his hands dirty. Well-well. Must be the End Times.

* Obligatory “oh my GODS, ELIAS…” re: “I justified [Leitner’s murder] to myself” because… talk about something that feels like a Web-thing. It was repeated many times that the violent impulsive bit was surprising from Elias, and Jon had precisely left the room to smoke a cigarette (recurrent theme of the Web, Jon in possession of a Web lighter etc.), leaving Leitner alone. That. Sounds awfully like Elias being a tool of The Web, rather than making that decision by himself………

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Still. I’d requested Detective Tonner be assigned to the case when they found Gertrude’s body, in the hope that having a Hunter in the mix would eventually lead to a confrontation, and setting you up as a killer certainly hastened that.”

* Elias revealed that he had used his ways to get her assigned on the case… while their first interaction in MAG082 consisted in Elias blackmailing her right away. Typical.

* So, in a way, people that Elias feels he “chose” so far: Jon… and Daisy.

* … So that was why he just threw out that random bit about Jon Being Very Dangerous:

(MAG082) ELIAS: I leave the matter of Jonathan Sims up to you, though I will not tell you where he is. I suggest you close the case and move on, but if you find yourself unable to do so, my advice is to kill him quickly. There’s no telling what he might be capable of.

He didn’t really need to, though, given how Daisy had her own grudge against Jon (the fact that he had unwittingly forced her to give him her statement against her will). But I do appreciate how Elias tried to frame him, and Basira just waltzed in, told Daisy “For god’s sake look at him!” (MAG091) when she was threatening him… and yup, indeed. Does not look like a murderer. (Although nowadays, Peter would like to differ.)

* Obligatory I’M SAD ABOUT DAISY, because, back then, she wouldn’t have minded much… but if she were to regain her sense in season 5 somehow (ha), how upset would she be to learn that the time she had hurt Jon (strangled or sliced his throat a bit) had worked as his Hunt mark, crossing another one off…? (Though, later, Julia&Trevor also did the work: Jon was hunted by Julia, and hurt by them both when they threatened him in season 4.)

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Then it was just a matter of feeding you statements to lead you to a… few avatars I thought were likely to harm you, but probably would stop short of actually killing you. Jude served her purpose exactly as I had hoped, as did our dearly departed Mr Crew – marking you for The Desolation, and The Vast.”

* I call bullshit on Jude, since trying to track her down… wasn’t the only conclusion you could make of Gertrude’s recording in MAG087: Gertrude mentioned she was back in London, sure, but it was a Stranger-related statement about the imminence of The Unknowing, and there were many leads to take from that one (investigating the forest? The skin aspect? The mannequins?), especially since Jon knew he had to try to stop the ritual. So, on that one, pretty sure it was Jonah making sense “retroactively”, but that he really had no idea where Jon would go with it.

* Though I can believe that he had made sure that “rumours” saying that he had been the one to kill Gertrude would reach the Lightless Flame, as Jude as heard (not fundamentally to make sure she wouldn’t harm Jon… but to make sure that they wouldn’t attack the Institute after Gertrude’s death).

* Same, Jude directing Jon towards Mike really was a fluke, thanks to Jon&Jude’s conversation!

* Jonny trying to hammer that Mike Crew Is Absolutely Dead And Done, once again.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Honestly, I had… nothing to do with Melanie and her Slaughter adventure, but when I saw the situation, I made sure to trap her here; so whenever her rage bubbled over, you were right there, a ready target. I didn’t foresee the mark coming from… surgery gone wrong, but it was a very pleasant surprise.”

* Alllriiight, so that’s what he was checking in MAG084, when we heard static when he was talking with Melanie! He discovered the bullet in that moment.

* ;; Slaughtered!Melanie was blaming Jon for being responsible of the fact she was trapped here… and she was wrong, but a bit of truth was in there – Elias had trapped her because she would be useful for his plans regarding Jon.

* List of people Jonah “chose”: Jon, Daisy, Melanie.

* OH GODS, AND THAT WAS WHY HE WAS SO CHIRPY IN MAG102…………

(MAG102) ARCHIVIST: I get, I get that you hate being here, Melanie, but do you really want to trade it for prison? MELANIE: No! But the way I see it, the police seem really keen not to investigate crimes committed here. ELIAS: That’s actually fair. ARCHIVIST: Shut up…! Melanie, please. […] We, We will… We will find a way to deal with… with him. Not today. A–and not like this. ELIAS: I am still here, you know. ARCHIVIST: And if you weren’t, I assume you would be watching this conversation, so... Melanie, we can’t do this. Not yet.

I had assumed, back then, that he was just very dumb, but… no. He was probably throwing oil on the fire on purpose, to try to get Jon stabbed by her right then, right there.

* ;; Same, I wonder if Melanie will learn that her stabbing him was actually a Slaughter mark, engineered/hoped by Jonah…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “The Unknowing was a distraction, but not an unwelcome one. For this to work, you needed more than just the marks; you needed power. And that was something The Unknowing served to test, though it posed no… actual danger in the grand scheme of things.”

* And that explained Elias’s comments about what he considered Jon’s necessary progresses, successes and failures!

(MAG116) ELIAS: I have been doing my best to prepare you, Jon, to See. You should hopefully have it a bit easier than the others. ARCHIVIST: Another of my… powers? ELIAS: More… an aspect of your becoming.

(MAG120) ELIAS: You’re doing well, Jon. I only hope you can continue your growth without my guidance.

(MAG135) ELIAS: Fine. Consider it a test – things are… coming, things that will need Jon to be far stronger and more willing to use his connection to our patron. His performance during The Unknowing was… disappointing. I needed a way to force him to harness his ability more acutely than he had before. The coffin was a useful tool; Daisy an adequate bait. BASIRA: Then you messed up. Way he tells it, he doesn’t know how he got out of there. ELIAS: But he did. And his powers were no small part of it. Even if he required some assistance, they were what saved him. And he’s still achieved what no one – mortal, monster, or anything in-between – has ever been able to. He climbed out of The Buried.

Elias praised him for his dreams, because they were proof of his records of fears; he lamented what he did during The Unknowing, since Jon was barely able to survive in it (ultimately resorting to compulsion, giving Tim the tools to press on the detonator)…

* And that was also why he was pushing for Jon to go in person despite the plan not relying on him:

(MAG117) ARCHIVIST: Tim isn’t going to sit home and wait, and Elias seems pretty insistent I go along. Part of me thinks it’s just so that we can see if whatever this… preparation he’s been trying to do on me works. And you know what? That same… petty little part of me… rather hopes it doesn’t; that all this time, all his… cryptic nudges and “learn to fly by falling” attitude ends up being a complete waste of time. Just to show him. Even so, I–I– it wouldn’t… feel right to not go.

… because ultimately, he was testing Jon in a controlled environment.

* (Still no mention of Tim who died there, and it was just adding to Jonah’s overall cruelty? The fact that Sasha and Tim died… and that it didn’t matter at all in his plans…)

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “And it did serve another purpose, of course. It inadvertently pushed you to confront Death – a mark I had been very worried about trying to orchestrate. If I tried too early, you’d just die; too late, and you might be powerful enough to see the attempt coming, and maybe even understand why. As it was, it was just right; and once again you came through with flying colours.”

* No wonder that Jonah was the most worried about The End’s mark, given his own personal relationship to the fear of dying, uh.

* And :) The Web :) Sent :) An avatar of The End to wake up Jon and make him “choose”. Which Jonah didn’t mention at all, and it seems like a huge oversight – Jon didn’t “come through with flying colours” on his own, he was given the keys to decide what would happen of him, and it’s not Jonah who provided them, but Oliver, sent by The Mother.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “By this point, your abilities were coming on in leaps and bounds, and I was concerned that meeting face-to-face might end up with you… knowing something you shouldn’t. I had initially planned to go into hiding, but when your colleagues surprised me with the police, well. It was simple enough to cut a deal. All that remained, then, were The Dark, The Flesh, The Buried and The Lonely.”

* Confirmation (once again after MAG120) that Martin HAD surprised him with his plan, and that Elias wasn’t really preparing Peter as an Interim Director because he thought the assistants would get him arrested, but because he had something else in mind.

* Was he planning to go hide in Scotland, or in a Lukas estate.

* So confirmation that indeed, he was trying to hide his main reason for preventing Jon from seeing him:

(MAG127) ELIAS: He can listen all he wants, but he’s at a very delicate stage right now, and I… fear my presence would be a, hum… [LIGHT JANGLING OF HANDCUFFS] a distraction.

(MAG148) ARCHIVIST: You should have let me come with. BASIRA: No. Besides, he wouldn’t have seen me if I had.

