#Spider Writes TMA

[podcast-hemocytoblast]

What if when Michael got Distortioned he/they/it/(?) had just kept showing up to work? Imagine Gertrude comes into the archives and finds a bunch of paperwork filled out in yellow highlighter and folded into impossible shapes, and then Michael-Distortion just walks into the room door-style and sits down at his work computer so it can email Gertrude a phishing scam.

[this-cult-of-dionysus]

Nikola Orsinov || The Piper || Mikaele Salesa || Jonah’s Deception || Spider Lighter

[americanoddysey]

[saintbleeding]

[ID: Digital painting of Jon and Martin from TMA. Jon is a thin British-Indian man with long, curly, silver hair, and many scars across his face, neck, and hands. He wears an oversized, faded red jumper, and his glasses rest on top of a book on the table in front of him. Martin is a fat non-op trans man with greying brown hair and slightly unnaturally pale skin. He wears an open orange button-up short-sleeved shirt over a mint green half-binder, and holds his glasses in one hand. The two of them are leaning forward across a breakfast table to kiss, Jon gently holding one of Martin's arms, and Martin cupping Jon's face in his other hand. On the table are two mugs: a yellow one with various cats, aand a blue one with a two-tone drip effect and mushrooms on the bottom half. Framing them is an abstract orange shape, overlaid with a Magnus Institute ID badge, a boarding pass, a teabag, a highland cow with its calf, a red corded phone receiver, a corkscrew with Prentiss worms, a butter knife, two spiders, a bloodied hunting knife, and a cassette tape, the insides of which have unspooled and are curled around the other items, making up the web of one of the spiders. Behind Jon and Martin is a warm brown room with two windows, both looking out onto rolling green hills and a cloudless sunrise. End ID.]

i feel very normal about the concept of ephemerality (<- lying. lying as in deceiving but also lying as in prone on the floor)

[sourb0i]

In the interest of getting some more writing practice, I'm going to open up askbox prompts! All you have to do is send me any character (or pairing, or trio etc.) From the following list, along with an optional two other words (they can be themes, or settings, or objects-- whatever your heart desires) and I'll write a short little scene of 500 words or less.

Fandoms:

Star Trek (TOS/AOS, TNG, DS9)

The Magnus Archives

Pacific Rim

The Legend of Vox Machina

Star Wars Rebels

Danny Phantom

Zombies Run

No crossovers please! I will also be picky about which ships you send me, so submit at your own risk lol.

I'm also happy to do prompts from my own WIP novel, Only the Good Die Young! It's a scifi western about a woman searching for vengance against the woman who killed her lover and burned her town to the ground.

[kitsunesakii]

[ollieofthebeholder]

to find promise of peace (and the solace of rest): a TMA fanfic

Read from the beginning on Tumblr || AO3 || My Website

Chapter 115: May 2018

The last three words of the note were the most terrifying ones. Melanie could handle Running down something for a statement, even if she really wished he hadn’t gone alone. She could handle Be back by nine, even if—maybe because—she didn’t know what time he’d actually written it. She could even handle NOBODY PANIC, underlined seven times, because at least he’d been smart enough to know that leading off with that was the surest way to cause panic.

But Love you all—that was low-key terrifying in a way she couldn’t adequately explain. Martin didn’t just write things like that. He said it all the time, of course, and he meant it, but for him to write it in the letter like that…Melanie couldn’t shake the feeling he was writing it in case he never got the opportunity to say it again.

Which was silly. It was the rest of them that were in danger outside the Archives, not Martin. Sure, things would probably want to get at him—he was the Archivist, after all—but also, he was the Archivist, he could handle himself just fine. Gertrude Robinson had survived fifty years, and she’d done it more or less on her own. Surely Martin would last at least that long, if not longer, since he had all of them supporting him. And he wasn’t stupid, she told herself. If he’d thought it was truly that dangerous, if he was worried something might happen to him, he’d have waited until the rest of them woke up. Or if he felt like it couldn’t wait, he’d have woken someone else up to go with him.

She tried to quell the niggling feeling that, actually, he probably hadn’t thought that far ahead.

It was early enough that they could all pretend the Institute’s quiet stillness was because nobody else had arrived to start the workday yet rather than the Lonely’s influence, but late enough that even Sasha was awake. The cats had been fed and were chasing one another around the Archives—even Nod was awake and participating in the game. Melanie had managed to convince Jon to let her do something about his hair and wrestled it into something approximating a braid. Sasha and Tim had put together breakfast for everyone and were currently engaged in an argument with Gerry over why he needed to eat actual food and not just pass it up because he didn’t get a lot of sustenance out of it.

“You wouldn’t let Martin get away with this,” Tim finally pleaded, setting the squat bun in front of him. “Just…at least pretend you’re eating something.”

Gerry nodded at Melanie and Jon. “They’re not. And they actually need food.”

Melanie looked guiltily at Jon, who had the same expression on his face. She hadn’t realized she was too worried to eat properly, but…

“We’ll wait until Martin gets back,” she said decisively. “It can’t be that much longer now, can it?”

“He said he’d be back by nine,” Jon said, a bit uncertainly. “It’s only quarter to eight.”

“You know Martin. He said ‘back by nine’ as a really, really outside chance. He’ll be back any minute.” Melanie spoke with as much authority as she could muster. It wasn’t so much that she believed it as it was that she needed it to be true. The longer he was gone, the more she worried about that Love you all.

Jon didn’t look particularly convinced. He cradled his mug—cocoa, not tea, Melanie had decided they both needed it after seeing the note—and pressed it to his lips, but didn’t take a drink. He seemed to be staring at a point in the middle distance, or perhaps at the past, or perhaps simply willing Martin to appear by sheer force of thought. Suddenly his eyes focused on something in front of Melanie, and he lowered the mug with a frown. “Were you recording?”

“No, I haven’t recorded in ages, why?” Melanie followed Jon’s gaze and blinked in consternation. Sitting in front of her was a small handheld tape player.

But not just any tape player.

“What the fuck?” she said softly, reaching over to pick it up. Without conscious thought, she slid her hand under the frayed strap of PVC canvas and curled it around the black plasticine back. She traced the scuffed and faded red front with trembling fingers. “How…?”

“They turn up all over the place,” Sasha said with a shrug. “I’ve never seen that one in particular before, but they just tend to turn up.”

