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wordsintimeandspace · 2 years ago

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nothing left but souls entwined (1/12)

Jon burns Gerry's page the night before the Unknowing, but Beholding isn’t quite done with him yet. Instead of being released, Gerry ends up in Jon's head - and takes over his eyes. Now blind and powerless, Jon has no other choice but to trust Gerry as he guides them through everything from rituals to relationships. And although Jon is still determined to find a way to separate them and finally set Gerry free, he and Gerry grow ever closer along the way.

JonGerry/JonGerryMartin, rated T, 3000 words for this chapter.

Please note that I’ll post future chapters on AO3 only, so please head over there if you want to follow this story: read on AO3!

The night before the Unknowing, Jon finds himself in a cheap hotel room unable to sleep. He spends hours staring at the popcorn ceiling above his bed, waiting with increasing dread for the dawn to approach, before he finally gives up on trying. With a groan, he pushes himself upright. For a moment he just sits there, his face buried in his hands.

When he finally gathers the strength to look up, his eyes immediately fall onto his backpack sitting by the desk across the room. In the dark, with only the street light outside providing a bit of illumination, he can’t see more than a bulky lump, but it draws his eyes nevertheless.

Jon gulps. There’s plenty of reasons why he can’t sleep tonight - the imminent end of the world, most of all - but the contents of said backpack are at least a part of it. The telltale beat of his guilty conscience pounds in his ears until Jon finally gets up and crosses the room.

From the backpack he pulls a page, carefully tucked between a book he cannot focus on and a statement he hasn’t yet read. It’s the page of Gerard Keay, torn out from the book that Gertrude used to trap and bind his soul. It feels warm to the touch, but Jon is sure he must be imagining it. It is August after all, and the room is stiflingly hot and humid even at night.

With a sigh, Jon takes the page and sits by the open window. He lights a cigarette, taking a drag and breathing out slowly before he has a closer look at the page in his hands.

It’s covered in ink, with neat handwriting that spells out the ghastly account of Gerry’s death. By now, Jon has read it so many times that he knows it by heart. He spent a long time staring at these letters, at each stroke of ink that builds a prison for Gerry’s soul, dooming him to an existence of pain until someone releases him.

Jon grimaces. He made the promise to set him free, back in America. A promise that he still hasn’t kept, despite the guilt churning in his stomach.

Even now, despite the awfulness of it all, Jon selfishly finds himself wanting to read the words on the page out loud. To summon Gerry into the silence of the night to make the crushing loneliness a little more bearable. To find the advice and guidance he so desperately craves.

Jon sighs and takes another drag of his cigarette. He can’t, and he won’t, but the desire still chokes the air out of his lungs. He wants to call Martin instead, like he used to back when he was in America and couldn’t sleep. He knows Martin will answer, even in the middle of the night, but he deserves to get some more rest than Jon does. He even wants to go see Tim, in the way it used to be back in Research. When he could have crossed the hall to knock on his door, and find comfort behind it instead of resentment and bared teeth.

None of it is an option now. Instead Jon is desperately alone, and he still has a promise to keep. When he finishes his next cigarette he finally gets up, his fingers absently tracing the engraved web on his lighter. Best to get it over with, and maybe he can get one more hour of sleep after, when his guilty conscience isn’t crushing him.

He takes the battery out of the smoke alarm before stepping into the bathroom towards the sink. In the sterile light he looks pale, the circles beneath his eyes dark as bruises in a stark contrast to the scars scattering his face. Even after all this time, they’re still a tone lighter than his skin. Jon doesn’t like looking at himself these days. He merely glances at his reflection before focusing once again on the paper in his hands. It takes him a second to notice that it’s not his vision that’s blurring, but that his hands are shaking.

Jon takes a deep breath, steeling himself for what he has to do. “Just, just do it,” he murmurs to himself, grimacing. He grips the lighter, cold and smooth against his skin, and brings it closer to the page. Gulping hard, he flicks open the cap.

It takes a few seconds of fumbling, but finally the lighter ignites. It’s a small, flickering flame, and for the first few seconds that it licks over the page nothing happens. Then, finally, it catches fire. There’s a burst of light and heat, and pain explodes behind Jon’s eyes like a supernova.

It burns like he’s the one catching fire, white hot and blinding. Jon is distantly aware that he’s screaming, the sound ringing in his ears, but it barely registers over the onslaught of agony. In the sink, the page crumbles to nothing but ash. It’s the last thing Jon sees before everything goes dark.

Jon comes to with his cheek pressed against the cold tiles of the bathroom floor. He squeezes his eyes shut, sucking in a hitching breath that’s nearly a sob. His chest is heaving, his stomach roiling with nausea. The pain that was so all-encompassing subsides a little, even as it becomes more focused. It turns into a throbbing ache behind his eyes, and Jon gulps against another wave of sickness.

He wants nothing more than to lie still until it eases, but suddenly a voice rings through his head and Jon sits up so quickly he nearly throws up.

‘What,’ Gerard Keay growls, ‘did you do?’

Jon wrenches his eyes open, but everything remains dark. “Uh,” he starts, his voice wavering, and pushes himself to his feet with some difficulty.

‘Oh! Oh, what the hell,’ Gerry says before Jon can string together a coherent sentence. The anger in his voice is suddenly extinguished by pure shock.

Trembling, Jon takes a few steps until his hand brushes a wall. He fumbles for the light switch, even though he really doesn’t know how he managed to hit it when he collapsed. “I’m, um- Gerard?” he asks.

‘Jon…’ Gerry says slowly, just as Jon finally finds the switch. He presses it - to no avail. The room remains pitch black, and Jon lets out a curse as he desperately tries to tamper down the panic rising in his stomach. He flicks the switch a couple more times. “I don’t- I’m not sure what happened,” he manages to get out. “I- I burned your page. I swear, Gerry, I did. I’m-”

‘I know you did,’ Gerry says, his voice strangely hollow. ‘I can see you did. There’s ash all over the sink.’

“You… what?” Jon frowns, hitting the light switch one more time. “Wait, I need to get a light, just give me-”

‘The light is fine,’ Gerry interrupts, and Jon stills, coldness spreading in his veins. ‘For fucks sake, stop messing with the switch. You’re going to give me a migraine.’

Once again Jon feels like throwing up, but now for an entirely different reason. It really is too dark. It’s more than just the bathroom light not working. There’s not even a slither of light coming from under the door, although he’s sure he left the bedside lamp on. His legs tremble, and he presses his back against the wall for support. “What?” he croaks, his head spinning.

‘Damn. Okay. I need you to be calm.’

“I surely won’t be if you say it like this,” Jon bites out, his hands clenched into fists. “Just… just tell me. Tell me what’s going on.”

‘I’m… to be honest, I’m not entirely sure.’

“Gerard, I can’t see.” A sob escapes Jon’s throat. He takes a trembling breath, grasping the wall behind him to find something to hold on to in the darkness. “And you do, apparently. I need you to give me more than that.”

‘I’m… in your head, I think,’ Gerry starts hesitantly. ‘Sharing your body. And I- I’m really sorry, Jon. But I- it seems I have your eyes.’

“W-what?”

‘I see through your eyes. We’re in a small bathroom. A hotel, if I had to guess? The tiles are awful. There’s a crack in the sink. I’m looking into the mirror and I see you.’

Jon’s legs give out. The fall is gentler this time, at least. Instead of collapsing he slides down the wall until he’s sitting in a heap on the cold bathroom floor, his chest heaving as panic claws at his throat.

‘Hey. I need you to breathe, Jon,” Gerry says, voice full of concern, and somehow it’s that tone that tips Jon over from despair to anger.

“You told me to burn your page,” he hisses. “That’s what I did. Did you know this would happen? Did you… what, trick me, into stealing my eyes?”

‘No, of course not!’ Gerry protests. ‘This… I don’t know what happened. This shouldn’t be possible.’

Jon grits his teeth, bitterness coating his tongue. “You did want to be released from the book, so this seems rather convenient-”

‘I wanted to die!’ Gerry bursts out in response, and the despair in his voice is enough to shut Jon up abruptly. ‘Properly this time. Finally be free. Do you think I enjoy this? Being trapped, once again? It doesn’t fucking matter if it’s the book or your body, the result is the same. I didn’t choose this. I didn’t choose any of this.’

Jon lets out a trembling breath. He presses the heels of his hands against his eyes, willing back the tears burning in them. “Shit. I’m… I’m sorry.”