He had explained this right after Jon had described to Basira his inner “door” of knowledge, and how he tended to Know things when close to people or concepts… So it was indeed Elias trying to avoid Jon from compelling him or forcing a statement out of him or knowing about his plans.

* And yeah, this is how we had begun season 4. Only four remaining. orz

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “I was a little put out when that idiot Jared Hopworth misinterpreted my letters and attacked the Institute too soon, before you were even out of the hospital, but then… Oh! You should have seen my face, when you voluntarily went to him. I couldn’t see what happened in there, of course, but given how you came out, I’m very sure it counts as a mark.”

* Alright so: Elias confirmed that he was behind Jared’s letters:

(MAG131) JARED: The letters started comin’ in about two years ago. Good white paper, large print. Nice and simple. Dunno who sent them; they were never signed, and I dunno how they kept finding me. There was never much in them; normally just a name, and a place, or a time. I ignored the first couple, but they kept coming, and eventually I got curious. So, I followed the instructions in one of ‘em. […] I didn’t doubt the letters again. They came pretty regular after that. And they always led to summat good. Quality bones, a new mate, or some unlucky fool who wouldn’t look at me for the fear. It got so I trusted them. The letters, I mean. So I didn’t question them. There’s a lotta stuff in this world I’ve never understood, and these were no different. Then I got one about your lot, your Archives. Told me to go there and kill you. They even sent a picture. So I did. Well, I tried. Didn’t know about those tunnels, or wherever this place is, but the pipes… they were wide enough for me and a few mates to squeeze through, bit by bit, one bone at a time.

… Back when the episode had aired, I had multiple suspects: Annabelle, obviously (since there was the matter of the big font in MAG123), potentially Adelard (because what was he doing?? … we didn’t know at the time that he was already dead.), potentially Peter (to push Martin towards him), and also Elias… because of the “bones” + the irony of the “pipes”. I can’t believe it was Elias, I hate everything.

* We had speculated a lot about the intentions of the person who had sent Jared after the Archives: was it to “punish” the assistants? To make sure they would fragment and avoid for them to plan together again like they had at the end of season 3? Was it to push Martin towards Peter? To enhance Melanie’s Slaughter effects? Was it someone targeting Jon himself, and just not knowing that he was currently in a not!coma? … And nop: it was indeed targeting Jon, and the letters had been sent by someone who knew that Jon was currently away from the Archives.

* I mean. Elias. Elias, my dude, my Victorian bro. What did you expect, by making Jared used to attack people on sight as soon as he would receive letters with his next target, when you sent him a letter with his next target? WHO was really the idiot there.

* “I couldn’t see what happened in there” is an unfortunate confession: so Jonah… can’t see in Helen’s corridors. That could come in handy during season 5…

* This is an implicit confirmation: Elias is not the one listening through the tapes, since Jon’s encounter with Jared was recorded, but Elias only drew his conclusions when he came out.

* HEY ELIAS. HOW FUNNY THAT THE WEB HAD SENT A FLESH-RELATED STATEMENT TO JON, DRAWING HIM TO THE CONCLUSION THAT HIS OWN BODY COULD BE USED AS AN ANCHOR, AND THUS CONTRIBUTING TO HIM GOING DOWN TO SEE JARED AND ASKED HIM TO REMOVE A RIB, THUS MARKING HIM FOR THE FLESH. HOW FUNNY HOW THE WEB BASICALLY SAVED YOUR PLANS’ BUTTS WHEN YOU HAD DRAMATICALLY FAILED.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “I suspected the coffin might turn up again, and once it did, it was simply a matter of getting any, uh… restraining factors you might have had flying off on a wild goose chase, and waiting. Honestly, Detective Tonner has proven invaluable through this whole process. [CHUCKLE] I was racking my brains for month about what I could use to lure you in.”

* Breekon wasn’t sure why he was going to the Institute, and that’s another “potentially the Web” thing.

* ;; Sad because “wild goose chase” has been the recurring way of referring to Basira getting misled and manipulated… (MAG134: “Then, your detective friend went on one of Elias’s wild goose chases, then Jon wilfully hurled himself into the coffin.” / MAG148: “So, what now? Another wild goose chase?”) There was something gratuitously mean about calling her “restraining factors” instead of her name…

* I’m SAD about DAISY, okay orz The fact that he presented her as a tool for his goals…

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “And of course, I knew the Dark Sun was just sitting there waiting; so when it came time, I whipped up another apocalypse, and sent you on your merry way.”

* It was a very strange thing that he would just begin to talk about the Dark Sun right after Jon had learned about it through a statement, indeed, so… I guess that he got inspired by Jon, rather than having that one under his sleeve all along?

* Also: he made sure that the police would get rid of Rayner and a few cultists during season 2. If he hadn’t done that, there would have still been a few powerful but diminished Dark avatars roaming around, who could have been used to mark Jon. So really: lots of posturing but actually lots of improvising, though Jonah isn’t really admitting that – but it’s interesting to focus on what he doesn’t talk about to clear that up a bit…

* Still laughing in retrospect that he… didn’t really try to Sell the Dark ritual much. It was mostly a “you can’t afford to be wrong about it being nothing” to Basira, and she had ample preexisting reasons to think that The Dark could be a threat (since she had lost a colleague against them, and that it had put into motion the chain of events leading her to quit the police).

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Then all that remained… was The Lonely. Poor Peter. He really should have left well enough alone. [CHUCKLE] Or just done what I’d asked in the first place. Ah, well. He knew what I was attempting, and was very unwilling to cooperate until I made him… a little wager about Martin. Of course, he had no way of knowing that, in addition to setting you up for the final mark, he was giving you all the tools you needed to escape from it.”

* Fork you and your puns, Jonah.

* ;; Peter did explain to Jon that he was weak to a wager, in MAG159…

* I’m a bit sad that we never saw Elias&Peter interact a bit more… cordially, since they had been acquaintances for at least 20 years – we didn’t really see why they were putting up with the other, and Jonah didn’t sound heartbroken (at all) over Peter’s annihilation? On the other hand, the bitter exes dynamic was hilarious but… you know. I’ll miss Peter, he was so awful and fun.

* Confirmation that Martin was Jon’s anchor… and Elias knew it full well.

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “How is Martin, by the way? He looks well. You will keep an eye on him when all this is over, won’t you? [RUMBLE OF THUNDER] He’s earned that.”

* Big “OH NO” moment on first listen, because I got seized up by the dread that something was currently happening to Martin (who was outside, alone), and that would be how Jonah would be striking… I really didn’t expect the final incantation.

* Fork you and your puns 2.0, Jonah.

* I HATE that “he’s earned that”, implying that Martin made efforts and sacrifices just to be taken care of and/or that he ~served Jonah’s plans so well~ that he’s earned to get his love story during the apocalypse.

* …………….. But also….. Listen………………. Elias->Martin is one of my favourite ships, okay……. And it was just candy……. that Elias would randomly remember him……

* Or: not so randomly, since the point of his whole statement seemed to have been to make Jon’s old fears and pain bubble over the surface all over again. What could be more efficient than suddenly bringing up Martin, when Jon knew that Martin was alone outside?

* I have a Lot Of Feelings over the fact that the last person to (unwillingly) serve Elias’s plans… was Martin. For his plan to work, Jonah needed to be sure that Jon would go after Martin (we heard a lot of pining through season 4, and so did Elias, uh.), and that Martin would be the key for Jon to come back (which is something he likely deduced from The Buried?). It’s still the thing that scares me much about Jonah: you would want him to underestimate and overlook affection, friendship and love between people… but no. He’s fully able to take those things into account — and to turn them against you.

(Though: I’m really not sure that he knew that Jon had feelings for Martin, or was likely to develop some, back when he sent Peter to Martin in MAG108, nor that Martin would fork Peter over (since he hadn’t taken Elias down yet)… He could have been relying on the fact that Martin had a crush, back then, to make sure that Martin would stick to Jon’s side and not lose himself to The Lonely? And Jon was already adamant about protecting his remaining assistants: he would have gone to save Basira, Daisy or Melanie in The Lonely, too, just like he rescued Daisy. I’m not sure the idea of an anchor to find his way back had crossed Jonah’s mind before The Buried… Jonah presents a lot of things organically and logically through his statements, but he’s probably rearranging details in his advantage: he got very lucky, quite often. … Or, well. The appropriateness of the term “Lucky” depends on how much The Web will be revealed to have contributed.)

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “And there, I think we are brought just about up to date. I have enjoyed our little trip down memory lane, but… past here lies only impatience. You are prepared. You are ready. You are marked. The power of The Ceaseless Watcher flows through you, and the time of our victory is here. Don’t worry, Jon. You’ll get used to it here – in the world that we have made.”