“No, I know this one. This was mine.” Melanie turned it over slowly, and sure enough, there it was, scratched onto the bottom in sharp, angular letters: MELANIE B KING. “It was my last Christmas present from Alastair. I had this huge collection of punk tapes I got at swap meets and charity shops, I used to listen to them all the time. But it quit working after a few years and by then everything was on CD anyway and…”

It wouldn’t work. It couldn’t work. It had to be just a broken piece of junk, and how it had ended up on her desk she had no idea. There wouldn’t even be a tape in it, and if there was…

She hit the EJECT button. The tape deck slowly puffed open, revealing a tape that could easily have been an underground band’s demo but could just as easily be a statement. Either way, it looked like it was about halfway through the tape, so at the very least, she could take a listen and see if it was worth rewinding. Scarcely knowing what she was doing, she pushed PLAY.

Gertrude Robinson’s voice came through, sharp and clear. “Get out of my Archives.”

There was a click, which made Melanie think the recorder had stopped, but then someone took a deep breath and Martin’s voice began a summing up, and she realized it was something he had listened to and made a recording of. His brief supplemental made her glad she hadn’t listened to it.

Then he said the words Hill Top Road, and she suddenly felt nauseous.

She jerked open her desk drawer and began rummaging through it as quietly as she could while still listening to the tape. Tim’s lips pressed into a thin line as Martin started enumerating all the ties the lot of them had to Hill Top Road, especially when he started listing off the Entities they knew had been active there. His revelation that the Dark had been what was after him struck her like an almost physical force, momentarily stilling her explorations, and she could tell from the long silence after he revealed it that it had struck him just as hard.

Then he recovered and spoke in a voice that sent a chill down Melanie’s spine, for reasons she couldn’t explain. “Right. I think this is a thread I need to pull. I can make the next train to Oxford and probably be back before everyone wakes up properly. It’s time to finish this once and for all. I’m heading to Hill Top Road.”

Click.

“Fuck,” Gerry spat. His hands were trembling. “Of fucking course it was the Dark. He wasn’t afraid of us leaving him behind, it was because he stopped to wipe off his glasses—I should have guessed, back then that was one of his biggest fears…”

“Martin? Afraid of the dark?” Sasha said incredulously.

“Of going blind. He’s worn glasses since he was three, and every year the glass gets thicker—he was afraid he’d eventually—” Gerry broke off. “Where the hell did you get that?”

“Aji Susie.” Melanie thumbed the switch on the password journal her mother’s youngest sister had given her at the funeral—you deserve a secret place to put your secret thoughts—that she’d never used until she started working for the Institute. She rattled off an old Cantonese tongue twister, and the journal opened with a faintly warped beeping sound, exposing the actual notebook.

Melanie’s written Chinese wasn’t going to win her any scholarship prizes, and probably even someone who read it properly wouldn’t be able to understand hers—she was sure there were errors in her characters that changed them from what she’d actually meant to write into something wholly inappropriate—but it served her purpose, which was to make notes about things she didn’t want anyone else to know about. She paged through a bit until she found the section she’d marked off to write down notes about all the statements around Hill Top Road. The first time Martin had mentioned it, she’d made the connection to the Halloween party and decided that might be something worth being concerned about, so she’d started jotting it down every time it came up and trying to make connections.

“Ivo Lesnik,” she murmured, running her fingers down the characters. “Desolation with hints of the Web. Father Burroughs, he felt the Desolation but something had already Marked him, so whatever that was he brought with him, probably the Web. Ronald Sinclair, opposite of Lesnik’s, heavy on the Web with the appearance of Agnes Montague as the Desolation. Anya Villette, definitely the Web, maybe a bit of Spiral flavor…shit!” She read her notes twice to make sure she wasn’t mistaken.

Jon had suddenly gone ashen, which told her he was thinking the same thing. “Anya Villette. Didn’t she mention a crack in reality? And we couldn’t find any record of her existing. You don’t think—”

“There’s no basement in that house,” Daisy said. She shrugged uncomfortably at Melanie’s look of surprise. “I’ve been trying to clean up the bits Basira left unfinished when she…went upstairs. Found her notes on that one a couple weeks back. Took me a while to figure out what she was getting at, but I pulled up the house plans. Poured concrete foundation. Something about a fire risk.”

“So he’s probably not in another reality,” Tim said. “Which is great. But you’ve mentioned the Web four times in a row. And whether he meant to or not…”

“There were an awful lot of Web-based metaphors in that summing up of his,” Sasha completed. “Why did he even need to go?”

“We’d have to listen to the statement to figure that out,” Gerry said slowly. “Probably.”

Melanie slammed her password journal shut and stood. “Right. You do that.” She turned and started across the Archives.

“Where are you going?” Sasha asked, sounding bewildered.

“Where do you think?” Melanie demanded without turning around or slowing down. “I’m going to find Martin.”

“Melanie, wait, I’m coming with you.” Jon scrambled after her and caught up halfway to the door.

“Neens!” Tim’s voice was sharp and commanding. It actually stopped Melanie in her tracks, and she turned around—just in time to catch the set of keys Tim had thrown at her. He looked worried but resigned. “Take my car. You’ll get there faster. We’ll try to get hold of him. Just…be careful.”

“Sure.” Melanie jangled the keys and continued out the door.

The first part of the journey was done in relative silence, with Melanie concentrating on getting out of London as fast as possible and Jon concentrating on not letting the seatbelt cut him in half when she took a turn too fast. Once she hit the M40 and the more or less straight shot to Oxford, and had time to think again, she said, “Martin’s was blue.”

“What?” Jon started and turned to look at her.

Melanie didn’t take her eyes off the road, which would have been dangerous at the speed she was driving, but she watched him from her peripheral vision. “The tape recorders. Alastair—Granddad—that’s what he gave all three of us for Christmas that year. It surprised all three of us, because he usually gave us each something different, something a bit more personal, but…he’d just had a stroke, so we assumed he hadn’t been feeling well and went for something easy. Martin’s was blue. Gerry’s was this weird mustard yellow, I think.” She drummed her fingers on the steering wheel briefly. “Martin used to record himself practicing his pieces on it, and later on he’d record his poems sometimes. Dunno if Gerry ever used his.”