Gerry is quiet for a long while. ‘Come on, let’s get you off the floor,’ he finally says, sounding about as tired as Jon feels.

Jon pushes himself to his feet, his knees trembling. He grits his teeth, holding on to the wall for balance, and hesitates as he tries to piece together any resemblance of orientation.

‘The door is directly to your left,’ Gerry says, saving Jon from blindly fumbling around the room. He hesitantly reaches out, and breathes out a sigh of relief when his fingers brush the cold metal of the doorknob. Slowly he walks through the door, stepping from the cold tiles of the bathroom onto the carpet of his room.

‘It’s maybe five steps towards the bed,’ Gerry continues as Jon makes his way across the room. ‘A little to the right. Yes. Good. You got it.’

Jon collapses onto the lumpy mattress with a groan. He rolls onto his back, staring straight up. God, he never thought he would long to see the awful popcorn ceiling. Even the strangely coloured spot in one corner that he’d warily eyed the day before would be a welcome sight.

‘I’m sorry,’ Gerry offers quietly, as if picking up on Jon’s train of thought.

This time, the gentleness brings tears to Jon’s eyes. His breath hitches, his chest constricting with anxiety and grief. “I am too,” he murmurs with a waver in his voice. He lets out a long breath, gulps down the tears and finally sits up with his back against the headboard.

He desperately wants a cigarette to help him calm down, but he must have dropped the lighter when he collapsed earlier. Instead, he pulls the blanket into his lap and tries to focus on all the questions that are nearly drowned out by the panic nipping at his heels.

“How… how does all of this work, then?” he finally asks, frowning. “You're in my head, you see through my eyes, but can you do anything else?”

‘Already jumping to the logistics of this?’ Gerry asks, bemused.

Jon shrugs, just barely biting back either a sob or hysterical laughter. “It’s either that or having a breakdown after all.”

‘Fair enough.’ Gerry pauses for a moment. ‘I… I don’t think I can do anything else. I can see and I can hear. I can talk to you, in your head. But I don’t think I can… I don’t know, move your body or anything like that.’

Jon nods. That’s a relief, at least, to know that he still has control over his own limbs. “Right.”

‘You’ve been speaking out loud so far, but I guess if you talk to me inside your head, I can hear it too.’

With a frown between his brows, Jon tries to focus on the words he wants to get across. ‘Like this?’

‘Yep. That works.’

Jon lets out a long breath. ‘Well. At least I won’t have to talk to myself in front of other people all the time.’

Gerry hesitates, for just a second too long. ‘You sound like you expect this to be permanent,’ he finally says carefully.

Jon pauses. ‘I… I don’t know. Do you think it isn’t?’

‘God, I have no idea.’ Gerry lets out a sigh. ‘Like I said, I don’t know how we ended up this way. But it might be possible to reverse it. Give you your eyes back.’

‘M-maybe. And release you, finally. I’m- I really am sorry it didn’t work when I burned the page.’

‘It’s fine,’ Gerry says, sounding resigned.

‘Is it?’

‘Well, no. But it’s not your fault, at least.’

Jon grimaces. Maybe, if he hadn’t waited so long, if he hadn’t so desperately wished to get another chance to talk to Gerry…

‘Does the Eye have anything to say about this?’ Gerry asks before Jon’s thoughts can spiral any further. ‘Anything useful, for a change?’

‘Oh, um, I’m not sure.’ Jon bites his lip. The Eye has been surprisingly quiet so far, but now he reaches out towards that power. Tries to Know and find the door in the sea of Knowledge that might bring at least a bit of clarity.

Before he can properly focus on it, a sharp knock comes from the door. Jon flinches, his heart in his throat.

“Jon!” Basia yells from behind it, voice muffled through the wood. Jon’s blood runs cold. All of a sudden he’s reminded with a painful clarity where he is and what he was about to do the next morning. “Jon, you’re late. Don’t tell me you overslept today of all days.”

‘Who’s that?’ Gerry asks, at the same time as Jon, mind whirling with sudden panic, goes, ‘Fuck.’

‘Jon?’ Gerry asks again, alarmed. Jon ignores him and clambers out of bed instead, unsteady on his feet.

“I-” he starts, his voice breaking. “Ah, sorry, I- I’ll be there in a moment.”

“We’re leaving in ten minutes,” Basira calls back, and then she’s gone as abruptly as she came, leaving Jon alone with his despair. How did he forget that they’re here on a mission? A mission that suddenly seems impossible, blind and disoriented as he is. For a moment Jon can just stand there, breath coming in quick gasps, feeling utterly lost in the darkness.

‘What’s going on?’ Gerry asks sharply, breaking through his panic.

“Um, it’s- it’s the Unknowing,” Jon stammers. “It’s today. Here. In Great Yarmouth. We’re here to stop it.”

‘Shit.’

Jon shakes his head. “I-I don’t know if I can do this. Not- not like this,” he admits, his head spinning.

‘What was the plan, then? I can’t imagine you came this far without one.’

“Um. We-we have the explosives. From Gertrude. From the storage unit you told me about.”

Gerry lets out a small, surprised laugh. ‘Explosives. Right. Bit extreme even for Gertrude, but she knew how to get a job done.’

“We were going to plant them at the House of Wax. Set them off when- when it’s started. When it’s vulnerable.”

Gerry pauses for a moment. ‘Okay.’ he finally says, firm and determined. ‘Okay, fine.’

“Fine?!”

‘Yeah. Let’s go and blow up some clowns.’

For a moment, Jon is at a loss of words. He still feels desperately lost in the darkness. “Gerry, I- I can’t,” he says, voice cracking.

‘You can,’ Gerry instists. ‘You will.’

“I don’t-” Jon stops himself, frowning. “You didn’t care about this last time.”

‘Last time I was a book. It’s different now, isn’t it? I’m trapped in your head. I’m aware of what’s going on around me. And I swear, if I’m stuck against my will in a world where the Stranger takes over I will lose my mind.’

Jon winces. “I don’t…”

‘Please, Jon. We’ve got to try, at least.’

Finally, Jon nods. He knows they have to try, no matter how terrified he is. He owes Gerry that much, at least.

With a deep breath Jon takes a small step forward, but he hesitates again when he doesn’t recognize where in the room he is. There’s a light breeze from the open window, somewhere on the left if he had to guess, but apart from that he’s still lost. The breeze only painfully reminds him that he’s still wearing just a shirt and boxer shorts, and that he has no idea where he left his trousers the night before. A whimper escapes his throat. “I- I can’t even find my clothes, Gerry.”

‘There’s a chair four steps to your right,’ Gerry immediately says. ‘It’s in front of a desk. A shirt and trousers thrown over the back of it.”

For just another moment, Jon hesitates. Then, with his heart racing and his hands clenched into fists, he takes a leap of faith. Instead of carefully feeling the way forward, he intently takes four steps in the direction Gerry indicated. He expects to bump into the desk, gain a bruise on his hip to the scatter of scars on his skin, but it doesn’t happen. Instead, after the fourth step, he reaches forward and immediately touches the soft cotton of his dress shirt. He lets out a breath of relief.

‘See?’ Gerry says as Jon slips on his shirt and trousers. ‘You don’t have to do this on your own. We can do this. Together.’

Jon lets out a shuddering breath. Somehow, Gerry’s voice in his head is strangely soothing. Reassuring in a way it shouldn’t be, given the task ahead of them. Still, Jon manages to relax his tense shoulders just a bit and nods. “Right,” he says hoarsely as he slips into his shoes and turns to the door. “Yes. Let’s do this.”

#the magnus archives #tma #tma fic #jongerry #jongerrymartin #my fic #my fic: nothing left but souls entwined

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that-one-girl-behind-you · 2 years ago

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Illicio 26/40

Part 25

TWs for this chapter: Fire Grief Gore (implied) Insecurity/jealousy, but the second part is mostly lighthearted and discussed almost immediately

"You got any plans?" Martin asks. The fire in the middle of their 'camp' -are they really stopping for the night if there's no night anymore?- gives off little in terms of heat, but it pushes the illusion of normalcy, which Martin is grateful for. "After we fix this?"

"If we fix this," Tim shrugs by the other side of the pit.

"When we fix this," Martin remarks a bit more firmly. He feels a lot more like himself today, 'camping' with his friend and with his boyfriend stuck to his side, still clad in Martin's green hoodie that clashes so much against the rest of his outfit.

It's easier to believe it like this, that Gerry doesn't want him just because of Jon.

Oliver isn't home.