* At this point, I still didn’t know how he would strike, and still not expecting an incantation.

* I hatehatehate Jonah’s use of first-person plural. It’s nothing new:

(MAG092) ELIAS: [SIGH] What are you? ARCHIVIST: I… The Archivist. ELIAS: Precisely. It is your job to chronicle these things, to experience them, whether first-hand or through the eyes of others. To simply be told, well… ARCHIVIST: It doesn’t please your master? ELIAS: Our master, Jon. […] We thrive on ceaseless watching, on knowing too much. What we face is the hidden, the uncanny, and the unknown. If you are to stop them, you need to get better at seeing.

(MAG135) ELIAS: Fine. Consider it a test – things are… coming, things that will need Jon to be far stronger and more willing to use his connection to our patron.

… but here? Absolutely making complicit, almost like an associate, when he was forcing Jon to read, when he had pointed out as soon as his first lines that Jon would try to resist reading? Awful.

On the incantation in itself:

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “You who watch and know and understand none; You who listen and hear and will not comprehend; You who wait and wait and drink in all that is not yours by right; Come to us in your wholeness! Come to us in your perfection! Bring all that is fear, and all that is terror, and all that is the awful dread that crawls and chokes and blinds and falls and twists and leaves and hides and weaves and burns and hunts and rips and bleeds and dies! Come to us! I – OPEN – THE DOOR!”

* It’s still interesting that, when it comes to aspects of the Amorphous Blob Of Terrors, Jonah still went for the good old fourteen regarding Jon’s marks and the incantation (Beholding + Corruption, Buried, Dark, Vast, Spiral, Lonely, Stranger, Web, Desolation, Hunt, Slaughter, Flesh, End). Indeed, he was planning on doing things before the Extinction would fully emerge, but I wonder if other potential aspects, that have been left out, will get relevant in season 5…

* Aaaaaaaaaaaand… there was a general expectation/fear in the fandom, since Jon had mentioned his inner door of knowledge, that it would be opened at some point:

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s… hard. It’s like there’s a–a–a door, in my mind. And behind it, is… i–is the entire ocean. Before, I didn’t notice it, but now, I–I know it’s there, and I can’t forget it, and I can feel the pressure of the water on it. I–I–I, I can keep it closed… but sometimes, when I’m around p–people, or–or places, or… ideas… a drop or two will push through the cracks, at the edges of the door. And I’ll… know something. BASIRA: … What happens, if you open the door? [PAUSE] ARCHIVIST: I drown.

On that one, I think that Jonah might have used the imagery of the “door” specifically because it was a really strong symbolic element for Jon: Mr Spider’s door, that he hadn’t knocked on; Helen’s door in his dreams, that he refuses to open (MAG120: “There is a door in front of him. A yellow door. He knows the dream it used to lead to; he knows it well. But that’s not where it leads anymore. He does not know what is behind it anymore, and he is deathly afraid of finding out. The Archivist turns away.”) as well as his refusal to knock on her door through season 4 until MAG146; there is also the fact that people who knew Jon rarely tended to knock on his door in season 1 and 2 (they just barged in), as if they knew knocking was something he didn’t appreciate.

Independently, Martin got kind of a warning (?) with The Extinction (MAG134: “It talked of Garland Hillier’s “new revelation”, about the absolute change of the world in terms that seemed at first elegiac, but later seemed… almost panicked, with the final entry simply repeating the words [STATIC:] “La porte est la porte.” “The door is the door.””), although it was another sort of movement: leaving your comfortable world to go into another, and coming back to yours safely. Not sure it will be that simple in season 5.

* New all-Fears ritual doesn’t have a name but would be tentatively called “The Magnus Archive” according to Jonny-on-discord, which. Sob.

- What I find interesting in what Jonah didn’t mention at all:

* It was revealing that he didn’t mention the assistants (or barely): didn’t mention Tim or Sasha’s deaths, Melanie’s escape, Daisy turning into a beast again, Basira being still trapped there. He had presented the assistants as disposable in MAG092, he really wanted to hammer in that it was the case here, uh… (Although he might have appreciated Basira a tiny bit this season?)

* I’m still curious about why he didn’t want Tim to go to The Unknowing. Was it because he was fearing that Tim would go rogue and definitely kill Jon there? … Or was it because he was fearing that Tim would die there while he had other projects for him? (… Next host…?)

* Nothing about Jon’s relationship to the tape recorders, which, mmmmmmmmmmmm.

* Nothing about Jon’s Web lighter sticking to him.

* A surprisingly short mention of The Web and that was it, despite how obviously it appeared that The Web had been a bit more involved than this in Jon’s adventures.

* … It’s still extremely suspicious to me that a Web-touched “Jonathan” began working at the Institute, while Jonah used to be friends with a “Jonathan Fanshawe” (“my namesake” according to Jon) who ultimately told him to fork off. That doesn’t really feel like narrative irony, but something pushed on purpose to get Jonah’s attention?

* It was Elias’s big moment of claiming his actions, and a few mysteries remain since he didn’t claim credit for Martin’s “intuition” of putting tape recorders around the Coffin to get Jon back, nor for putting Adelard’s last statement (originally an email!) on Jon’s desk, nor for the tape of Gertrude’s murder in Jon’s drawer. So… Web actions?

- I can’t believe that:

(MAG160) [CLICK–] [CONSTANT FUZZY STATIC] MARTIN: Wake up, wake up…! Wake, Jon–Jon–JON, wake up! [SLAP] ARCHIVIST: [YELP] Uh, wha– … Martin…?

Alex&Jonny are promising there will be no onscreen kiss… but we did get a slap.

- That was ONE HELL OF AN ENDING:

(MAG160) MARTIN: I, I don’t know if it’s just here, or if it– ARCHIVIST: No. … No, it’s everywhere… They’re all here, now. I can feel… all of it. MARTIN: J– … Jon, I’m scared. ARCHIVIST: [HINT OF A COLD SMILE] The whole world is afraid, Martin. Because of me. And The Watcher… drinks it all in. MARTIN: … Jon? ARCHIVIST: Look at the sky, Martin! Look at the sky. It’s looking back! [BROKEN LAUGHTER] [CLICK.]

I love how it was impossible to tell if Jon was genuinely laughing or breaking down sobbing, and it was probably a mix of both.

- The situation, as it ends, leaves potential for everyone to feel guilty:

* Jon already highlighted it (“The whole world is afraid, Martin. Because of me.”) – although he was manipulated, pushed in that direction, and ultimately controlled into doing it without being able to fight back. In Jon’s case, one source of heartbreak is that he had tried to cling, although bittersweetly, to the idea that sacrifices had to be made to save the world:

(MAG093) GEORGIE: Jonathan Sims, are you trying to save the world? ARCHIVIST: I… Yeah. I… I guess I am.

(MAG126) ARCHIVIST: … I remembered Gertrude’s notebook; we found it alongside the plastic explosives, but it rather got lost amongst the business of… [SIGH] saving the world at the cost of two lives…

(MAG150) ARCHIVIST: What about The Unknowing? We, we saved the world! MELANIE: Did we? I… I mean, I–I think it was the right thing to do, but how many people were killed to do it? We, we weren’t even a neutral party; we did it as agents of The Eye, because Elias told us to. […] You ever think that maybe this whole… ritual business is just an excuse, an–and that we’re all part of some… huge miserable Fear-machine? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] I’ve… considered the possibility.

(MAG155) ARCHIVIST: I’ve… [DRY CHUCKLE] I’ve saved the world…! The whole world! Does that… give me the right to… [SIGH] take what I need to survive…? I’ve been reading nothing but these old, [FLAPPING PAPER] dry statements for so long, I… [PAPER RUSTLING] I feel weak. Like I’m… fading away. Do I restrain myself, keep my appetite in check, even at the cost of my life? Or do I try to rationalise what I am, like… Ms. McHugh?

And the end of the season was a double-slap: he hadn’t even saved the world in the first place… and he was instrumentalised to cause the apocalypse in the end.

* Martin hadn’t checked the statements, had decided to go for a walk, and had previously been used for Jon’s last mark with The Lonely (and their situation is kind of echoing what Jon had told Peter, when he wasn’t managing to get Martin back at first: “… It was for me, though. I’m the reason he…! … I did this to him as much as you.”) – although, of course, none of it was his fault.

* Basira had been the one to send the statements, and it’s unclear yet if Jonah’s was already snuck inside the pile she sent, whether he added it during the transit (… or if he had made her put it in with the others? I doubt it, but how would Basira react, if he were to promise her that he could lead her to Daisy…?) – although she had done it in good faith, to make sure that Jon would keep himself in check.