Jon hummed briefly. They traveled a bit further in silence before he said quietly, “He hasn’t told me about the Halloween incident yet. I guess he didn’t want to think too hard about the Lonely, but…if it was the Dark…”

For a moment, Melanie debated telling Jon that it was Martin’s to tell, but…really it had been all of them, and it wasn’t like Martin would get mad if she did. Probably. “We’d gone to a party. Mum and Dad met in a support group for single parents, and one of the other parents hosted a party at her dad’s house on Hill Top Road—not 105, it was something like 118—for Halloween every year. I found out later it was inspired by the Agatha Christie book. Anyway, the year before Mum and Dad got married, they agreed to let Gerry be the responsible one for the three of us, so we went alone. I loved Halloween back then, loved getting to dress up and be—something I wasn’t, you know? The party was fun—or at least I was having fun—games, dancing, spooky stories, the lot. They were getting ready to do a snap-dragon—”

“Is that the game where you try to snatch raisins out of a pan of burning brandy?”

“Yeah. Martin was right, it would’ve been dangerous with my costume. I was dressed as the Beast—you know, from the Disney movie—and I had way too much fake fur, I definitely would have gone the way of the king and his cronies in ‘Hop-Frog.’ Anyway, we didn’t end up doing it, because Gerry grabbed us right before it started and said we had to go.”

“Why?”

“He didn’t say then. Later, when we finally made it to the train and were on our way home safe, he told us he’d overheard two of the girls in the washroom talking about how annoying I was, saying they’d only invited me because Martin wouldn’t have come without me, that kind of thing, and it got his back up, so he dragged us both out of there.” Melanie sighed at the memory. She’d idolized both Judith and Helen, tagging along after them like a puppy on the rare occasions she wasn’t spending time with her brothers, and finding out they’d been secretly laughing at her the whole time had hurt—not as much as it would have if she hadn’t been so relieved they made it out, but enough. “We cut across the park. It was raining to beat the band, and Gerry and I were under the umbrella—Martin had this big old coat on as part of his costume that kept him dry enough, so he was trailing along behind. We were holding hands, but…well, I had gloves on, and it was so cold I was going a little numb, so I didn’t notice at first when he let go and stopped to wipe his glasses because he couldn’t see. I realized we’d lost Martin somehow—and we shouldn’t have, we were in an open field on top of a hill—so I made Gerry stop. We went back for him, but…everything got so far away and muffled. We were shouting his name, but he couldn’t hear us, or we couldn’t hear his answer, and…” She swallowed hard.

Jon swallowed, too. “How—how did you find him?”

Melanie glanced at him briefly as she changed lanes to go around someone who was driving sensibly under the conditions. “Started singing.”

“A sea shanty?”

“Heh. No, we hadn’t started using those yet. It was ‘Somewhere Out There.’ You know, from An American Tail.” Melanie took a deep breath and started singing. Her voice was better than it had been at nearly ten, but the song was a bit higher than her usual range. “Somewhere out there, beneath the pale moonlight…someone’s thinking of me and loving me tonight…”

Jon nodded and surprised her by singing the next line, quietly enough, but with absolute sincerity. Melanie jumped back in when her part came around again and knew they were both thinking of it bringing them to Martin.

The rain had stopped, sort of, by the time they got to Oxford, but it was still grey and gloomy and, in Melanie’s opinion, mildly foreboding. She pulled Tim’s car to a stop in front of a house with a sign proclaiming it to be for sale, two houses down from their destination, then paused with her hand on the gear shaft, staring at the shrubbery.

“Jon?” she said quietly. “What’s today?”

Jon blinked at her, obviously confused, the door half open. “The twenty-fifth, why?”

“Just wondering.” Melanie’s sense of foreboding only increased.

She stepped out of the car, locked it, and put the keys in her pocket. Before she followed Jon up the block, though, she reached over and snapped a lilac bloom off the laden bush in front of her, then tucked it behind her ear.

105 Hill Top Road was a perfectly ordinary house. Two stories with what looked like a half-story on one end, no porch, a poured concrete foundation as Daisy had said. It was painted an innocuous grey, the door a slightly faded red. There were no curtains, no shutters, and no lights. For all intents and purposes, it was completely abandoned. For a moment, they stood at the end of the walk.

Jon stared up at the house. “Martin would hate it if we gave in to Fears trying to claim us just to save him.”

“Yep,” Melanie said, eyeballing the door.

“But he’d be the first one to bind himself to something in order to protect us.”

“Yep.”

“So we’re going in.”

“Yep.”

“Whatever it takes?”

Melanie met Jon’s eyes and saw her own feelings reflected there. “Whatever it takes.”

Jon nodded. “Good. Just so we’re on the same page.” He frowned and touched the lilac behind her ear lightly. “What’s this?”

Melanie shrugged. “‘Makes a spanking plume, even if you can’t eat it,’” she quoted.

“Oh.” Jon obviously didn’t understand, but just as obviously, he seemed to get it. He turned around and reached for a lilac bush nearby, hesitated, then shifted to a different bloom and broke it off. As he was tucking it into the end of his braid, Melanie spotted the cobwebs, sparkling with rain, spread over most of the shrub.

Great.

She squared her shoulders and reached into her jacket. “Full frontal charge, or are we trying to be subtle?”

“Because that worked so well when we tried it at the Trophy Room.” Jon balled his hands into fists. “Let me be the one to slam face-first into the wall this time.”

Either Jon had better luck than Melanie did or whatever was in here wanted them to come, though, because the door opened easily under his hand. Melanie drew her trusty knife as they stepped in and closed the door behind them.

The interior of the space was actually quite nice; if not for the long commute, and the fact that the Web had too much to do with it, Melanie might have been tempted to find out how much it was per calendar month. The walls were painted a delicate shade of cream, the floors seemed to be genuine hardwood rather than laminate, and the light fixtures were quite nice as well. There was no furniture in the house, unsurprising as nobody lived in it, but it didn’t look terribly abandoned.

Except for the thick layer of cobwebs.

“When was this house built again?” Melanie asked. Despite her earlier thoughts about subtlety, she kept her voice low. It seemed appropriate.

“2008,” Jon said, and he, too, barely spoke above a whisper.

“Ten years’ worth of cobwebs would be a lot,” Melanie said. She heard the lie as soon as it was out of her mouth and added, “But this isn’t natural.”

“No.” Jon looked around, gnawing on his lip. “I wonder…”

Slowly, carefully, he reached out and brushed one of the cobwebs, almost like he was plucking the string of a guitar. He stood stock-still for a minute, almost like he was listening, then huffed a humorless laugh and shook his head. “I don’t know why I thought that would work. I’m—I’m not part of the Web. I thought if I gave in a little…but, but I don’t know if I can use what’s here without giving in a lot.”