Of course he isn't, he left months ago after another row of fighting. It hadn't even been the worst by far, but they just- Graham was tired, and Oliver was always busy.

Graham looks at the table again, running a finger over one of the curved edges of the spiderweb.

Perhaps that's why he's thinking of Oliver after all this time.

Despite his collected, professional looks, Oliver's got a very endearing weakness for "the occult", as he likes to call it. Somewhat of a guilty pleasure, he often says.

Said.

Anyways, Oliver would've been all over the table, with its web design that if you look at juuuust close enough, turns out to have hundreds and hundreds of names written into the canal-like grooves, in a font so tiny it reminds Graham of that carved rice grain at the Ripley's museum.

Perhaps- perhaps he'll give him a call.

They didn't end in the best of terms but it doesn't mean they can't build a relationship again, right? Doesn't mean they can't be friends. He once loved Oliver, that can't be gone just because he's no longer in love with him, which is something Graham often tells himself despite being very much sure of the opposite.

Maybe just lunch, and then a visit to the flat so he can fawn over the table. Run a finger along the edge like Graham likes to do when things are overwhelming, only to look up and find it's been hours since the last time he did so.

Only if Oliver isn't busy, though.

"And you were," Sasha says. Her voice feels- it doesn't feel like her voice, and there's a pang of panic in her stomach. If it's not hers, whose is it then? "I- you never picked up the phone."

The man looks a bit pale still, looking at her like he's seen a ghost.

"I'm- no. I think I might have- Jon?" He turns to give him a questioning look, and Jon shrugs.

"Hm. I didn't think you'd recognize Graham's real appearance," Jon hums casually, almost to himself. "Maybe because you were dead when she was taken. Anyways, you were on the ship at the time. Bad reception, and then the satellite killed you."

"Excuse me, the what?" Sasha blinks. None of this makes any sense, why is Oliver here and why was he dead? Who is this Oliver person, what-

"Graham-"

"My name is Sasha," she shakes her head. That's the main thing she has to be sure of. She's Sasha. She may have been Graham once, but now Graham is Sasha and that's all there is to it. "Jon, care to explain what's going on?"

Jon gives her a worried look, the corner of his lips turned down in a concerned gesture.

"Back when you were only Graham," he starts slowly after a moment, "you knew Oliver. I think you were-"

"A couple," Sasha nods abruptly. She remembers, intimately. But this makes no sense... was- how did she never notice Oliver was an avatar? He was always a terrible liar, she would've- "How- how did you end up like this?"

Oliver's eyes -they're light gray now, she realizes, like the color has bled out from them- slide to Jon somewhat nervously, like this encounter isn't going as neatly as he wanted.

It's very Oliver of him to have planned the whole thing, Sasha thinks with a spark of fond amusement. They must cut an appalling picture smack in the middle of his no doubt carefully orchestrated dramatic encounter, the Distortion and the Them dogpiled up on the Archivist.

"Oliver," she says, her voice firm. "Jon is alright, with some luck he's not going anywhere while we talk. But now, I think you owe me an explanation."

"I owe- what happened to you?" Oliver asks back, still looking for all in the world like he did all those years ago when Sasha asked him what his plan was if Barclays didn't work out, bewilderment and confusion warring on his usually calm, handsome face. "You were safe! I- why are you not Graha-"

"Don't call me that," Sasha snaps. "Don't ever call me that."

Ollie's face clears up all of a sudden, the way Sasha remembers it doing whenever he caught onto the plot twist of a movie. His eyes soften, and he looks at her gently, sadly.

"Stranger?" Is all he asks. His voice is careful, almost apologetic, and it makes Sasha want to cry. It's- this new existence is confusing at the best of times, and there are so many things she didn't get to tell Oliver, so many things she only thought about after he left.

Is this the constant in all of her lives? Loved ones left behind none the wiser, unsaid words that weigh her tongue down?

"...There was a table," she says after a moment. A table, popping up in her life again and again, to rip her away and fill her absence with poison. To hurt those she loved wearing a face that isn't hers, killing her a little more every day. "I got it at an antiques sale, you know I liked- you would've liked it. It was black shiny wood with a spiderweb design. Very on-brand for your aesthetic," she adds with a wet-sounding snort.

"...That's why I couldn't see your root," Oliver says after a long, tired silence. "It wasn't you anymore."

"I'm going to pretend I know what that means."

"It's- Jon can explain later, I'm sure," Oliver sighs. "I- Jon? Was it because of me?"

Sasha feels Jon move under her, partly to shrug, partly because of the Web urging him to escape. She readjusts her position to hold him down, and he gives her ankle a grateful squeeze.

"At this point I'd say it's just as likely that it was because of her past association with you as it is that it was because of her future association with me," he says in the end. "I'm not too keen on figuring out the Mother's mess anymore."

"I'd say that's wise." Oliver runs a hand down his face, and Sasha's stomach contracts with a sudden, fierce rush of fondness, as she knows with unerring certainty what words will come out his mouth next. "This is not going how I expected."

"Always glad to rain down on your plans," she grins.

Oliver snorts at the familiar exchange, shaking his head softly as his lips stretch into a smile. The dimple forms on his left cheek still, Sasha notices with muted amusement.

She loved him so much. Those should've been her parting words, instead of a scathing remark and a sarcastic 'wish-you-well'. And now they're quite literally two different people -many different people, in her case-, and whatever bridge still connects them to the past is now weak and crumbling.

Will it feel this way with Tim too? With her daughter, her wife, her cousin? Though she's back after so long, she's not the person any of them lost, just enough of it to hurt them.

"Sasha..." She can hear Jon under her starting to speak, and she shakes her head.

"I'm fine. Just- I'm fine." She turns to Oliver again. He's still giving her that pained, sorrowful look, and Sasha looks away. "Tell him what you need to tell him."

Oliver sighs, and moves around them to crouch by Jon's head.

"I'm sure you've noticed by now, but-"

"Humans are dying here," Jon interrupts. "It makes sense, but it's still unexpected."

"Do you know what that means?"

She feels Jon nod.

"It's not a big leap," he says, and Helen snorts.

"You don't need to be Martin to figure it out?" She asks.

"Exactly," Jon says, and the smugness in his tone makes Sasha smile. "The Watcher isn't loving the revelation, I must say."

"I didn't think it would," Oliver agrees. "There's plenty still here, but mine isn't the only End domain."

"Not by a mile. And other avatars are not as into the passive observer style as you are," Jon says. "Which is a bit surprising from you, by the way."

"Is it really? t's not like trying to help ever did me or anyone any good." Oliver shrugs.

"It did me a lot of good, I'd say," Jon's voice has turned almost contemplative.

It feels like an eternity, before Oliver responds with another question.

"What about everyone else?" he asks in a careful, measured tone.

And then another one, before Jon speaks again.

"I... can't speak for anyone else, but- but Oliver, I'm grateful I woke up. For many reasons," he says thoughtfully. "Even if I shouldn't be."

Out the corner of her eye, Sasha sees Oliver nod slowly.

"What will you do about this?"

Jon sighs. "I don't really know. The Mother and the Watcher are both trying to take me to the panopticon, but I suspect they each have a different goal once they get me there, and I can't say I care much for either of their plans, whatever they are."

"That'll make them happy," Oliver observes. Then, after a moment, "you know what's funny?"

"Historically, I don't," Jon says in a dry, monotone voice that makes Sasha snort. "What is?"

"I could feel you, back at the hospital. You were halfway into my patron by the time I opened the door for you to leave if you wanted," Oliver says. "You weren't afraid of dying back then. You felt mostly... irritated."

Jon sighs. "I didn't want to- I couldn't stand not knowing what had happened with the others. Or why this had happened to me."

"I figured. But yes, you weren't afraid." Oliver shrugs. "You are now, though."

There is silence, as Jon contemplates how to respond to that.

"Didn't have much to leave behind back then," Jon shrugs. "Sasha? I think it's time we get going. Helen left."

"Oh?" Sasha turns around, only to find that Helen and the door are nowhere to be seen, and she's already halfway through getting off Jon. "Well, that sucks."

"It's okay, it worked for a lot longer than the last time," Jon smiles up at her as he gets up, his eyes already turning the poisonous neon green of the Beholding. "I'll see you soon, and... thank you, Oliver."

"It was nothing. Really," Oliver says quietly, watching Jon walk away. "So... so you cut him off from the Eye?"

"Both of us," Sasha corrects him. "One of us can weaken the call so he's conscious, but both of us can make him stop."