* Daisy marked Jon for The Hunt, and then was used as bait for The Buried…

* Melanie gave Jon his Slaughter scar, Melanie&Georgie refused to help Jon at the end of MAG157 because they didn’t want to be associated with the fears (and it was their full right).

I like how bittersweet it is, to see how “easily” things could have been avoided? While, of course, they didn’t want the apocalypse to happen, and they were fighting against someone who had a few centuries of planning behind him, without knowing where he would strike. They’re not responsible for any of it, objectively, but I’m curious about their perceptions of the matter…

- Still so impressed at the build-up for this season, because we had so many hints that are easy to see in retrospect, or things that were easily discernible thematically, though it was harder to see where it was supposed to go…

* The scar/marks theory had been a popular one for a long while, even acknowledged by Jon:

(MAG093) ARCHIVIST: Elias has been sending me statements, apparently to prepare me, whatever that means, but some of the people I’ve been talking to have been… very dangerous. I’m starting to feel like a bit of a punching bag, to be honest. Would be nice to meet a monster, and not have a scar to show for it.

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: Oh. It–it’s fine; scalpel wounds… [CHUCKLE] they heal quickly. BASIRA: Hm. ARCHIVIST: … Too quickly, really. [CHUCKLE] BASIRA: Already? [CHAIR SCRAPES] ARCHIVIST: Just another scar for the collection!

And we were right about it ;; The question was mostly why it was necessary, the assumption was that it was to prepare him for The Watcher’s Crown… and it was even worse than that.

* A big chunk of season 4 was about investigating rituals: in season 3, we knew that The Spiral, The Buried and The Unknowing were not current threats anymore. This season, we were told that The Flesh, The Vast and The Slaughter were past concerns, that The Dark had already had its turn recently, why exactly The Buried had failed, what had neutralised The Desolation, that The Hunt’s whole concept dictates that it couldn’t really have a culmination point, that Gertrude had savagely taken care of The Lonely’s, that The Corruption might have had its try with the attack on the Institute, that The End and The Web aren’t really in the game (or are they.)… and ultimately that The Watcher’s Crown had already been attempted 150 years ago. The surprise laid with the fact that Jonah was planning bigger.

* We already had a few hints that something was off in season 1 and 2 (Elias being a filing clerk in the 70s, but joining the Institute in 1991 and… changing… a lot… to the point he had become the new Head in 1996), but it only increased afterwards: starting season 3, Jonah’s letters were systematically episodes in which Elias was appearing (MAG092, MAG098, MAG127, MAG138); Elias’s detailed knowledge of Jonah’s actions and emotions in MAG092; Manuela presenting the Head of the Institute as an old friend of Maxwell Rayner (MAG135) and not naming him; Eric Delano’s surprise about Elias changing so much (MAG154)… + Elias tending to appear in episodes with “remains” in the title (MAG040, MAG092, MAG127), which. ha.

* A whole thematic arc was, also, about Jon’s identity (as a person or a monster), leading to Martin’s “I see you” and ending with acceptance.

* So. Many. Doors. This seasons. And it led to Elias opening That One.

  Overall thoughts looking back over season 4, re: big questions I had towards the end of season 3 / beginning of season 4:

- I’m still laughing really hard that “Wow, Jon, sounds like pining” at the beginning of the season turned out to have been actual pining. I was cautious about it from experience (it could be something else, feelings don’t have to be romantic in nature to be important, you can long for someone without being romantically interested, qpp is a thing, etc.) and then! Surprise, children! The Archivist had it bad.

- Adelard Dekker wasn’t showing up… because he was dead already (died even before Gertrude). I was growing suspicious of it but ;; Ouft, the way he gave his farewells…

- No Lukas!Martin (well, one could still run with that without contradicting canon, but it would also clash with the recurring theme that bloodlines do not actually matter in the end); in the end, Peter’s interest in Martin specifically was because of 1°) abandonment/longing issues, 2°) one-sided crush (which ended up reciprocated), 3°) Elias needing Peter to choose Martin and sending Peter after him specifically because he thought that Martin would ultimately reject Peter’s plan, thus ensuring Elias’s win. At the time of their encounter (MAG108), Martin hadn’t even proved to Elias that he was more cunning that Elias accounted for! Picked Martin for gayness (at the time, Elias probably thought that Martin would cling to Jon’s side and/or that Jon would try to get him back since he was overall concerned for his assistants, thus getting scarred by The Lonely in the process?), ended up winning because of Martin being more cleverer than assumed and Elias had faith that Martin would be allowed to play Peter like the cheap whistle he is. (Look, I’m not saying that Elias->Martin is the superior ship, but–)

(Something funny: Elias sent Peter to Martin in MAG108, and that was shortly after MAG106, in which Melanie and Basira’s office gossip made it clear that Martin’s concern over Jon was not Martin’s usual behaviour, and that other characters were suspecting that there were romantic feelings behind it. Given Elias’s tendency to improvise, I still think it’s absolutely possible that… Elias hadn’t even noticed the crush before Melanie&Basira talked about it.)

- I was so cautious about the assumption that Rayner was body-hopping, I was expecting that to be a red herring or something more complicated, but nop! Occam’s Razor, he absolutely was.

Same for Jonah Magnus and also dead wrong in that regard (but it does make sense that the two operated similarly, since Jonah knew him and in this world the supernatural tends to work… the way you think it should work) =D

- … So, confirmed in the Q&A that Gertrude was meant to have been shot multiple times on tape, and that there was no foul play in the fact that we only heard one gunshot in MAG158 vs. the three holes in her body Martin had reported in MAG040. So I was off the mark about that too, and she truly was meant to have died in March 2015 during The Dark’s ritual attempt!

(Though there is still the problem of MAG087 not making any sense when it comes to the dates… so there could still be Something, but no gunshot involved?)

- I loved how one of the focuses this season was the ritual, and the conclusion it reached! Basira had introduced the concern over the rituals (and specifically Beholding’s) in MAG123, we spent the whole season cataloguing which ones had failed recently, sometimes being told how they had been interrupted, sometimes not but with some wild-mass guessing; it was a major concern all through the season, and the pay-off was grandiose and making so much sense given what we already knew!

- I’m still laughing very hard about the anticipation of the Ny-Ålesund trip, in which I was expecting butchery and Bad Things Happening To Basira (we knew, back then, that a blind character was likely coming), and maybe Rayner wasn’t truly dead?? What about The Dark’s creature?? What about the cultists and Manuela’s branch??? What about the incoming eclipse in August 2018???

… and nop, it was a bust, Elias had been a misleading arsehole, Rayner and Dark creature and most cultists dead, ritual utterly failed in 2015, Manuela alone and unable to do anything. Big “eLIAS” moment.

- Fav period was the speculation regarding Jon’s anchor, because it was wild and delightful, and I still sometimes randomly snicker remembering Lottie&Jonny’s exchange about it.

- I desperately wanted to “hear Daisy’s voice”, metaphorically (… and also, like. concretely. Fay Roberts’s voice, okay.): it was funny in MAG117 to have her skip her testament and just load a gun but, also, it wasn’t really shaping her as a 3D character? And gods, was I pleased with this season and what she had to say about what she had experienced, committed, and the feelings she had about it. I think she was my fav character this season ;_;

- We still don’t know what The Web’s deal is, but given how Jon&co were kicked out of Hill Top Road (Not Levelled Up Enough / Not The Right Time, Inspect This Area For Plot Later), it’s definitely coming in season 5.

Things I overall liked less:

(Obligatory disclaimer: personal taste and opinions, things that resonated less or more uncomfortably with me. This is not a statement that these fictional things shouldn’t exist + the show is not over, there is One Last Season, so a few reveals or development could happen that would make me like these things better overall~)

- A bit sad about the “Elias was actually Jonah Magnus all along” reveal! I do admit it’s been well-done and well-played, I did pick up on the hints here and there (Elias mentioning something that had happened in the 1970s, Jon noticing that Elias Bouchard’s reported behaviour in the past was very different from the man he knows, Elias knowing way too much about Barnabas Bennett’s disappearance, Sarah/the Anglerfish’s “It’s Elias now, then?” and Nikola’s “Elias, can I call you Elias?” (The Stranger had reasons to have a kick with his identity-stealing methods!), Manuela conveying Rayner’s hello, the fact that Robert Smirke had pointed out that Jonah feared death most of all); the reveal was incredible and breath-taking… but! I do agree that it would have been a completely different story (this one is the story of someone refusing to die, and who has been sacrificing anything and anyone over two centuries to gain “power and immortality”), but I would have loved it if the local and consistent big bad had been a lazy privileged but opportunistic student who had found his calling in scheduling and paperwork twenty years ago ^^

- A bit sad, too, that it means we’ve never met an avatar of Beholding (or someone affiliated with Beholding) who wholly worships it? Clearly, Jonah is a lot more Beholding than he admitted (and there was reverence in how he described it in MAG120), but he also wants to think that he mostly used it for his own gain. No (twisted) love like Jane and the Hive, or Jude&Eugene towards The Desolation, or Manuela towards The Dark, or Hezekiah towards The Buried, or Simon towards The Vast, etc.