“I’ll keep you from falling too far into the manipulation if you keep me from going full red rum on whatever we find in here that isn’t Martin.” Melanie looked around the room, then grabbed Jon’s arm tightly. “Look, over there!”

Jon looked in the direction she had indicated. “Stairs. You think they’re on the upper story?”

“Positive. It’s a spiral staircase.”

“You think the Spiral is involved too?”

“No, Jesus. Don’t you know the poem?” Melanie started dragging Jon towards the stairs.

“Poem?”

“‘The Spider and the Fly.’ It’s the third line. ‘The way into my parlor is up a winding stair / And I’ve a many a curious thing to show when you are there.’”

Jon swallowed. “I, ah,    take it that doesn’t end well.”

Melanie paused on the first step and smiled grimly at Jon. “‘Oh, no, no,’ said the little Fly, ‘to ask me is in vain / For who goes up your winding stair shall ne’er come down again.’”

“If Martin’s up there…” Jon looked up, then stepped onto the stairs himself. “Let’s go.”

The upstairs hall seemed just as abandoned as the ground floor, albeit shorter. There were doors on either side, firmly shut, and at the very end of the hall a door that stood ajar. Melanie glanced at Jon. “I hate being led.”

“Me, too,” Jon agreed, “but I also don’t want to waste time. If Martin’s here, he’s in there.”

“Agreed.” Melanie sighed. “Spooky door ahoy.”

She thought she was prepared for whatever she would find in there. She wasn’t.

The first thing that struck her was the size of the room. It was a bare, unfinished gable attic that took up fully half the upper story, with a high roof that extended further—the source of the potential extra half floor they’d noticed from the outside—and unlike the other rooms had only a single high window, through which only the weakest of light came through. In fact, the room looked far, far older than the rest of the house, a feeling that was only enhanced by the cobwebs. The second thing that struck her was the woman standing a few feet away, watching them with a playful smile on her face. She was quite pretty, really, with dark skin, bleached blonde hair, and what looked like a short lace veil covering one side of her head. Other than that, the only thing she wore was a kind of white gauzy scarf that wound its way around her and only barely concealed her breasts and genitals. In each hand, rather incongruously, she held what looked like some kind of wands, and she almost looked like she was posing for an artist.

The third thing that struck her was the enormous thing dangling from the ceiling.

To call it a thing was a bit of an injustice, really. It was clearly human, or at least human-shaped…and from the size, it was almost certainly Martin. But it—he—was entirely encased in a thick white cocoon of silk, wrapped up like…well, like a fly in a web. Rather than a solid cylinder, though, it was as though each limb had been thoroughly wrapped individually after being posed in a way that had to be painful. He dangled upside down by one ankle, the other leg bent to cross perpendicular behind the first, his arms seemingly bound behind his back but remaining akimbo.

“Martin!” Jon and Melanie yelled in unison. The thing that was undoubtedly Martin did not respond, but, thankfully, he was at least moving.

The woman laughed and stepped forward, slowly and carefully, somehow neither dislodging nor shifting the scarf that Melanie could now tell was also woven from cobwebs. Her low, warm voice was almost seductive as she recited.

"Come hither, hither, pretty Fly, with the pearl and silver wing; Your robes are green and purple — there's a crest upon your head; Your eyes are like the diamond bright, but mine are dull as lead!"

Jon turned cold eyes on her, but Melanie could feel him shaking slightly. Still, he spoke bravely enough. “Who are you? What have you done?”

“Who am I? I’m hurt!” Poem notwithstanding, the woman’s eyes glittered with amusement. “Don’t you know my name by now, Jon? Can I call you Jon?”

“Does it matter if I say yes?” Jon’s hand found Melanie’s. “You’re—y-you’re Annabelle Cane.”

Melanie recognized the name—it had come up in a statement before she’d joined the Institute properly, and later there had been mention of a woman in statements that almost certainly matched her description. Definitely a Web avatar. She squeezed Jon’s hand in return as Annabelle smiled again. “I am. As for what I’ve done…nothing I wasn’t asked to do, I’m sure.”

“By who?” Melanie snapped. “The Mother of Puppets?”

Annabelle’s smile indicated they were sharing a joke, and Melanie felt slightly sick. “Do you really think I could have captured your brother if he didn’t want to be caught?”

Melanie stood her ground, with difficulty. “Yes.”

Annabelle laughed, but she didn’t argue with Melanie, which told her she was right. Jon’s grip on Melanie’s hand was almost hard enough to hurt. “If you’ve hurt him, I swear by all that is holy you won’t live to regret it.”

“Now, Jon,” Annabelle remonstrated. “What makes you think I want to hurt anybody?”

“He’s tied up in your fucking web!” Jon blurted. He yanked his hand from Melanie’s as he said this, balling his hands into fists once more.

“Is he? Look again. Tell me what you see.”

As much as she didn’t want to, Melanie complied. Something about the pose was familiar…

Annabelle began humming merrily. Melanie was about to tell her to knock it off, that she didn’t understand sea shanties at all and anyway that wasn’t a shanty, when the tune struck her. It was “Lannigan’s Ball”, a jaunty Irish folk tune…and one that had formed the basis for one of the songs on High Noon Over Camelot, her favorite Mechanisms album—Jon’s, too, it was one of the things they had bonded over that first day, and they’d both agreed it remained their favorite album even after The Bifrost Incident. She looked at the wrapped form of Martin again and knew exactly what it reminded her of.

The Hanged Man.

Melanie wasn’t super familiar with tarot. She’d had exactly one reading, just before leaving for college, and she’d honestly been a bit dismissive of it. But when she’d realized the songs on High Noon Over Camelot were named after tarot cards, she’d looked them up, and even though she didn’t remember a lot about them, there was one thing about the Hanged Man that had stuck with her: The rope keeping him hanging was not very tightly bound, and he could easily free himself if he wanted to. He was exactly where he wanted to be.

She glared at Annabelle. “You fucking posed him. I don’t think he could get himself down from there in the state he’s in.”

The gleam in Annabelle’s eye indicated Melanie had passed some kind of test. She swallowed down on the surge of anger that rose up in her. Giving in to the Slaughter wouldn’t be good; she might hurt Martin, or Jon, if she couldn’t pull herself back in time. Things felt…thinner here, harder to resist, and she knew if she gave in she wouldn’t be able to pull herself back.

Still, she tightened her hand around the handle of her knife.

“Maybe you’re right,” Annabelle allowed. “But I think he prefers being the one being there.”

“To what?” Jon demanded.