"That must be useful."

"It is." Sasha shrugs. She should say something else, but she can't for the life of her figure out what. She's no longer the Graham he knew and loved a lifetime ago. "I better get going. I have to keep up with him."

It's only about a dozen or so steps, that Oliver speaks again.

"Sasha?" He asks, and it's the same tone he used for her old name before, despite the word itself being different.

"Yes?" She half turns to look at him, keeping an eye on Jon even as her heart hammers in her chest.

"It was- it's nice to know you're back," he says. His lips are curled in the gentle smile that not once failed to make Sasha respond in kind, not even now.

"You too," she says. Then, because she has to, because it wouldn't be fair otherwise, "I'm different- I'm not the one you knew. Not really."

Oliver seems to mull this over for a couple seconds, before looking back up at her with those uncanny pale eyes.

"I'm not, either." He shrugs. "But... those two didn't end up well anyways, did they?"

Sasha snorts; it feels like a weight is dissolving off her stomach, and she gives him another smile before she goes to turn again.

"Don't be a stranger, Ollie."

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The Eye feasts and feasts and feasts, gorging gluttonously on its brethren themselves feeding.

The other entities have ever resented it for that, but there's little they can say when it was the Beholding and its avatars that brought for the world they've been crawling towards for millennia. Feeding it with the suffering they cause is the least they can do.

And still, the feeding isn't quite as satisfactory as it should, not after the Archive's continual revelations, which the Eye is increasingly peeved about, were overlooked by the Pupil in his search for triumph.

More humans have to be being created now, despite the world's new state. Even the Lonely bred its own stock. Surely they won't all end up waltzing into Terminus' cold, impassive embrace.

The eye feasts, but what before felt a scrumptious banquet tastes like ash, and scatters just as fast.

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

"If we fix this," Tim shrugs by the other side of the pit.

It's easier to believe it like this, that Gerry doesn't want him just because of Jon.

"Hm. I don't know. Traveling, maybe. I liked that before. And now I don't have to stay at the Institute, so..." Tim shrugs brusquely. "You?"

"Well... we have to stay up north until Gerry's carrots are ready to harvest-"

"Stop that," Gerry smacks a hand against his thigh, his face coloring charmingly in the light of the fire.

"I'm serious! I've got plans for those carrots," Martin snorts. "But yeah, after that... I don't know? I don't want my flat back, and Jon probably lost his already..."

They- maybe the cottage? If they get Daisy back, they could purchase it from her. If they don't- well, she won't be asking for it back anyways.

The three months they spent there were nothing short of heavenly, and Martin remembers even the awkwardness of learning to move around each other with undeniable fondness, boundaries and tastes learned slow and carefully, like they had all the time in the world.

They'd been very naïve, in hindsight.

"The bookstore and my mother's house above it are still standing," Gerry pipes up. "We'd have to find out if Gertrude did something with the papers; hopefully it won't matter that the owner was dead for a while."

"It's still sad though," Martin boops him on the nose. It's hard to feel down when faced against Gerry's absurd sense of humour.

"Oh, tragic. I hear he left behind two grieving boyfriends, he was apparently supernaturally handsome and charismatic."

"Bit of a big head, though. But hey, there's no accounting for taste," Martin shrugs, then smiles when Gerry places a kiss on his shoulder. "But yeah... I guess it's an option. I just didn't expect you'd want to live th-"

"We can raze it to the ground, sell the plot and use the money to purchase something," Gerry cuts in, his voice casual and light.

Tim's eyes flash orange across the campfire though, so Martin guesses there's a lot more feeling in the remark than what Gerry meant to put into words.

They sit in silence for a moment, until Martin softly squeezes Gerry's shoulders.

"I wouldn't be opposed to a little flat, I suppose. Granted that there are no wet towels left on the bathroom floor."

"What kind of unconditional love is this?" Gerry laughs.

"If Jon loves us less because of improperly dusted surfaces, I can love you less for having to step on a towel at three in the morning." Marin smiles. This feels good. They will fix this. They will.

"I still can't believe you two tried cleaning in front of Jon," Tim snorts. "Did you learn nothing from the first three months down at the archives, Martin?"

Martin shrugs. "I learned he liked his tea with two sugars, he was less of an ass when I made it that way."

"Your taste in men sucks," Tim says for the umpteenth time, rolling his eyes to the sound of Martin's laughter.

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

"We'll need to stop him soon," the Dist- Helen says. Her voice reaches the Archive as if through water, the call of the Spider adding to the natural muddying of the Spiral.

"So soon?" Sasha- yes, it's Sasha, the real one. "He said we shouldn't do it too often, didn't he? Or they'd get impatient."

"It will be a short one," Helen reassures. Just like everything else Helen does, it's not too reassuring. "I've been keeping something for him, and he's going to need it before you go into that one."

"...You know? That was also very annoying back when you were Michael."

The Archive feels its lips curl into something resembling a smile. With all the overlap between Stranger and Spiral, it's not too surprising that they bounce off each other so easily.

"You still went to the cemetery, didn't you?"

"That says more about my lack of self preservation than it does about your powers of persuasion, if you ask me," Sasha says dryly. "Should I sit on him again?"

"Oh, for sure. She's not going to like it one bit." Helen's sharp, angled smile is all too easy to picture.

"Wonder why she hasn't stopped you yet, then."

"Can't reach me in here," Helen responds, and the Archive hears a loud creak, like old hinges and wood. "Dear Tim did quite an exhaustive cleaning last time he was in me."

"...You're just saying stuff to make me curious on purpose aren't you?"

Helen chuckles. "There's just enough Beholding in there."

"Real funny," Sasha says, and then there's a pair of slender arms wrapping themselves around its torso, and then a long hand does the same around its wrist, and the call fades off into the background.

Jon blinks owlishly up at the sky, a bit disoriented as he always is whenever Sasha and Helen call him back.

The sky blinks back, and Jon rolls his eyes before focusing on his captors.

Sasha's barely older than a teenager today, he realises with a pang of sadness. It's- not having known them personally, it's easy to ignore the many victims the Not Them took, the many lives it cut short far too early.

Young Lisbeth Ackerman had meant only to squeeze in a last minute rehearsal for their acting club's performance, even willing to ignore the prop table that had unnerved them so much the whole week.

Still, this body's strong and heavy enough that it will take Jon some effort to break free when he inevitably starts trying.

"Hi. Want me to sit on your stomach?" Sasha asks, leaning her head on his shoulder as she tangles her fingers behind his waist. "Your lap?

"Hi... My- my lap I think. I should be able to see- Helen said she had something for me?" He turns to look as they lower themselves to the ground, and finds that the hand on his wrist extends into a forearm and then an arm clad in a pristine purple suit jacket that disappears behind a bright yellow door.

'That doesn't bode too well for Martin,' says Helen's voice behind the wood, and Jon's heart skips a beat.

"H- Helen?" He asks, his voice hoarse with anticipation.

'-oesn't. But I'm- I wonder if you'd be this far gone, if I hadn't turned you away when you first came to me.'

"It's time," Helen says; Jon can only barely catch a glimpse of her mischievous grin through the cracked door.

And then a lone tape recorder pokes through the threshold.

'Is that what this is, then? Making amends?' A tired sigh. Has he always sounded this exhausted?

'Not really. I- we were always going to change, I think. Our only choice is how we do it.' The sound of something being pushed across a flat surface, and Jon remembers the eerie stillness of the office, the hopelessness after Anabelle's revelation. 'I hear you collect them?'

'Only until it's time.'

'Time for what?'

'I don't know.' An amused huff that is echoed from behind the door, even as Helen's hand convulses around his wrist. 'Doesn't it frustrate you, Jon?'

A little, choked up laugh that has Sasha giving him a little squeeze in her arms. 'You'll have to be a bit more specific.'

'All these rules about what should and shouldn't be done. We are power. Why should we be contained?'

Helen's hand flinches and spasms, and Jon reaches out almost desperately to grab on to her jacket. There's- this feels like Eric Delano's tape, and even back then the Spider never did factor avatars helping each other into her plans. There's something here that he needs to hear, and she will not stop him.

'I think... Because I want to be contained.' Jon says so many months ago. A man not yet broken but starting to crack, held together only by the flimsy promise of hope. 'If I'm going to be a monster, I'm going to be one on my own terms.'

Jon feels his breath catch on his throat, as the feelings that back then accompanied the words rush back into him.

'How noble of you.' Helen says, and Sasha snorts on his lap.