I wonder if we’ll meet a true and unabashed servant of Beholding in season 5?

- I loved Peter&Elias’s “divorced multiple times” energy, but I’m a bit sad that it felt so unbalanced in Peter’s disfavour in the end: it clearly felt like Elias-Jonah had toyed with him a lot, while Peter was too young and lacking experience and knowledge to be able to see when he was being manipulated?

- A bit surprised about the lack of Tim! His death was heart-breaking, and as much as circumstances weren’t great for some mourning and pondering about him (Jon woke up six months after his death, when other characters had lived through it), it… didn’t really feel like Tim had existed and died in the series, compared to Sasha (at the end of season 2 and during season 3, while they precisely didn’t remember her as a person)…? At times, it felt like maybe a Tim had once worked here, but he had quit on his own, not that… he had died. Maybe I’m a bit blinded by the fact that I experienced season 4 on a weekly basis, whereas I had just listened to season 2 and 3 in one go, but even now, even after compiling, I still feel like something was missing… (For example: Martin refusing to talk about him twice, Jon listing him amongst the dead with Sasha… versus Tim asking Melanie to describe the real Sasha to him and going to lie down, audibly upset and collapsing on himself. I feel like I was missing a bit of emotion in season 4 regarding Tim…? ;_;)

- I’m more neutral than anything about it because it’s conflicting one thing I love and something I don’t like much: Georgie & Melanie! I’m super glad that Georgie was revealed to be bi, and that she got a girlfriend! I’m super glad for a F/F couple! I’m super glad that “Georgie and Melanie as a Thing” is now canon! But I’m personally not too fond of storylines where a romantic involvement happens during or at the beginning of a process of recovery (in such circumstances I’m more invested when it’s a caring but careful friendship), so that one did miss the mark a bit for me. At the same time, I would have been a bit sad if Georgie&Melanie had become a duo without anything romantic ever, so.

- Nnnot too fond of the “terror attack” at the beginning of MAG158, mostly the fact that we heard the guns&the screams and knew it was happening. Overall, I’m not too fond of “random people get terrorised and butchered just because they’re in the way of people targeting the protags”, plus there, the whole concept that it was a cleansing felt… a bit too rough for me. So, really glad that Alex said they toned it down to avoid getting too close to real-life, as opposed to for instance having someone injured stepping in into the Archives to reveal what was happening, because yips, would have been way too far for me indeed ^^”

- Instead of “Oh! That was interesting and very sad and an amazing exploration”, I’m still mostly uncomfortable and disgusted towards the whole storyline of Jon having attacked people.

Disclaimer: I’m not very fond of stories where a twist is that your male protagonist was, in fact, an unreliable narrator doing some very cruel and horrible things while the information we had until then was designed to stir empathy for him. I also felt like MAG141-142 were very disjointed from the first half of season 4 – there had been no hint of Jon having attacked people before, while it was a festival of Jon making references to his “victims” right after it was revealed to us? And, more specifically, I find MAG142 extremely well-executed, the voice acting was fantastic on its own, but it also cemented that the most accurate comparison to what Jon was doing, to me, wasn’t “addiction” or “hunger”: it was sexual assault. It wasn’t that, I’m aware, but it did provoke in me the same visceral discomfort of… following a sexual assaulter’s woes about his own actions, and sobbing that he’s becoming a monster and did something bad when, yeah, dude, you did something bad? Especially with Jess: a woman in the middle of a romantic encounter is preyed upon, is cornered when alone; our male protagonist subjects her to something she didn’t want, hurts her deeply, thanks her for the experience, leaves, leaving her a mess… and her Narrative Purpose was to come ring the alarm about it to his male love interest. We learn that there were three victims, plus Jess and Floyd (whom we witnessed first-hand). The conclusion is that, although influenced, it was all Jon’s actions. It’s made clear that Jon knew that it was happening (although he wanted to cling to the hope that he was manipulated into doing it), that he hid it from the others while claiming that they needed to trust him, and that it only stopped “because he was caught”. And we end the season with cheering for Jon&Martin, with Jon going to save Martin in the Lonely and taking him back, and then spending a few weeks together in Scotland and being romantically involved, after having suffered from manipulation, isolation and circumstances for so long. Jess, Floyd, the three other victims? Don’t matter narratively past the fact that they’ve been hurt and messed up by the protagonist. Are they okay…? Well, it’s not their stories so we don’t know and, as much as we know, the characters don’t care much: Jon spent his time lamenting about what it meant about his (lack of) Humanity, and whether or not it would be rational or earned to do more harm, whether it was fair that he was suffering in trying to stop, whether his own suffering would stop… rather than expressing concern over his victims’ well-being, apologise, I don’t know, doing anything at all to prove that he wasn’t a plain villain. And we didn’t hear their voices anymore. Their purpose was to get hurt by the protag, and… so far, that’s it. And the circumstances have changed, so their suffering probably won’t matter, since everything is now awful for everyone.

There were a few narrative biases (the tape are not “neutral” and chose to not record Jon’s first four victims; Elias-Jonah didn’t even bother mentioning that it had happened in his big monologue, because… it was irrelevant for them – they are not people/entities we’re rooting for), but I feel that story-wise, it was a bit… showed that these victims weren’t supposed to matter much. Overall, they were basically treated as dead meat when it was discovered what Jon had done, as long as he stopped, and it felt extremely violent to me, especially in Jess Tyrell’s case given the circumstances in which Jon had encountered her and how she recalled the story; and it just felt (and keeps feeling) upsetting without any aesthetical pleasure…? I’m really not saying that Protags Should Always Be Pure (Jon… already wasn’t, anyway), and I do get that it was necessary to show what Jon’s choice truly meant, that Beholding was terrifying as a Fear-concept and not a lesser evil compared to the others. It’s something I’m finding interesting in fics, too! But canon-wise, I feel like it could have plainly worked if Floyd had been the only one, and if the exploration had been around what Jon had done to him…? Instead, Jon is a recidivist who knew from the start that he was one, and hid it from everyone until he was caught and stopped. That’s one of the points where I find it a bit hard to ignore that Jon is a male protag, and it’s a bit too reminiscent of IRL injustices (“it’s alright as long as he stops, right)”) – especially given that there’s no judiciary system to handle his actions. Of course, characters do what they can with what they have, amongst many bad options; they don’t have any way to do things perfectly or painlessly, it’s not that kind of story. But still, the “recidivist and hiding it from others” bit made everything discomforting and upsetting to me, rather than something that I was able to find compelling and interesting. That’s… a very human kind of monstrosity, and I just stopped caring much about him or his suffering for the rest of the season…? So a lot of the emotional beat of Jon getting Martin back and them being together just went over my head, because no, Jon is not only “a victim”, he’s also done terrible things to characters who weren’t lucky enough to be protagonists?

As I said, it’s down to personal experiences, squicks, triggers and narrative dislikes; I’m not saying the series or the handling was Problematic or anything like this! And it’s possible that we could hear from Jon’s victims in season 5!

(- A bit related: I do hope that season 5 is not a string of random people getting butchered or suffering while Jon&Martin are strolling through, or Jon Narrating Their Fate As Statements and moaning about how hard it is for him while said people are dying and suffering, because the emotional beat won’t work much for me if it’s the case ;; On the one hand, I usually don’t like apocalyptic stories much; on the other hand, I’m curious about what Jonny can do with the style; but on the third hand, the whole “Jon had secretly hurt people and hid from the others” subplot wasn’t really my brand in the way it was executed, so… I’ll See how it goes.)

- I felt like on its own, it… wasn’t technically a great season for female characters.

I loved Daisy and Melanie’s stories, and Basira’s was heart-breaking in retrospect (though she didn’t get any form of closure or temporary “end” as of now)! For me, they made the most striking storylines in season 4!

But when it comes to the main plot, what would dictate the overall circumstances all characters would suffer from… the main actors were all men. It was a bit “Mm” to me to end up in the situation, in the Panopticon, with four male characters as main players and nobody else – Annabelle wasn’t (explicitly) one, and Helen was apparently there to Watch&Giggle without intervening, Georgie&Melanie didn’t want to get involved, Basira&Daisy mostly made sure that Jon would be able to go rescue Martin, Gertrude has been dead for a while.