Annabelle tilted her head and studied Jon. Her smile now was almost pitying. “To you, of course.”

“Is that a threat?” Melanie growled.

“Perish the thought!” Annabelle laughed. It was an engaging laugh, the sort of trill you were tempted to join in with, but Melanie was more tempted to start attacking. “It’s the opposite, actually.”

“What?” Jon and Melanie said in the exact same tone.

Annabelle’s expression grew serious all of a sudden. She gestured to Jon with one of the wands, which Melanie realized now were knitting needles made of some kind of bone. “I hope you know this is for your protection. You wouldn’t like the consequences if Martin hadn’t chosen to do what he’s doing.”

Melanie tried very hard not to look at Jon. That was a little too close to the conversation they had had outside for comfort, and there had been an awful lot of spider webs. Annabelle had probably heard them. She was probably using it to manipulate them. That wasn’t happening. Not on her watch.

She brought the knife up to a usable position. Jon spoke before she could. She could feel how scared he was, but he sounded pissed. “His choice or not—or whatever you’re trying to claim—we’re taking him home. Now. Let him go.”

“I’m hardly keeping him captive.” Just like that, Annabelle’s mischievous smile had returned.

It took every ounce of control Melanie had to keep from going full Slaughter. She took a deep, slow breath and angled the knife forward.

“Get out of my way,” she enunciated clearly, “or it goes in your neck.”

If anything, that just made Annabelle smile more broadly. She didn’t say anything, just stepped grandly to one side. She kept backing away without a word, until she stepped into the mass of cobwebs in the corner and seemed to fade into them. The silence in the room, save their breathing and the faint creaking as Martin’s cocooned body fought to get free, told her that Annabelle Cane had gone.

Melanie took another breath, then looked over at Jon, who looked shaken and frightened. She didn’t blame him.

“Come on,” she said shortly. “Let’s get him out before he suffocates.”

[get-your-fuckin-star-bitch]

Holy shit I think I might be able to use this as a way to figure out the general plots of chapters if I ever wanna properly write this out-

Having said that, TURN YOUR GAZE UPON PART THREE OF THIS WRETCHED THING!!!!!

It turns out that not everything in the institute’s extensive collection of artefacts is exactly durable against blunt attempts at slamming them into glass cases.

Although, it should probably have been obvious seeing as the thing he seemed to have picked up to use as a bludgeoning object was, in fact, a vase. Hundreds of years old, priceless, and very, very breakable when you tried hard enough to slam it into something. It shattered into pieces in his hands, one of the shards slicing into his hands as the contents of it fell to the floor.

CONTINUED UNDER CUT!!!!

It took him more than a few moments to realize that the vase seemed to have been made home by more than a few scuttling, eight-legged creatures. And when he did, he screeched, flailing around and knocking things over in his attempts to get the crawling spiders off of his hands and legs. They seemed to not be too keen on touching him, either, fortunately… and soon were out of sight, the pieces of the vase vanishing with them.

The next thing he knows, someone’s standing over him with a torch, shining the light down into his face. He must have passed out at some point, and though he could hear the muffled sound of their inquiring voices, he couldn’t make out the words, or see the details of their faces to know who they were.

So instead he clocks out once again.

The next time he wakes up, it’s in a hospital bed, arms and chest and other points of injury all bandaged up and tingling from whatever medicine they’d applied as treatment for the burns.

Only then does he finally begin to cry.

So- obviously, it’s Gertrude’s fire. But the police don’t know that, and neither does Michael. Nor do any of the other staff members — except, of course, Elias, who naturally keeps his mouth shut and lies through his goddamn teeth about not knowing anything.

Still, Michael is proven innocent, mostly because there’s no clear, irrefutable evidence that points to him being involved in the fire. He returns to the institute after he’s recovered enough… only to find his cubicle cleaned out.

For a second, he’s about to start crying again, frustrated that he’d now lost his job on top of everything else. And Elias hadn’t even bothered to let him know? What’s wrong with this institute?!!?!

Gertrude had been right- he should have just-

Tim vaults up onto the table before he can finish his thought, and Sasha appears out of nowhere beside him, both of them screaming “SURPRISE!” and throwing confetti paper into the air.

Trying not to let on that he’s pretty sure he just had a miniature heart attack, Michael asks what the surprise is supposed to be, and why is his desk cleaned off. Tim’s smile broadens at this, and he jumps down with a cheeky, suave grace and gestures down the hallway in a way that makes Sasha snort aloud. “aaa’right this way- your highest-of-honor-y-ness-“

Sasha can’t help but let out another laugh “Tim-“

“Sasha.” Childishly.

She laughs again, but tries to look at least a little disdainful by way of an eyeroll… “Oh come on, just let him see what it is before you give it all away in one sentence-“

Making ‘calm down’ motions with both hands… “Okay, okay, alright-“

beat.

“I’ll just tell him-“

“Nooo, timmmmm-“

He’s laughing too, now. “Oh come on, I’m just joking- hey! Mike!” There’s a little mischievous gleam in his eye as he stops Michael and motions towards a door, waving his hands a little for effect. “Showtiiime!”

And he opens the door.

It’s a decently-sized office room. The desk looks new, and so does most of the rest of the furniture. The only older things in the room… are all of Michael’s belongings. Sat there in boxes, waiting to be organized and set up around the room.

“Ta-daaa!!!! So, whaddya think. I think it could use a couple windows, but hey, I’m not the archivist!”

Sasha gasped in pretend horror. “Tim!!”

“Uh-oh- whoops! Guess the secret’s out now, oh well! Guess I never change-“

Michael had been staring at him with his mouth slightly ajar for a few moments now, and Tim only just noticed.

“Whoa- hey there, buddy- who pressed your pause button?” The joking tone melts into something that could probably be described as ‘lighthearted, slightly teasing, but well-meaning concern’. “Something’s up, you know you-“

“Michael.”

Michael’s face is drained of color in less than a second by the voice that’s coming from behind him.

“Oh, hey! Michael, this is Jon! He’s our resident psychopath! ‘S always listening to everything everyone’s doing around here! It’s kinda creepy!”

Michael turns.

The man standing there is relatively short, at least compared to Sasha or Tim. Michael tended to try and not compare heights based off of his own, as he was always towering over people no matter how average their heights were. But “Jon” was definitely short. Michael almost wanted to laugh aloud at himself for thinking he’d been Elias- imagine.