'Selfish, really. It's the only thing I have left.'

'Didn't she say it wouldn't matter, in the end? The grand scheme of things, and all that?'

'It matters to me.'

'So you'll spend the entire journey there being miserable, just for the sake of some moral high ground?'

'If I weren't miserable in this situation, I wouldn't be Jon. I- maybe the Spider dropped me gift-wrapped at the Eye's front door, yes. But it can't take that from me-'

"...It can't take who I am," Jon speaks over his own voice.

There's- Sasha's weighing him down, and Helen is still trying to cling to him, and the Eye and the Web are pulling him forward while his pained heart pulls him back, and it's just- it's just too much.

He earned his happy ending, and they tore it from him. Just like his life, his loved ones, his home, his hope for a future.

His hands clench -the burnt one with a spasm of mind-clearing pain- in Helen's jacket, in Sasha's sweater.

"Jon?" Sasha whispers against his shoulder, her breath hot through the fabric; a reminder that she's alive because of him. Because of his actions, not the Eye's, not the Spider's.

"Let me up," he says, and when Sasha leans back in surprise her face is illuminated in an eerie green glow that makes her skin look pale and greyish. "I need to be up."

Helen's hand spasms so violently it releases its hold on his wrist, and a moment later Jon feels the sharp sting of her knife-like fingers in the flesh of his forearm, trying to anchor herself by whatever means possible.

And Jon looks up.

At the panopticon so far away, at the empty expanse before them where he Knows the Mother of Puppets waits patiently for her little toys to return, dancing to the tune she plays so cheerfully.

The glow of his eyes Illuminates the way ahead, and for a moment Jon fancies himself a beacon, a lighthouse standing impassively while the storm rages around it.

The world around him trembles, rises up to meet the one who created it, who gave it a new purpose.

"I think," he says, his voice deep and laden with power, just like he remembers it being when he brought the world down. "I'm quite done being told what to do."

And the call breaks.

It feels like coming up from a deep dive and breaking the surface to take a deep breath, like he can see the world around him clearly for the first time since his time at the cottage.

The pain of Helen's fingers digging into his flesh is sharp in a way it wasn't before, like it's Jon who's feeling it rather than the Archives, which he guesses is just the thing.

"...Are you okay?" Sasha asks, and Jon nods a bit shakily, grateful for her arms around him as he doesn't feel too steady on his feet at the moment.

"I just- I'm going to need a moment," he says, squeezing back at Sasha's chubby frame.

And so they stand there, their silhouettes profiled by the bright, angry orange light of the burning city waiting ahead of them.

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

This new domain feels... odd, is the best way Gerry can describe it.

Familiar but not quite right, like visiting your childhood home after a few decades, and finding you no longer fit in it, if you ever really did.

All around them hundreds, maybe thousands of people walk towards their own death, dragging their feet along the bright, pulsating red root that marks their individual ends.

"This one feels worse than the Stranger," Martin grumbles by his side.

"You think so?" Gerry hums absentmindedly.

There's something almost peaceful to the victims' journey, a sort of poetic acceptance to their long-awaited rest. Like-

"Gerry?" Martin's hand lands on his bicep, pulling him to a stop.

"Hm?" Gerry blinks, looking up at him with a lazy smile.

"...No." Martin frowns, snapping his fingers an inch from his eyes. "Cut it out, I'll pinch you."

"Cut what- oh, fuck!" Gerry flinches away at the sudden jab of pain, his mind coming back into focus. It feels a little like waking up from the dormant, pseudo-conscious state he remembers from the book and-

Ah. Of course.

"Are you with me?" Martin asks, his hand still heavy on his arm.

"Let's revisit that later, but yes," he blinks a couple more times, careful to keep his eyes on Martin instead of focusing on any of the victims. "Where's Tim?"

"We were having a conversation before you went Walking Dead on us," Tim's voice behind him sounds decidedly grumpy.

"What happened?" Martin's hand moves from his arm to cup his cheek, and Gerry feels his face warm up at the tenderness in the gesture. It's not- despite being so liberal with his own touch, he's not too used to others reciprocating in kind. "I thought the Eye-"

"The book," Gerry's voice sounds a bit hoarse when he forces it out again. "I'm- I did spend a good chunk of time wishing for an End of my own, I suppose."

"...Ah."

"I'm fine now, it's- it just felt familiar," Gerry says as reassuring as he can even as he still hears the siren call of Terminus all around him. "I'm sorry for scaring you."

It takes a few more moments, but Martin eventually huffs with what could pass as amusement. "Just warning you, if you do it again I'm just going to drag you out."

"You know what? That sounds perfectly fair, you deserve your own 'dragging a stubborn mule of a man away from a fear entity's grip' experience, it's life-changing." The smile comes to Gerry's lips a lot easier now, and he scrunches his nose at Martin just to make him snort and shake his head in fond exasperation.

"So funny, mister Keay..."

"This is very sweet and all," Tim grunts behind them, "but could we please get going? This place is not even scary, it's just depressing."

"I'm sorry it's not up to your standards," says a new voice, and Gerry whips around with Martin in tow.

The newcomer is a slender, young black man with short cropped dark hair, giving them an unimpressed stare with his eerie grey-white eyes.

"We don't want any trouble," Gerry says, slowly and carefully. There are three of them, but End avatars are different. He's not too sure any of them can even be killed anymore, but all they need is to pass through; better to do it without any fanfare. "We'll just be on our way."

"Everyone is, it seems," the man rolls his eyes, before pinching the bridge of his nose. "No, ignore that. Sorry, I'm not having a great time."

Gerry risks a look at the travelling corpses in lieu of voicing his retort, and the man shakes his head.

"Yes, I know. It's not like I can do anything about that, though, so-"

"It's- you're him," Tim's voice cuts through like a knife, and Gerry's surprised to see his brow furrowed in thought. He hasn't heard of this particular avatar, and he can't imagine why Tim would've either. "With the- Martin, the veins."

"The- what?" Martin scowls in confusion.

The newcomer seems collected and peaceful, but Gerry keeps his gaze trained on him; he's met kind monsters before.

"You came by the Archives to warn Gertrude she would die," Tim says, and Gerry has to rip his eyes from the man then. "Jon asked me to look for him," he says, and the tiniest pinprick of orange glow alights in the depths of his dark eyes when he turns to look at them. "He said the Web kept me from finding him. His name is Oliver Banks."

Gerry feels Martin's hand twitch in his arm, as the man nods in response to Tim's words.

"Apparently I’ve made of trying to help archivists somewhat of a hobby," Oliver shrugs, before his gaze settles on Gerry. "You feel like the End."

"Books fear me, the Entities want me," he says with a shrug as Martin's hand flinches on his arm again, and Tim snorts. "Are you going to let us through?"

"Ah. Gerard Keay, then." Oliver's gaze is a bit unnerving still, but Gerry holds it as steadily as he can, with the certainty that he's simply not going to die until- "You're going after Jon, aren't you?"

Huh.

"How'd you know?"

"Your root ends with him," Oliver half-shrugs, tilting his head to the side as his gaze intensifies. "Or... starts. I've never seen anything quite like you."

"He gets that a lot," Martin cuts in dryly. "Now if you excuse us, we ought to get going," he adds, when Oliver doesn't immediately look at him.

"Yes, I suppose you should," Oliver nods in the end. "They aren't too far ahead."

"Got it, thank you, bye."

Gerry arches an eyebrow as Martin marches on, pulling him along by his grip on his arm.

"They?" Tim asks behind them, but Martin is channelling a draft horse and they're out of earshot by the time Oliver responds, if he even does.

They stop when they reach the end of the territory, which is as any other liminal stretch between domains; just empty, barren land with little to no defining features other than a rock or two.

Martin very tellingly doesn't let go of his arm.

"So. Are we going to talk about that?" Gerry arches an eyebrow.

"About the dead people walking, or you wanting to join them?" Martin huffs, going to sit on a boulder a few feet away.

Gerry snorts fondly, walking calmly up to him.

"I told you why I wanted to walk with them," he shrugs. "Are you going to tell me why you were jealous of that man?"

Martin's head whips up to look at him like a deer in the headlights, and Gerry feels a burst of triumph in his chest. Getting one over Martin doesn't happen often, and he doesn't think he'll ever stop enjoying it.

"I wasn't- where on earth did you get the idea that I was jealous?!"

"Martin, not six months ago you were looking at me like that," Gerry rolls his eyes. "So either you're jealous, or you have a very curious way of showing me you don't like me."