Now, it’s a remnant of season 1, which was mostly made of which members and friends of RQ were available to work with in this story (Jon, Martin, Elias are the only main characters who have survived since then, although Melanie had been introduced); if it had been a female character in the place of Peter or Martin… it would have felt iffy too (played and killed off, manipulated/used and needing to be rescued). Furthermore, it makes a lot of sense that, given that this is all Elias-Jonah’s chessboard, he would favour men in general (Victorian asshole who was mostly acquainted with men, if his correspondence is any hint).

At the same time it’s a bit obvious that Annabelle has been more active than she took credit for so far, and has her own plans (why did she so actively help Jonah bring the apocalypse, and why was it necessary for Jon to stay away from Hill Top Road?); plus, Helen is still around, Jonah indirectly pointed out that he can’t see in her corridors; Georgie can’t feel fear, and Melanie might get some immunity (at least from Beholding), so all of them have reasons to get exceedingly relevant in season 5 (if one power gets to “win” in season 5, it’s easy to bank on the Mother of Puppets). So. I didn’t feel like season 4 was super-satisfying in that regard, but also, there is a season 5, and there are enough open doors to think that, when the series will get concluded, it won’t be a gentlemen’s club moving the main plot forwards. So, I’m curious about how season 5 will unfold in that regard.

  Fav episodes this season were:

- MAG127, “Remains To Be Seen”: I loved the “voice” of Jonathan Fanshawe, and how delightful it was to hear someone tell Jonah Magnus to fork off? Plus, we got the continuation of Albrecht’s story and his demise a few years after his letter from MAG023; the whole atmosphere was… very eerie and dusty?; I feel like Jon’s description of his “door” (and the “I drown.”) was one of the most striking pictures this season; and it also marked the return of Elias. Jinglebells!Elias, letting us to know that he spends his time gesturing when he talks.

- MAG129, “Submerged”: “When would you start to worry about the rain?” gODS. Very good atmosphere in that one, too, and Jon&Martin’s exchange at the beginning of the episode made us scream so loudly (“iS MARTIN OKAY, LISTEN, HIS VOICE WAS SO OFF, WHAT IS HAPPENING–” “Actually, Alex had the flu” “oh”)

- MAG132, “Entombed”: Resolution of the Saving Daisy mini-arc, and the pay-off was delightful!! Big “OH” moment when it was revealed why Daisy had asked about Jon’s shirt in season 3! Daisy not being a wild monster inside of the Coffin, as we feared, but able to be… herself and expose her doubts and what she didn’t want to be anymore… (Plus, I really felt that indeed, Jon&Daisy had shared something in the Coffin? I loved that small fragile bond that was created out of almost nothing, it felt very genuine and beautiful ;_;)

- MAG145, “Infectious Doubts”: Arthur Nolan’s VA was fantastic, and the exemplification of how Gertrude interacted with avatars was… something, alright. Indeed, one could understand how she managed to live as long as she did. And their discussion about Agnes and the fact that neither of them really knew her keeps breaking my heard for Agnes ;_; (Still crossing fingers that we’re able to hear her in some form in season 5? Given the whole, constant thing about how we only “know” her through male characters and/or people romantically or sexually interested in her…)

- MAG151, “Big Picture”: Simon Fairchild, okay. And Martin having had Enough. Plus, obviously, the… not exactly “answers”, indeed, but the way Simon tried to explain how to look at things and concepts without freezing them into concrete like Robert Smirke had done (given that Martin was the one to be given that talk, I’m really curious about whether he will put this to use in season 5); the shade-throwing about Peter; the reveal that Jon had listened to Martin’s tapes, which was also a “!!” moment.

- MAG157, “Rotten Core”: Tfw you’re The Corruption in season 4 and you don’t get a dedicated statement until near the end of it, but when you do, there is another one shortly afterwards, and it’s. This. About Adelard’s end. It was a very gruesome one, but also so… just plain sad? When it comes to Adelard, still managing to shape him as a character with a mind of steel, with his ultimate resolve and last words. I really came out of it wondering what Gertrude had felt when receiving it, because it… indeed felt like the end of an era/a long-distance partnership. (Also, THE RETURN OF THE ADMIRAL!!! Kitty cuddles and purring!!)

- MAG158, “Panopticon”: Still so impressed that so much had been crammed into this episode, with so many different tones, and with the sense of urgency going crescendo. Plus, you know, big reveals about Gertrude’s death, Elias’s identity, what was Peter and Elias’s deal, and finally, what was hidden in the tunnels.

  Things to *squint* about in season 5, or overall questions/pondering:

- … The name of the show still works as of now, though it’s almost “Magnus’s Archive(s)” as things are right now. I suppose that characters will go back to the Institute at some point (if only to reach the Panopticon for some reason), I wonder how long it will take?

- How will the “one episode = one statement” thing fare in season 5…? I kind of hope it’s not a succession of Jon narrating/describing people’s gruesome demises, or live-statements which would make things (SOMEHOW) even worse for them. Technically, Jon had received statements and tapes, so we could explore those first… if he’s in any state to. (Obligatory: will we begin the season with “Recording by The Archive”? Or by Martin, searching for Jon, to reverse the end of season 4?)

- Who is listening through the tapes and why are they manifesting. (I was banking on Web at the end of season 3, nowadays I’m not so sure given how it’s been using them physically, a bit too blatantly.)

- What are the tapes Jon received in MAG160 about…? And were they sent by The Web? Is there another Gertrude tape amongst them? (A message about her “retirement plan”? The “little chat” Gertrude had mentioned in MAG158, which happened after Jonah had taken Elias as a new host and when she realised what was happening? An Adelard-Gertrude conversation if they manage to find The Perfect VA for Adelard? … A Jon-Gertrude conversation for when he began to work at the Institute? Jon had recalled that he had talked with her once or twice – what if it had been recorded because Jon was already relevant for whatever-is-listening-through-the-tapes…?)

- WHAT DOES THE WEB WANT / WHAT DID IT WANT AND GET

- Hey Jon, how is your lighter today (and how many cigarettes have you smoked recently)?

- Hill Top Road trip 2.0, and what the “scar in reality” means (and why Annabelle didn’t want Jon to get involved there… as of season 4, at any rate)

- I remembered about Anya Villette’s statement recently, and namely that bit:

(MAG114, Anya Villette) “I don’t know this place. They said I should come and talk to you. A few people did. People I thought I knew, but they were different. I should know this place, I think. I used to go to the Tate a lot when I lived in London, and I, I passed the building, but… I don’t know you people. Nothing makes sense anymore.”

For me, her statement was clearly Spiral, but the implication of the Institute not being there did grab my interest, because see: Robert Smirke died earlier in the Magnusverse than in our real world – Martin pointed out that he had died the day he had written MAG138’s letter, on February 13th 1867, while the historical Robert Smirke died on April 18th 1867. The difference being that, in the Magnusverse, it was implied that Jonah’s experiments and preparations of The Watcher’s Crown had directly caused Smirke’s death; the Watcher’s Crown attempt which resulted in the sinking of Millbank, and the establishment of the Institute to hide the Panopticon. The main difference between a world “without the Magnus Institute in London” and a world with it was… Jonah’s ritual attempt. It wonder if this is where two realities may have shifted and diverged, in the Magnusverse? We still don’t know much about this “scar in reality” lying at Hill Top Road, and why it’s hidden, or what it could cause…

- Given how Peter wasn’t sure why The Web had never tried to push for its own ritual, was it because the Mother knew that it would fail anyway? Was is something well-known amongst Web agents that it was All or Nothing, or was Jonah a pioneer in that area, and Annabelle (?) decided to lend him her support?

- … Or maybe not at all: I’m curious about other avatars’ stance on/in the new world, if there will be divergences, if most will embrace it, it if it will cause dissatisfaction because they’re not needed as vessels to feed their patrons anymore? Having the time of their lives, or dissatisfied/now useless when it comes to feeding the Fears?

- Elias hinted that Gertrude might have had a backup plan to stop The Dark, if it had turned out that their ritual could succeed – could that help with the whole apocalypse? I’m… not really convinced that the apocalypse can be undone or tuned down, and it’s likely that season 5 ends even more badly than season 4, but we shall see… Reminder that:

(MAG126) ARCHIVIST: … I remembered Gertrude’s notebook; we found it alongside the plastic explosives, but it rather got lost amongst the business of… [SIGH] saving the world at the cost of two lives… It… it’s borderline incomprehensible, not because of any code, or cypher – there’s every chance I could read those; just simply because… most of it is… numbers or fragments of sentences that would no doubt mean something to her, but… well, not to me. I have been staring at it for hours, in the hope something from it would just… come to me.

Jon hadn’t managed to decipher her notebook as of season 4, I wonder if it could get relevant again.

- How many episodes before we hear Elias again.