The definitely-short man looked unimpressed by Tim’s introduction, though the sourness in his face was, at best, only tart enough to curdle days-old milk. He didn’t have the heart, though he didn’t seem to want to show that on his face. The man sighed. “Thank you… Tim… I’ll take it from here.”

Tim shot the guy a double thumbs-up, and before Michael could ask anything more about what the hell was going on, he and Sasha had left.

Jon cleared his throat politely, though impatiently, and Michael turned to see that his hand was held out for a reluctant handshake.

Michael felt his ears redden a bit, and shifted nervously on his feet, not sure how to explain to the strange, cranky little man that he wasn’t exactly comfortable with doing a handshake. His mind was too much of a mess to even start a proper sentence- so he just settled for sucking it up and trying to go for it, trying not to be too obvious about how much this was making his skin crawl.

But before he can properly begin to shake, the hand gripping his recoils, and Jon’s face morphs from an expression of impatient neutrality to one of alarm.

Immediately, Michael starts to apologize. But it doesn’t look like Jon’s even listening. His eyes are locked on Michael’s left hand, regarding it as though it might reach up of its own accord and attack his face.

Michael’s words die on his tongue, and the two of them stand there in uncomfortable silence for another moment or two before Michael offers an awkward “it was good meeting you”, to which Jon only responds with a shoulder-shrug and indecisive “mm” before walking briskly away.

Well. That could certainly have gone worse… but it’s the sort of reaction he’s used to getting sometimes. Something wrong with his smile, something wrong with his posture or how he holds the other person’s hand, a fidgeting motion the other person doesn’t like, a mispronunciation or misinterpretation of some word or phrase… it all just becomes monotonous, repetitive nonsense at some point.

But the worst is when you have to see that other person every single day.

Habitually replaying the interaction in his head to try and see where he might have made a misstep, Michael’s absentmindedly rests his hand on the door handle of his new office… and realizes, with a jolt, what has been nagging at him related to Jon’s reaction.

Not wanting to look, but still wanting to be sure before making his conclusions, he looks down at his left hand… and lets out a relieved sigh. The hand still looked perfectly fine, shaped and exactly the way he knew his hand should be. Perhaps Jon was simply also a texture-sensitive person, and Michael could finally have someone to talk to about things that only ever seemed to make him want to crawl out of his own skin and run away. The idea made him grin as he walked over to his new desk to try out the swivel chair.

Perhaps it was for the best that he failed to notice the way his hand’s reflection was bending, stretching, and distorting in the mirror that sat in the pile of his belongings…

[clown-eating-pig]

I love the idea that avatars of the spider are super unassuming and innocent in the way that they’re perceived. Like….something about the juxtaposition of spiders creating an immediate feeling of danger in most people compared to the people that represent them being perfectly adept at hiding that aspect of themselves.

[fluffywing-e-tarot]

The Magnus Archive AU : Grandma Gertrude

When Jon encountered his first Leitner, there is a different path that this takes. Jon dose beguin to read the book. However, it's not the bullie that knocks the book out of his hand freeing him from that moment. Instead, it is his nan. It happens in his home. he watches his nan read the book and then be eaten by it.

Jon dosen't know what to do. He runs into his room. but the knowledge that the book is in his house terrifies him. Eventually, he finds his nan's contact book. Looking for anyone who could help him. That is when he spots the relation of his mother's name.

Gertrude Robinson

She is his distant maternal grandmother. She dosen't have a phone number or address written. Instead, under the work line is written:

The Magnus Institue

That was all the infomation he had on her. Jon tentitivly entered the room where his grandmother was eaten by the book. The book was still there.

Jon waped the book in a blanket. it felt safer but not safe enough. Jon found a rubish bag layered another layer to the defenses. Jon also found a paper bag and added that and all the tape he could get his hands on.

Jon found a Phonebook finding the address of the Magnus Institute. Jon knew if he left the book. Someone else would. So when he was packing his bag. all he put inside was the book. everything else was put in his jacket pockets.

Jon's expiriance traveling to london from Bornmonth was just as bad as his expirance reading the book.

Jon started his trip out on the train keeping a hand on the bag holding the book. it is when he realised the conductor started to hover around him that jon didn't want the man to touch him. then another passenger grabed him that jon struggeld and jumped off the moving train just outside a platform.

There was no other choice but to walk the rest of the way to London. every town he entered people where drawn to him. Jon always ran and hid in places difficult for adults to reach. it when a cop grabed him that jon bit the officer. every night, jon sat awake. not trusting himself or sleep to keep track of the book. Jon swore he could feel the draw to it. the book pulling people in his path. a sirens song.

when Jon finaly made his way to the institue. Jon didn't know what he should do to talk with his apperent grandmother. He stepped into the small entery way the kind looking lady gave him a small smile. When she noticed him.

"Hello there, young man. What can I do for you?" she said.

Jon felt the fear that had been keeping him awake for the past few weeks spike again. But then he remembered that he came here for a reason. He fished out his nan's contact book. Which he updated with the address to the insitute.

"I'm here to see someone by the name of Gertrude Robinson. If she still works here?"

"The Head Archivist isn't here yet. Are you here to make a stament."

"No!" Jon shouted. He didn't know what that was. It wasn't why he was here. It was like he felt the nice lookeing lady's eye looking down on him, judging him. Wanting him to just disappear.

"Ms Robinson." Jon looked up to where the receptonist was looking not at him. He saw she looking at the door. Jon spun. Seeing there was a small woman. She had dark hair, turning grey tied up tightly in a bun.

She was only stepping into the insitue. what looked like a half eaten pastry in her hand.

Jon saw her eyes lock with his. Gertrude Robinson, though never met him had a look of recognition.

" He says that he is here to see you." The lady said.

"Come along. You look absolutely fithy." Gertrude opened the front door for him. The watching eyes from the receptionist. Made a shiver rundown his spine. Jon ran out the door. fallowing Gertrude down the london streets.

Gertrude handed him the half finished pastry. Right before his stomach growled.

"But you were eating it." Jon said

" Jonathan, you are far too young to be concerned about germs if you're hungry." Gertrude siad. With that invitation, Jon took a bite. Not realising the scone was gone. Until he was licking the last crubs from his fingers.

Jon stopped walking. Gertrus stopped and looked back at him.

"Jonathan, what is it?" Gertrude had this look of concern on her face. Jonathan couldn't trust her. she could be hurt. She could betray him.

Jon felt his body starting to move away from her. Jon couldn't trust her. Just like Nan, the cunductor, the homless man, the agressive lady, that police officer, the receptonist. He couldn't trust anyone with what he witnessed.