"You know what, I'm starting to question it myself," Martin grumbles, his face colouring a little when Gerry laughs. "Stop that. Come here."

"Coming, coming," Gerry says consolingly, taking a seat next to Martin and throwing an arm over his hunched shoulders. "What is it?"

"...Jon was in a coma for about three months," he says in the end.

Gerry nods. "Melanie did mention something like that when I woke up and she was threatening him with a knife, yes."

Martin's lips twitch, but they don't quite smile, and his eyes are still downcast and, when Gerry leans in a bit closer, going somewhat grey.

"I went in to see him every day," Martin says, his voice not white sullen anymore, just... defeated. "Every day for three months. I talked to him, I asked him to come back, but- and this Oliver guy went in once, gave him a state- it wasn't even a statement, he just spoke to him! And-"

"And Jon woke up?" Gerry completes the thought when Martin abandons it. Then, after a weak nod from the man, he adds. "He's an avatar of the End, Martin."

"It doesn't matter," Martin remarks sullenly. "All I know is he pulled Jon back. I couldn't bring him back from the End, I couldn't bring him back from the Buried, and I wasn't even there when you called him out from the Dark. I keep failing him when he needs me the most and-"

"If it helps somewhat, you didn't even try to pull him out of the Buried, I'm still convinced you could've reached him."

"...Gerry, how on earth would that help?" Martin deadpans, and Gerry holds his hands up in surrender.

"I said if. All I'm saying is I just know you went straight for the tapes idea because of the Lonely. It worked just fine in the end, but if you'd called him, he would've heard."

"But then-"

"The End is different, Martin." Gerry's arm goes back to its place on Martin's shoulders, his free hand coming to tangle their fingers together. "Terminus doesn't give up its victims so easily. I doubt anyone but one of its avatars could've opened the way back for Jon, especially if the Web was involved."

"...It's very stupid, isn't it?" Martin mutters after a few minutes.

"You can't help how you feel." Gerry squeezes his hand. "As long as you understand it's not something you need to be worried about."

Martin snorts softly, before pressing a kiss to Gerry's cheek. "I should learn from you, then?"

"Oh no, I'm not possessive but I'm very jealous," Gerry shrugs with a sheepish smile, "I just dealt with it in a completely different way, apparently."

He squeezes Martin's hand again when he breaks down laughing, satisfied with his efforts. Gerard Keay, paragon of emotional maturity and healthy communication.

"Am I interrupting?" Tim's voice breaks him from his reverie, and Gerry looks up to find him standing a few feet away, arching an eyebrow at the tableau they cut.

"We were just done," Martin responds, somewhat breathless still. "Did he tell you who Jon was with?"

Tim shakes his head, his brow furrowed. "He just said some other avatars. Helen, I guess."

"Maybe he found Daisy?" Martin asks, his amusement fading into intrigue.

"Maybe..." Tim mutters.

Gerry arches an eyebrow. "You don't sound too happy about that."

Tim gives a half-hearted shrug, and a tired sigh.

"I saw her change, down at the tunnels. It was- I never said it because Basira had been running herself ragged, but... at this point, I wouldn't want anyone to find Daisy, not even him."

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

All around her it smells like fire and burnt hair and cooked meat. The smoke tastes of salt, like evaporated tears, and she can hear anguished cries coming from countless ragged throats.

These aren't prey, she decides. The hunter feeds on panic and adrenaline fueled by the eons-old instinct to escape or be killed. She despises the taste of sorrow, of hopeless desolation. Of those that have given up and lost all the fight they could give.

The fire licks at her sides, at her paws. It singes off patches of raggedy sand-coloured fur, and makes every step on her already misshapen legs even more agonising. Her form, which is only suited for giving chase and taking prey down, is all but encumbering as she tries to make her way through the burning buildings.

What was she looking for here?

Was it- retribution?

She came here to settle debts, to pay harm with harm. To find-

"And to what do I owe the honour? The great and powerful Archivist, and his pet monsters?" says a voice, up, up, up in one of the burning buildings, and the hunter's chest swells with a snarl that crackles louder than the fire around her, before she jumps.

The building's wall cracks under her weight, her claws digging deep into crumbling concrete to pull the hunter up. The smoke chokes and blinds her, but the sting barely registers in her mind. All she has to do is go up, up, up.

"I'll be honest, we could've taken the long way. I was just curious," says another voice, and the hunter flinches, her torn, leathery ears perking up in recognition. Is this the prey she's looking for?

"-were already a little nosy prick back then. Sometimes I still regret not having killed you, your pain was so tasty," a voice says. It's hoarse, like the speaker has spent years inhaling smoke, and bitter. It sounds like mean laughter and pained cries, and the hunter's hackles raise.

"It's a very popular opinion, I've found," says the other voice, quieter, tired. Unamused.

The Hunter's brain flares up with alarm as recognition finally hits. This is the voice in the deep, the one that spoke of home, and he shouldn't be here- or- or should he?

The hunter stops her climb for a moment as her smoke-addled mind snaps and chases at itself. Which one has the blood that sings to her? Which is the one she's hunting?

"But then again, I wouldn't have this sweet, sweet little corner of hell to myself would I?"

"Ideally, no. I suppose you've enjoyed it so far?"

"Who was this again?" asks a third voice, one that sounds like confusion, like lies. It makes the Hunter angry, she doesn't like its kind. It was voices like it that took her into the deep and tight and crushing, where her will broke along with her mind and body.

"No one, really."

"Oh, is that so?" the first voice cackles. "Look at that, becomes an eminence and forgets about the ones who made him. You wouldn't be here without my mark, Archivist."

"You say that like it's a bad thing, though I can see why you would be under the impression that I ought to be grateful for that."

"Jon- the fire is-"

"Of course you'd be one of those," the voice laughs again, "all holier-than-thou and pretending you're above the rest of us. Pretending you're not the worst of us. Does it make it easier for you to sleep at night, after what you did?"

"I don't sleep much," says the voice. Then calmly, quietly. "I'm going to kill you, Jude."

"Jon?!" the lying voice asks. "You said-"

"You're bluffing," the first voice barks. "You're feeling their pain aren't you? Feeding off of it, like the parasite you are. Are you enjoying it?"

There's a pause, during which the hunter crawls higher up towards the smoking window the voices are coming from. She's so close, so close to being done.

"I am."

"Why would you shut down an easy meal?"

"That's just who I am, I suppose." The response doesn't wait this time, and the voice in the deep is firm and calm, before it adds almost sheepishly, "that, and I really don't like you."

The steel frame of the window is partially melted, soft and malleable under the hunter's claws, and she can finally see inside the room, preparing her hind legs for a jump. The woman reeks of wax and smoke, facing away from the hunter and towards-

The hunter freezes.

And she knows all of a sudden, with the sort of instinct all great predators are born with, that she's no longer the biggest danger in the room.

The creature on the woman's other side pulls at her as much as his presence terrifies her, soothes her and agitates her in equal measure.

Apex, whispers some tiny, primal voice at the back of her mind, and a low, anxious growl leaves her throat.

She should leave. She should turn tail and run and make sure to never again cross paths with this being, to never-

"You can't be angry at me still, Jon. You shook my hand didn't you? It was your fault, like everything else," the woman laughs, and the hunter sees red.

The woman crumbles like sand under her weight, and her claws dig into soft, pliant flesh that tears so easily, that bleeds out choking rivulets of thick black smoke that swirls up into the hunter's nose and eyes.

Boiling wax sticks to her teeth and sears her gums and tongue as the hunter bites and tears and chews. The woman is not so much afraid as she's shocked at the pain, at finding herself a victim. Prey.

Swallowing her bit by bit satisfies a deep, old hunger seated deep within the hunter's stomach, and she feels herself relax at last.

It took her a lifetime but she did right by her pack, which is what matters, she thinks as she plops down on the hot floor to lick the wax off her paws.

"Jon, what the hell is that thing?!" The hunter whips her face up at the voice. She's on the shorter side, plump-faced and with a large, soft belly, and she reeks of the Stranger.

The hunter hates her immediately.

She climbs to her feet again; her humped back bumps against the burning ceiling, searing some more fur off.

"Uh, you- you may want to go into Helen," the man says as the hunter takes the first step towards them. He's small in size, and were it nor for the power the hunter feels contained within his frame, she could swallow him in a single bite.