- I’m not sure how Elias is supposed to get “on top” of this, since Jon had been the one to “open the door” to the Fears? Why is Elias so confident that he will never die? Given how he had mentioned “an eternity of terror and suffering” for all at the beginning, I wonder if people might not become “immortal” in the new landscape – in the sense of not being able to die at all, of The End being a fear but also out of reach, putting people in a state worse than death? Still, curious about why Elias was so sure that he would get an edge and not share the same fate as everyone else, since I doubt the Fears could feel anything, to say nothing of gratefulness? So, what protection does he have?

- How will Elias die/be neutralised, and by whom or what? (I kind of randomly hope that Georgie will do something? I always found it a bit interesting that she was introduced as a talking character right after Elias had been revealed to be the villain… while Georgie is connected with The End and knows the words that killed her friend.)

- Will we learn a bit more about “Emma”, Gertrude’s third assistant named by Eric?

- Are we absolutely done with Agnes’s story, and/or is there a tiny chance that we could hear her voice in some way…?

- What happened with Salesa, and what was the broken lens he retrieved supposed to do?

- Was Eduardo Acosta’s statement relevant, for Tim to interrupt Martin in MAG104.

- Will Jon’s two missing ribs become relevant again? Did Jon leave his rib at the Institute, or did he take it with him in Scotland? (Jon, putting it on the fireplace lintel as soon as he unpacked–)

- There is still the matter of Extinction and whether it was a partial bust (that is now irrelevant) or if it will come into play after all; perhaps we’ll meet or witness the creation of one of its first avatars or something. (Honestly, I was beginning to wonder if Gertrude hadn’t been one for the Fears, given how she had pointed out that she was Desolation To The Desolation…)

- Martin spent a lot of time studying the Fears in season 4, to the point that he received Simon’s guidance about how to perceive them… so I wonder if that will be relevant, too, since he wasn’t able to use that knowledge at all in the season finale. It really felt like he was growing as a main character, until he was cast into The Lonely and took a backseat so… I’m expecting for it to come into fruition? Jon had the rigid knowledge of the Fears, and the knowledge given by Beholding, but Martin was taught to get the feeling of them, and it might be more efficient now that they’re here?

- How will the connection between Martin and The Lonely manifest? Martin had to suffer Peter’s influence for almost a year, has been shown to be able to use powers in front of Georgie, and still wanted to isolate himself a bit in MAG160, so I doubt that The Lonely will let him go this easily.

- Will Martin’s studies over the entities help in some way? Will The Extinction (and other aspects of the Big Blob Of Terror that weren’t contained in Jonah’s invocation) be relevant?

- Was MAG158 the “true end” of Daisy, and will it lead to her being absolutely unhinged and lost in season 5…? It felt like it when it happened, but the way Jon&Martin mentioned her in MAG160, it didn’t really feel like she was lost-lost – but that card has already been played with the Coffin…

- I found the season incredibly harsh on Basira overall: she tried to handle the situation while Martin was jumping ship and Melanie was getting more erratic; she got manipulated by Elias multiple times; she wasn’t even the one to rescue Daisy from the Coffin; she hadn’t noticed that Jon had been attacking people behind her back; she “lost” Daisy emotionally a bit further by initially refusing to respect her wish of not going back to The Hunt; she ultimately lost Daisy a second time… Except for punching Elias, she didn’t really get any “win”? I mean, everyone’s lives suck, but it feels that comparatively, Basira got the worst of it (Jon managed to save people, to elope with Martin; Melanie managed to flee from the Institute and has Georgie with her; Martin was finally found and cared for… but Basira?). I wonder how it will come out in season 5, and if she will manage to get… something. Anything. There were a few red threads (ha) thrown around with the fact that she was trying to track Annabelle, we’ll see if it leads somewhere… (If anyone was desperate for control, it was Basira in season 4…)

- On that note: is Basira still vitally “tied” to the Institute, even in this new world paradigm?

- I’m really curious about how Melanie will be handling things in season 5 and how she will fare in the new world, given how she cut herself off from Beholding, which is still supposed to be reigning a bit over the other Fears in this apocalypse. And she mentioned being “not scared anymore”, so…

- Same thing with Fear-less Georgie.

- I’m curious about Jon’s state at the beginning of season 5: absolutely collapsed on himself? Barely responsive? Already centred back while also still depressed? Already with a plan? Stuck for a while before Martin&him begin to move for one reason or another (trying to find Basira, Georgie, Melanie, or getting a clue regarding what to do?).

  Bits about the trailer/teaser for season 5:

- I like how it was casually introduced that life in Scotland hadn’t been that idyllic, since they had run out of tea even before the apocalypse. Englishmen in Scotland, raiding the tiny village shop until it was out of tea. Amazing.

- … Martin still not getting Jon’s sense of humour with the “knock-knock” joke.

- And it meant A LOT that JON was WILLING to make a knock-knock joke, given his relationship to doors and especially Mr Spider’s!! ;w;

(- This is how Web!Martin can still win, given the parallel.)

- … Aouch for Martin suggesting coffee instead. Jon doesn’t drink much of it, according to season 2.

- Not!Tea is canonically ~something that isn’t tea~, and I’m… mostly D: about the fact that Martin was convinced that it was tea. He was thinking that he had brewed and prepared this thing – did he really? – and sounded absolutely certain that it was plain ordinary tea he was holding… so the world is really messing with people’s heads and perceptions, uh…

- And it makes me worried because anyone else wouldn’t have had Jon’s “advantage” of seeing through deceptions and fears, and warning someone about it. Quite honestly, I’m not really worried about Jon&Martin (bad stuff will happen to them, but we will hear their thoughts about it); my worry is mostly about regular people, because again, I don’t like random innocents being canon fodder around protagonists for the sake of their own progress or because of their actions. (And yes, I’m aware that s5 will probably be a lot of this, especially given the short comment about the village orz)

(- It’s possible that the village would be the theme of the first “statement” if Jon begins to narrate people’s fates, I guess…)

- Though at the same time. Jon didn’t sound afraid at the prospect of the not!tea potentially attacking Martin, which should have been a concern?

- Things are “unchanged” according to Jon, who isn’t sure that things can change again… and it’s aouch given his laments over things changing during all of season 4 (+ Martin “not big on change” according to Tim). Jon isn’t sure things can change again, I’m really not sure either, so… either they can’t, either they do, either people keep changing too…?

- Things have changed, and Elias was apparently kind of right that Jon… was made to live in/feed from this world.

- … The way Jon described the rolling wave of knowledge was directly echoing how he had portrayed his inner door in MAG127 so: now, the door has opened and the entire ocean is indeed out there, uh…

- But Jon is not “drowning”? We’re still following the same logic as at the end of season 4: that something feeling right doesn’t mean that it is right. It is actually a bit reassuring, since… Jon kept his morals? Is trying not to know, not to use his powers? Saying that he wished it didn’t feel right means a lot: that it does, but that he still would prefer otherwise. Jon is not a creature of pure instinct but someone able to decide what is right and wrong, still fighting against urges and new influences. That’s weirdly optimistic, in this situation?

- Jon was going for bitterness and “despair”, but it was also contradicted by what he was doing: if he had truly fallen into despair, he wouldn’t be this cautious about his powers and the knowledge, he might “stop feeling guilty” like Helen. He isn’t. He’s still holding on, which means that, indeed, there is still some hope or something to salvage – or at least, the idea of not making things worse.

- Same with his comment about the fact that “comfort” doesn’t exist anymore: he… immediately proved that, no, yes, it does, with the hug (?) he shared with Martin.

- Jon&Martin still together as of now (which, honestly, I wasn’t expecting! I was bracing myself for them to already be separated somehow), still in Scotland given their comments. Will they stay in the safehouse for a while, or will they quickly get on the move?

- Martin’s “You know I’m here for you” sounds to me like we’ll end up with a situation in which it isn’t the case anymore – because Martin would have to let Jon down, would be dead, or because Jon is not even there anymore.

- Tape recorders still around, we don’t know what they are, but they’re still listening in. Despite Jon’s claim that “it’s over”, it’s not and there are still Tales To Be Told, even after the end (?) of the world.

Anyway, expectations are overall “they’re going to die (or not even be granted that, and they’ll be condemned to an eternity of worse)”, but ;___; It feels weird to think that I’m already going to say goodbye to that bunch of idiots in 40 episodes ;_;

  MAG161’s title is surprisingly a bit obtuse for me, and I wonder if it will still be possible to try to “guess” an entity through announced titles this season (now that all the Fears are there and acknowledged as part of a whole) – Buried stuff??? As a season opener, I would say, either Annabelle stuff, either Jon&Martin; Aaangst is a given; but after that…

[kalgalen]

31 jm

I started this before this week’s ep but boy did it give me more fodder

Tell me a nice memory.