"Jonathan. stop."

Jon stopped clutching the backpack tight.

"Jonathan," Getrudes voice was softer. Then the strange presure of her voice before. it made his brain itch. she knelt infront of him.

"What do you have in your bag?"

"Nothing." Jon said, twisting his hand in the bag's straps.

"I know that everything seems too much right now. but let me ask you this."

"Dose coming to finde me have to do with what is inside?"

"Yes." Jonathan said. shifting his gaise from locking with Gertrude.

"I need you to let go of it, Jon." Gertrude said.

"No!" Jon held onto Gertrude. deperation in his voice.

"Jon, I know you're scared. I can't help you calm down if you don't let go."

Jon's tears were infull display. " I can't lose you too! You're all I have left." it was the child in him that wanted somewhere safe. The other part of his mind chanted.

You can't trust her. You can't trust her. You can't trust her.

"I will befine, Jonathan. We can do it together." gertrude said. " We just need somethings."

"Do what?"

" Detroy it ofcource."

Jon's heart jumped not in fear that had every wakeing moment was occupied with. but with something different.

an hour later. Gertrude had gathered a bucket and firewood along with lighting fluid. She bought him to gravle near some tracks.

" you ready Jon?"

"no?"

Jon sruged off the bag. Still clutching it close.Jon pushed the bag away from himself. But he didn't want to throw it away. His mind still chanted.

She will betray you. She will betray you. She will betray you

with one final push. Jon let go of the bag. dropping it into the bucket. Gertrude acted fast as she sprayed lighter fluid on it and tosed a match in. His bag caught fire imedietly.

Jon colapsed to the ground as he heard the spider scream. his eyes were fxated on the fire. The feelings in his gut that had been sitting at the botom of his stomach confirmed the book was gone. the knott was gone.

The watching gase he had felt since the beguining of the journey was gone too. the paranoia was gone.

"Well, now that's finished. Let's get you all cleaned and get lunch." Grandma said.

Now that Jon wasn't feeling his heart palpitate at the smallest sound, the slightest gaise. Cobwebs or the imagination of limbs. Jon didn't know if it was possible. He felt like he had been running purily on adrenalin for the entire expirance and travel with the book.

"Grandma, I don't think I can walk." Jon said.

Gerturde seemed like the type to roast the closest person to her, for their incompatace. She didn't do that.

" Honestly, you've been far too pumped with fear for the past week." Grandma said, hefting him onto her back. " Thank God you actually made it to the Institute. You can rest now, Jon."

Jon leaned against his grandmother's back. Letting sleep take him with the steady lull of his grandmother's step. it wasn't until a door slammed behind him. where jon shook himself awake.

"Sorry, Jon." Grandma said. she carried him to a bath. Setting him down on the tile. Jon could actually stand as she flitted around. Once Jon was in the warm water. Jon had never felt more human since that moment. Jon eventually fell asleep again.

[languor-em]

Concept: mix them up. They are a Strange pair of conductors who traverse through the different fears.

Deep Beneath the earth, through the Darkness, winding around and around the many Twisted tunnels. Occasionally the tunnel is made of Flesh, as if the train is being swallowed. Other times the walls open to a forest, with gleaming eyes and haunting Howls on the wind. The bridges this train crosses are at Heights so extreme, the ground cannot be seen in veiw. One of the strange conductors, the smiling one, has a pet Spider the adore, her babies skitter across his skin and he loves every one of them. The other conductor, ever frowning, carries a lantern that holds a single candle within, it’s warm purple Flame ever burning.  While you may be the Lone passenger in the cabin, the two are ever Watchful. They assure that it’s for you safety, don’t want you to step off at the wrong stop. No, they will keep you company, all the way to the End of the line.

:O!!!!! YOU!!!! YOU'RE SO SMART!!!!

I love this- I LOVE this!!! Your brain is massive, this is an amazing idea!! Spider Dad Emmet has me going absolutely insane!!! The imagery of Ingo carrying a creepy lantern!!! Charon style!! YES!!!

The Train always finds those who Need it.

Maybe you're an employee at the Archives. Perhaps you're investigating a strange set of disappearances in the subway systems, disappearances that seem to line up with a new series of statements concerning strange trains and even stranger conductors.

Or, maybe you are just a normal person, taking your usual train home one evening. Maybe you aren't paying quite enough attention to your surroundings, not realizing until it's far too late that this is not your train. That you are the only person in your car.

The Train does not care who you are. Who you were. And the Conductors will gladly guide their passenger to their destination.

After all, the Train arrives for those who need it, and it takes them to where they need to be.

Now, whether you ever come back...

That remains to be seen.

[gingerbreadpopsolo]

Doot doot! WIP sneak peak 👀

ALRIGHT you cheeky fiend!! i had to get to myself to my hotel safely, but now I'm here, here's a WIP of my Magnus Archives Crack AU, where Jonathan Sims's dad is Mr. Spider.

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

“Mr. Spider is a shitty name.”

“I beg your pardon?”

Mina rolled her eyes and flicked a pen at his direction. His offense at her blatant attack nearly caught him off guard, but Mr. Spider grabbed the pen just before it hit his face. “If you called me here just to irritate me, I will take my leave,” he warned her, tucking the pen into his breast pocket.

This time, instead of pocketing the second pen that was thrown at his face, he flung the it back at her. Unlike Mr. Spider, Mina did not have the reflexes or the help of strings to catch the aberrant object. A soft chuckle escaped his lips as she yelped in surprise. He smirked as Mina spun her chair around to pout at him.

Mr. Spider merely arched his brow in response. “Well?” he asked. “Are you going to elaborate on why my name is shitty, as you say?” Honestly, he was surprised that the declaration didn’t chafe him as it should have.

“Well, it’s not really a name, is it?” said Mina as she joined him on the floor. As she sat down, she placed a book that she had taken from her desk onto her lap. The book was old, with its dog-eared pages and a faded cover. Yet, the title still stood out boldly in comparison to the rest of the book, The Great Big Book of Names. “From the way I’ve heard you use it; it feels more like a title or a descriptor.”

She handed the book to him and pointed to herself. “I am Mina Sims. I’m a student council member at Livingstone Academy—”

“I know what a title is Mina,” Mr. Spider grumbled as he examined the book. “Is this a baby name book? Why on earth--?”

“It was on sale,” she interrupted. “Anyway, I’m trying to make a point! They both have a different weight to them. Student Council Member isn’t the entirety of me, it’s just a part of it.” Mina gently placed a hand on Mr. Spider’s shoulder. It burned like warm candlelight.