"I really don't," the stranger says. She takes a step back, and the man steps before her. "Jon-"

"It's- she can't hurt me," the man says, though he doesn't sound so sure. There is a certain hint of fear to his scent, a dubious, sad sort of terror. What scares this monster, the hunter realises, is not knowing if he should be afraid of her. "I- do you remember me?"

The hunter snarls.

He smells of old paper, of shiny plastic and blood. Of suffering, so much suffering that the hunter wonders for a moment how it is that he's still walking around.

He smells of- of everything.

Darkness, lies, pain, deep, fog and all the others, they swirl around inside him like he's containing them all, like he's made out of them all.

Another step. She cannot kill him, but she can kill the stranger.

"Y- you said you'd kill the other one, maybe you want to redirect that murderous energy?"

"I- no!" The man's face pales. He takes a step back as the hunter advances towards him. "No, she- Daisy?"

"This is the cop?!" The woman retreats all the way back to the crumbling, smoking door. "The one that tried to kill you?!'

"Daisy, can you hear me?" the man asks again, and the hunter responds with another snarl. She doesn't want to fight this being, but she will if he stands in the way of her prey. "We've- we were worried about you, all of us."

There's a thin, pale scar in the man's throat, and something aches in the hunter's chest.

"Please," says the man. His voice is soft, and it reaches the hunter as if through many miles of rock. "Please, Daisy. I don't want to hurt you."

"I don't think she'll do you the same courtesy, Jon." The stranger has managed to open the door behind him. "Come on."

"Sasha, I can't- I need to at least try to-"

"She's clearly not recognizing you, let's get out of here!"

"We can't."

"What?!"

"Don't- Sasha, listen to me," the man gives the stranger a worried, anxious look that sends a pang of recognition through the hunter's mind. "Don't try to run, she wants to chase you."

"I- why me?!"

The man's eyes, large and dark and sad, turn towards the hunter again.

"She's not too fond of the Stranger."

"Well- well, that makes two of us," the woman stutters, but she lets go of the door. "Jon..."

"She's in there," Jon- the man says. "Daisy, I found you once-"

The hunter snarls, but he trudges on, unimpeded. He's always been so stubborn.

"No, listen! I've been looking for you! Basira's looking for you!"

The name feels like a whip across the face, and the hunter recoils. It's a name of- of coconut and yellow, a name whispered with a last, dying breath.

'Will you find me?'

It pulls at her like a hot-red hook through her entrails, the name, the man's voice.

'Always.'

There's dirt closing off all around her, sharp stones digging into her flesh, and try as she may she simply cannot draw a breath that doesn't smell of rotting old wood and rain. Her ears are ringing with thousands of agonised screams, and the hunter can't tell if it's the Desolation's prey or her own, or if there's any difference at all.

"Jon, I- fuck!"

"Daisy- !"

The man's blood on her tongue tastes familiar, and his fear is delicious and filling and wrong. It burns her tongue and makes her choke like she just bit into something foul, but her jaws are locked around him and she feels-

She feels defenseless.

She was so afraid of this, of losing control, of losing herself.

But she did it for him, for- for her. It was worth it, to give herself away one last time. Why does this hurt? What is she missing?!

"Daisy!" The man is screaming in pain, and it hurts, the word jabs at her blood-lusted mind like a knife, and the concern in the man's voice is the cruel hand twisting the weapon in the wound. "Daisy, please!"

"Daisy, the quiet!"

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

"You know... I still stand by my opinion that the carousel was far too on the nose, but this isn't a much better look," Tim sighs.

The heat of the fire all around them feels like a pleasant, almost familiar warmth, and the victims' pained cries taste absolutely scrumptious with sorrow. It serves to remind him of what he is, and he hates it.

The flames nearby flare up, fed by his resignation.

"I don't know where you got the idea that these things know how to be subtle," Gerry says, pulling him out of his mind. When he looks over, the man is almost done putting his hair into a messy bun, which he ties with a hair tie Martin pulls from his own wrist before pulling the hood over his head and tug on the drawstrings, presumably to keep the ash out. "If it makes you feel better though, you're as far removed from an avatar of the Desolation as you could be. I think the reason it brought you back-"

"Was to make me miserable, I know," Tim grunts, as they resume their trip across the burning city. "I just- I hate it here."

Or more accurately, he hates that he doesn't hate it. That knowing everyone around him is for once in as much pain as he constantly is in gives him a sense of vindication he hasn't experienced in years.

He could stay here, he thinks.

They pass the remnants of a burning hospital, and Tim breathes in the hopeless cries of those who will just never find peace again, not in this place. He could make it so that each and every one of them suffers what he suffered- what's the saying?

Misery loves company.

"Are we going to run into someone here too?" he asks after a while. "I don't think I ever met anyone from the Desolation."

"I don't think so," Gerry says carefully. "This place is....recently unoccupied."

"What's that even mean?" Martin turns to look at them with an arched eyebrow. "How would you know?"

Gerry shoots a look at the infinite, unblinking eyes that cover the sky.

"Right-" Martin nods, "dumb question."

"Was it Jon? Like he did with the- with the thing that took Sasha?" Tim asks.

"I... Think? I only get vague knowledge, nothing too specific. Right now all I know is this place is looking for someone to sit on the big chair." Gerry looks at him out of the corner of his eye, and Tim keeps his gaze fixed firmly on him. "How are you doing?"

"I don't like what you're implying," is all he says, sending the closest flames flaring up into the sky.

"That's good. I don't like it too much either." Gerry looks on ahead. "But here we are."

"Here we are? What- oh." Martin says before following Gerry's gaze. He seems to deflate, but his colour surprisingly doesn't wane when he turns to look at him. "Tim?"

"I'm not going to stay here," Tim says so shortly it sounds strained even to his ears, like he's trying to convince himself more than he's trying to reassure Martin. "I won't. I-"

"Tim," Martin repeats, gentler this time.

"What?" Tim clenches a fist in the fabric of his jacket.

"I'm- I know you wouldn't do this-"

"I wouldn't." But he would, wouldn't he? Hasn't his entire existence been about causing pain, ever since he woke up? To Jon, to Martin, to himself- hasn't he fed on it, fueling his fire with their loss? "Martin-"

"I know. But- but I think you need to look up," Martin's hand feels warm for once, the chill of the Lonely chased away by the fire's heat.

"I don't want to," Tim shakes his head. "Just- just guide me out."

"...I get the feeling that won't get us anywhere," Martin says gently. "Gerry? Am I wrong?"

"It would be too easy, I think. We've established the Desolation will gladly feed on him, and- and the Watcher wants to see him choose."

Tim shuts his eyes tight, resenting in a way he never did when he was human the bright orange spots that explode behind his eyelids as he does. He- he doesn't want it.

Not the pain blossoming at his chest, nor the power he can feel at his fingertips, or the voice -his own voice- that tells him this is justice, that he deserves this.

Who knows pain if not him? Who knows better how to rip these humans to pieces, how to show them just how insignificant and hopeless their lives are, until all they are is an agonising longing for that all that they have lost, all they have destroyed?

Who-

"Tim. You have to look." Martin's voice is still gentle, but firmer this time.

"I really don't want to," Tim says.

I really don't think I can.

"You're not alone this time." Martin's hand on his shoulder squeezes a little, and surprisingly doesn't flinch when Tim lets out a dry bark of laughter.

"That's rich, coming from you." There he goes again, striking where he knows it'll hurt the most, where-

"It is, isn't it?" Martin's voice sounds like- Tim opens his eyes to see the sad, gentle smile spread across his features. "I think it makes sense, though."

"It does."

"I would know."

"You would."

Martin doesn't react to the jabs, doesn't retaliate with the pointed, barbed remarks Tim knows he's capable of dealing.

"I don't think you want to be here anymore," he goes on casually, like they're talking about leaving the office early. "I don't care much for it either."

The crackling of the fire calls him, the screams of those that are like him, that decided to take out their hurt on the world, to strike first, lest it strikes them down.

"Martin-" it feels like the smoke is choking him, even though that shouldn't be possible anymore. "I don't think I can say no."

"I think you need to try." Martin squeezes his shoulder again, and his voice is so calm, so casual that Tim clings to it to try and anchor his own whirlwind of emotions, before looking up.

The House of Wax museum looks just like he remembers. Just like he dreamed it would look like burning to the ground.

It smells of burnt plastic and wax, and through the smoke-blackened windows he sees silhouettes, so many silhouettes. Some are human of course, clawing at the walls and at themselves and each other and screaming through tear-hoarse throats.