Cutting off a part of himself was never going to be easy.

It’s not literal, this time, but it isn’t any less painful. He’s attempting to destroy that which brought him back to life once before, and the process feels like dying all over again - but slowly, this time, as shreds of himself are torn away by the cruel talons of a god that doesn’t give anything for free. The Powers don’t look kindly on the ones who chose to reject them, especially when they’ve embraced them so thoroughly in the past. The Eye will take and take until it’s got everything it has ever given him back, and does not care if everything that’s left once the Archivist is gone is an empty shell.

It’s a choice Jon had to make, though, after the world had not ended. He couldn’t justify keeping his status, after everything they’ve been through; the monster wasn’t needed anymore. Perhaps dying would have been simpler then - and he’d tasted the same thing in Melanie’s thoughts and side glances: we should just kill him.

But Martin had caught it too, and he had taken a sidestep closer to Jon, and glared at Melanie with such ferocious protectiveness Jon had felt his knees weaken.

And so he’s giving up on the monstrous part of himself. It feels like painstakingly picking shards of glass out of an old wound, like rooting out ivy from the old tree it’s keeping together. They’ve locked him in Elias’s old office; it isn’t the most agreeable place to spend his days and nights in, but it’s got a couch that’s comfortable enough, and the others can check on him regularly. They bring him food, as well as books to keep him distracted, but it’s like being offered vegetable scraps when what he craves is a five-courses meal. 

Daisy and Basira visit quite often, together or on their own, for mindless chatter - or companionable silence, as they each settle with a book and read quietly for a few hours. Melanie doesn’t come unless she’s on meal duty, and he supposes he should be grateful she agrees to do that at all. She seems to be warming up to him, though; he doubts she’ll ever go as far as calling him a friend, but she sticks around for a bit, once, and tells him Georgie has been asking about him.

“And… what did you tell her?” he had tentatively asked, voice rough with disuse. Melanie had shrugged.

“I said you were trying.”

Which is probably the most charitable way to describe his situation. There’s not much he can actually do to help with the withdrawal process; he can only hold for dear life when the deprivation hits him badly, and hope he won’t wake up outside of the Institute with several more victims on his conscience - and in his dreams.

The nightmares have never been a fun part of his night, but now, as he loses the favor of the Beholding, they are even less so. He stops being a silent witnesses, living instead through the terrors that happened to other people. Buried, hunted, haunted; he wakes up choking on a scream more than once, spending the rest of the night with all the lights turned on and his back to the wall.

He feels lonely. No one asks how he’s doing in that fight against himself; the memory of the things he’s done is still too raw for them to pity him the way they would a human being. It’s unfair, and it hurts, and he hopes he can earn their forgiveness some day; in the meantime, he can only pretend he does not care when they find him huddled in a corner after a particularly bad attack, skin marred with bloody grooves and cheeks still wet with tears.

Jon misses Martin.

Martin visits a couple of times a week, mostly to bring him food, sometimes to tell him news from the outside. Jon shouldn’t miss him; but even if they’ve won, even now that the distance isn’t necessary anymore, he can’t help but feel like Martin’s avoiding him. He’s avoiding his gaze, for sure - though Jon can’t blame him for this. Martin talks about the weather as if it’s the prelude for something bigger and more important, but then tells Jon to have a good day and disappears. Their meetings are a frustrating ballet of silent apologies and unsaid confessions.

Jon misses Martin.

He knows Martin is fighting battles on his own. On some days - the bad ones, when his Sight is particularly strong - he can still catch glimpses of the fog stuck to the sole of Martin’s shoes, or the gossamer threads of silk caught between his fingers - or the inhuman spark in his eyes, hungry and curious, mirroring Jon’s own. And it feels - silly, and counterproductive, to avoid addressing their common struggle as an attempt to normalcy. What they save in shared awkwardness they suffer in private anguish.

This is no way to heal.

When Jon finally decides to break the ice, it’s more out of necessity than thanks to a spark of bravery. He’s not been having a good day; the Archives are calling to him, promising knowledge and power and relief, and he’s backed himself into a corner of the couch, frowning deeply at the book in his hands. He’s been reading the same paragraph over and over again, unable to focus on the lines; he hungers for more than empty words.

He jumps when the key turns in the lock, but slightly relaxes when Martin slips through, holding a tray.

“Hey,” Martin says, careful.

“Hi,” answers Jon. He closes the book, not bothering to hold it at the right page, and watches as Martin deposit the tray on Elias’ desk.

Martin shuffles in place, uncomfortable but unwilling to leave so soon; Jon finds himself smiling - longing.

“So. How was your…day?” Martin asks, putting on an interested face.

Jon chuckles, makes a show to think about it for a second.

“Oh, you know. Been doing some light reading, mostly? Not much else to do around.”

Martin winces. “Right.” He doesn’t let the short answer stop him, though. “Is it any good?”

Jon looks down on the ornate leather cover. He’s actually not even sure what it is about at all. He shrugs.

“Hard to tell. Did you know there still are two different letters from Adelard Dekker down in the Archives?”

Martin’s optimistic attitude doesn’t withstand this particular blow; he sighs, leans his hip against the desk as he crosses his arms. He’s deadly serious, suddenly, and Jon is reminded once again of how much he’s changed.

“You know you can’t ever see those, right?”

Jon slumps, feeling like a chided child.

“Right. Of course, I know. But I also know they’re here, and I want -” He cuts himself with a frustrated sign. He knows he has to take responsibility for his actions, but the yearning that lives in his chest isn’t his. Not entirely. “It wants to know, and I can’t stop thinking about it, and I swear I’ve been trying -”

The last few words are lost as he chokes on a sob. He swallows hard, tries to blink frustrated tears from his eyes as he looks away. He feels pitiful - the miserable shell of a man, about to crumple on itself if he doesn’t find anything else to fill him soon.

The couch dips when Martin sits next to him, and it takes all of Jon’s frayed will not to shuffle closer to his heat, both metaphorical and literal.

On his lap, Martin’s fingers are fiddling with the fabric of his pants; his hesitation is almost palpable in the silence of the office. Jon can taste his decisiveness on his tongue a split second before he speaks up:

“Alright, come here.”

Jon looks at him, bewildered. Martin has opened his arms for a hug and is staring at him expectantly, resolution in the slope of his eyebrow but apprehension in the set of his mouth. It takes a beat more for Jon to understand what he means, and that he means it, and then he’s closing the distance between them and letting himself being wrapped in an embrace that instantly loosen the knot in his throat.

It occurs to him he’s never hugged Martin before. Slowly, his movements jerky and unsure, he raises his arms - closes them around Martin’s middle and lets his face fall into the crook of Martin’s neck, breathing in deeply.

“You - are you alright, Jon?” Martin asks after a moment. “Or rather, is there anything I can do to help?”

One of his hands has started rubbing soothingly the back of Jon’s head, and with each scrape of fingers in his hair his mind strays further from the hunger in his chest.

“Don’t leave, please,” he mumbles into Martin’s collar.

“I’ll - I can stay with you for a bit. Of course.”

“Thank you.”

Martin hums and keeps petting him, and the tension Jon has been feeling for so long starts to fade. He closes his eyes.

“Do you mind if we - This isn’t the best position,” Martin says, half-pulling away. Jon is confused until he understands what Martin in trying to do. They rearrange themselves until they’re sitting side by side, Jon’s head on Martin’s shoulder, Martin’s fingers still running through Jon’s hair.

“Not that I’m complaining about what we’re doing right now,” Martin chuckles, “but is there anything else I can do?”

“I -” Jon hesitates. There’s an idea forming in his mind, something that might satisfy his hunger without having him giving up on his control. A parody of a statement, something for himself instead of for the Eye. He licks his lips, but in nervousness more that anticipation. “I don’t think I know you well yet, and I think it’s a shame, because we - because I, uh,” missed you love you want you to stay here with me for as long as possible, “care about you, you know? So I was thinking - can you tell me about yourself?”

Martin blinks at him in surprise, then squints.

“This isn’t - like, Beholding-related, right? Because you know I can’t do that.”

“No! Not at all. I just - I truly want to know you. What brings you joy. What makes you happy. That sort of thing. Tell me - tell me a nice memory.”

“A reverse-statement, huh?” Martin smiles, and Jon thinks the sight alone might be enough to bring him back to humanity. “Okay, I can do that. Give me a second.”

Martin thinks for a bit, and Jon closes his eyes again, letting himself enjoy the scrapping of nails against his scalp. When Martin starts speaking again, he is Jon’s only focus.

“So there was that one time, when my dad was still around…”