Some others move far more gracefully than they should, trapped in a haunting dance even wreathed in flames as they are.

He- this is for him.

This is the little tailor-made corner of hell afforded to him by the grief and the spite that simmer at his core.

In here, it doesn't matter how much he lost, how much he hurts, because he can make sure everyone else hurts more. Isn't this what the Desolation means for him, a way to pay back the world for how much it took from him?

"Tim?" Martin asks gently. "Are we going?"

Tim wants to say yes, he knows he should. He doesn't want to stay, he's relieved to realise; his feelings about that haven't changed and the burning wax museum is not as much a lure as it is a sad reminder.

Where is he going to go?

Walking away from this doesn't mean he doesn't take it with him everywhere he goes. Not contributing to torture the people trapped in this domain doesn't mean he will not do the same to the people out there, he doesn't think he knows how to do anything else anymore.

"I- Martin, what for?" They don't really need him, do they?

"What? We're looking for Jon-"

"Well, you can keep doing that. Gerry's the one that can find him, not me," Tim sighs. "Just... just fix this mess."

Make everything right so that Tim can go back to sitting in the dark in Martin's old flat thinking about everything he lost.

"That's exactly what we're doing," Martin says firmly. "All three of us. You said you didn't want to stay."

"I don't." Tim shrugs, his eyes still glued to the blazing building, and it almost hurts to tear them from it to look at the other two. "But Martin- this is what I am. It's always going to be what I am."

"Don't be-"

"Martin, just- stop," Tim interrupts, punctuated by a loud crack from one of the museum's windows. "I've tried to fix it. It doesn't work. Maybe it's time to accept that. Maybe there was something else in there at some point, but it's gone. This is all that's left."

Martin's face crumpling down just accentuates his point, he feels like. Dealing with Tim is like trying to handle broken glass, you're bound to slice your hand open at some point, no matter how careful you are.

"Tim-"

"Hey. I'll say something too," Gerry cuts in, leaning around Martin to look at him. His eyes are Watcher-green and he has no doubt the man is seeing more than what Tim means to let out. "First off, I think you're an asshole."

What.

"...This is your pep talk?" Martin gives his man a very unimpressed look, but Gerry merely shrugs.

"It's true. You get under my nerves, but they love you, so I'll deal with you," he goes on. "You hurt people when they try to help you, because you're hurt. It sucks, sometimes we get dealt a shitty hand."

The flames covering the building flare up in response to Tim's irritation, but he pays them no mind in favour of glaring back at the man. "You would-"

"I would know, that one's not going to stick with me." Gerry clicks his tongue. "But I digress. What I mean to say is I'm impartial here. You can't try to rationalise this as Martin being Martin and trying to cheer you up because he likes you, like you were doing just now."

"You're making a real good case to get me to come." Tim's eye twitches. He sees Martin's eyebrows raise, and his lips twitch like he's holding back a smile. "It's not like I think Martin's a doormat or-"

"Good! He isn't, but he and Jon are willing to let you get away with a lot of crap I don't particularly care about." His eyes are fixed on him with laser-like focus, yet he speaks casually enough that Tim gets the feeling he isn't even interested in the conversation, which is- Tim no longer feels too guilty about melting his hand by the carousel. "I only met you after the Desolation brought you back, so I have to imagine you weren't always an insufferable prick, just most of the time. But I did notice something about you."

"Oh?" Tim grunts, annoyed. "Really? Aside from that charming diagnosis of my psyche, you had time to notice something about me?"

"I'm observant like that," he says, and his neon-green eyes flare up a little. "I've only seen you use what the Desolation gave you one time, you know? Which is quite tame for avatars with your particular alignment, like I told you."

"I- what?"

"Come on, Tim." Gerry smirks. "I'm sure you remember lighting up Manuela Domínguez like a summer bonfire."

Tim clenches his fists by his sides. "Don't- it's not like I enjoyed it, I had to do that!"

"Oh you had to?" The asshole has the gall to fake shock. "Why?"

"Because-" Tim starts then stops, his indignant snarl stuck in his throat.

Because Jon was in danger.

Gerry's smirk grows more pronounced the longer he stays quiet, and Tim- Tim hates him for that-

"What about-"

"Stop."

"-the tunnels? With Julia and Trevor?" Gerry steamrolls over his objections, like he doesn't know the answer, like he doesn't know it's because he was trying to buy Jon time to get to Martin, to help.

"What's your point?!" he bites out. The asshole is still just standing there, looking like a particularly smug turtle with the hood of Martin's hoodie pulled tight around his face.

"My point is you're trying, Tim, whether you think it's enough or not." Gerry shrugs, and the animosity melts off of his face. "It's really the only thing we can do, any of us. It's what Martin and I will do. Now, are you coming with us, or not?"

Tim blinks. And then he blinks again. And then a third time.

The building still burns behind him -inside him-, but it's no longer the only thing in his mind. He saved Jon, that time up north. He helped save Martin, helped protect Basira. The Desolation never meant for him to do anything other than cause more pain either to himself or others, but he did it still.

He takes a step forward, and then another, and Martin and Gerry fall into step beside him, all three of them in silence.

He can only guess they did what they had to here, because they come to the end of the burning city not long after- or rather, the end of the burning city comes to them, marked by a tall, blackened building with claw marks up its side.

"Jon was here not too long ago," Gerry's eyes flare green again as he looks at the building. "We're closing the gap."

"Is that how he pulled you out of the Lonely?" Tim grunts as they watch him walk further on, looking at the ground like a hound sniffing for a trail.

"It's very frustrating, isn't it?" Martin snorts by his side. "But very effective, I'm afraid."

"I suppose," he says. Martin is smiling at him when he looks up. "What?"

"I knew you'd come."

"...I have to try, I guess," he sighs. "Is that a house up ahead?"

It looks far too normal than it has any right to be, just an old manor with a large garden, and moth-eaten curtains billowing out every open window.

"I... guess?" Martin arches an eyebrow. "Doesn't look too bad compared to the others we've seen, does it?"

"It doesn't, and I don't like it," Tim scowls. It feels... familiar. Like it's sapping warmth away, like even the Watcher averts its gaze from it. "I think we'd better take the long-"

"We have to go through the house!" Gerry's faint voice reaches them, the man merely a point of bright green profiled against the building's silhouette, waving his arms at them.

Martin winces. "...Looks like we have to go through the house."

"We have to go through the house," Tim sighs.

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

"Doesn't that feel weird?" Sasha asks, because she's mostly sure she's not in mortal danger anymore but also because that has historically never stopped her before anyways.

"I figure it feels better than going naked through the apocalypse," Helen says, sticking her head out her door a few steps away. "Besides, she's done worse."

The other woman doesn't answer.

She's clinging to Jon's hand like a kindergartner about to cross a busy street, and hasn't said a word other than his name from the moment she climbed out of the bloody, misshapen hide naked and covered in gore, and now she walks behind him in silence, dressed in the ill-fitting, torn garments of the woman she mauled to death.

She looks- frail, is the only word Sasha can think of.

Despite her lean frame being lined with muscle, despite her height and her teeth sharpened to a point, she seems lost and confused, like Jon is the only thing she's sure of anymore.

Bit of a surprising look, for someone who made him dig his own grave before she decided not to execute him.

A few steps ahead, Jon sighs.

"I- please don't bring that up. Out loud, I mean," he says.

Sasha arches an eyebrow. "First off, if you keep looking into my head, you'll see things you don't want to see-"

"That's very ironic, coming from you."

"-and second off, why? Is it a bit too R-rated for her?"

"Sasha," Jon sighs again, and she bristles.

It still irks her, to think of all that happened, all that she couldn't help with because of her stupid detour to Artifacts Storage.

"It wasn't your fault," Jon says, a lot more patiently than Sasha would've thought him capable of. "And Daisy- she's different than she was back then."

"Must've been one hell of an apology." She crosses her arms over her chest.

"Not really..." Jon looks away, his gaze fixed at some point by Sasha's shoes. "... it's not like I can forgive her for that. She knows that."

"Then? What changed?"

"She did." Jon shrugs. "It's never going to make it right, but- but she's no longer the person that could justify those things. That would do them on the first place."

"Hm," she huffs, and Jon gives her a tired smile.

"We may not be humans anymore, but we're still just... people. It's always going to be messy." He looks forward then, before squeezing at Daisy's hand and gesturing at Sasha to keep moving. "We should go on; I'm getting cold."

#vit writes #jongerrymartin #jgm #illicio

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