Mr. Spider was at a loss for words in more ways than one. Truthfully, he never gave much thought about his name. The only ones who used it besides Mother never uttered it more than once.

Until Mina.

He looked down at the name book, thumbing the yellow pages as Mina sat beside him. The warmth from his shoulder spread down deep into his chest as he glanced at her from one of his hidden eyes. She went out of her way to find a resource because she thought his name was shitty? She was giving him a choice?

“Why not pick something for me then?” Mr. Spider ran his finger down the spine of the book. “If you dislike it so much.”

“Well, it’s not my name I’m picking out, it’s yours.” Mina countered before sighing. She bumped his shoulder apologetically. “I’m sorry, it’s your name, your choice. I shouldn’t have said anything.”

“Probably not,” he acknowledged. He could drop it right there. It’s not like he left the parlor for anyone or anywhere else. He knows Mina would respect his decision. Mr. Spider sufficed as a name…but that’s all it did. Sufficed.  He never had a reason to have a name. Why would he? Maybe, he could have something that was his for once.

He looked down at the book again, eyeing its wear. The number of names in this book was overwhelming in a way that Mr. Spider never experienced before. So many choices to make with no strings to helpfully pull him to where he needed to be, or who to be in this case. “Would you help me pick, if I asked?” he heard himself whisper.

The warmth flared at Mina’s bright smile.

[envihellbender]

MaDe TMA au!!

Characters: Declan Gerritz, Mathias Iversen (OCs)

Verse: The Magnus Archives AU, in this the Magnus Institute is in York, Declan is the Archivist, Mathias is an assistant who has been marked for the Web, the main antagonists are Martin and John. John in Elias’s place and Martin in Peter Lukas’s place.

Content: Spiders, technology malfunctioning, puppets

[CLICK]

DECLAN (THE ARCHIVIST)

Statement of Mathias Iverson, regarding a strange encounter with a television programme. It occurred in his flat in Westfield, York. Statement given 14th of February 2023. Audio recording by Declan Gerritz, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute. Statement begins. [A PAUSE FOLLOWED BY A SHAKY BREATH FROM DECLAN] When-whenever you’re ready, Mads.

MATHIAS

Oh. Right. Yeah. It happened five days ago, at least, I think it did. I’ve not… been home since. I always wind down after work with a film. Disney film, usually. This time it was Løvernes Konge. I still have the old video tapes from when I was a kid, they still work really well which is good because I don’t like the English titles as much. I also got an old VCR I picked up in a charity shop, it was really cheap. I find it more relaxing to watch them that way, I guess. People keep saying I should just get a Disney Plus account but… anyway, not relevant. I was watching Løvernes Konge and it had just gotten to the bit where Simba is going to the elephant graveyard. I don’t know if this is relevant but just above my television for a while there has been a spider for about a week or so. Not the biggest I’ve ever seen. But not like, small either. It had a web all built and I have been leaving it alone because well spiders keep pests away. Anyway. The screen… Changed. It went to static. At first I didn’t question it, thought maybe it was a problem with the VCR. I mean the thing is fucking old. But when I went over to check the cable or smack it I saw my silhouette in the static. My outline. A black shadow of me. I put my hand up and my shadow self moved too. I turned the television off and took the tape from the VCR, and it was fine I suppose. But I could smell burning. I tried not to think about it. My upstairs neighbours are terrible cooks and my downstairs neighbours get stoned fairly frequently so it’s not too out of the ordinary.

Anyway so I ignored the television for the rest of the night and listened to some true crime podcasts instead. I fell asleep during one. It was about the Cray twins, it was pretty inaccurate and glossed over- well- that doesn’t matter. When I woke up in the middle of a new episode I did not recognise the television was on. It was showing a static screen like before with silhouettes on it. But the silhouettes? They were like. Fanden. They were all spiders. They were just the black shapes of eight legged creatures. Had to be spiders, right? At first I thought they were on the screen but I even put my hand on it and all I could feel was the glass and the slight static hum. But the spiders moved. They cleared space like I spooked them. I tried turning my television off but it didn’t do anything. Eventually I unplugged it and went back to sleep. I tried to ignore it. Maybe it was a technical glitch or maybe it was a supernatural thing that if I left it alone and showed I wasn’t going to interfere maybe it would leave me alone.

Anyway. I went to bed, and I slept pretty well actually. I slept for four hours, and got up around three in the morning. I sort of dismissed what had happened as a dream. I started making my meal prep for the week. I have a specific type of insomnia where I can only sleep for four hours at a time most nights so I try to be productive when I’m awake. I mostly cut up vegetables and cook pasta. I quite like the flat at night, there’s not as much noise from upstairs and downstairs at that time. Anyway. When I went into the living room to sit and maybe watch something on Netflix when… the television. It was- it was already… on. It was on. I’d left it unplugged. I vividly remember pulling the plug from the wall. But no, the plug was… well it was back in obviously. Anyway. On the television, instead of spiders this time it was a strange programme instead, it was these puppets, they looked like… there is this kids show from back ho- back in Denmark named Kaj and Andrea. It’s got these puppets and they are a frog and a bird. But they look. They looked wrong, I can’t explain… the proportions weren’t right and they moved a little too humanly, I think. It was smooth as if they weren’t being controlled and the bird’s wings moved like arms. They were talking in a mix of languages, I caught bits of English and Danish, then maybe German and French. Eventually, I noticed the spiders on the screen, slowly edging from the sides and taking up more and more space. It was then they both turned to the screen and … they were talking in English. Clear English. And they were talking to me. At first I thought I was insane, like no they’re just talking at the camera but- but I don’t know. It started with them saying it’s awfully late, how I shouldn’t be watching television at this time, then they began saying I shouldn’t sit so close to the screen. It was then they got bigger, and they grew teeth. And they said, clear as day:

“Do you think we need more legs, Mathias?”

I tried to turn it off. But the buttons… at some point the television had been covered in web and I’d not noticed. How had I not noticed? I- I went to unplug it but the web went all the way down the wire and attached it to the socket in the wall. I tried to rip it out but it wouldn’t budge. The stupid fucking puppets on the TV laughed and laughed and laughed. They said- they said “don’t you wish to play with us, Mathias?” How fucking creepy and cliche is that?

Anyway. I packed a bag and ran. Hung out in the 24 hour cafe just outside of the city centre until it was time to go to work. And I’ve been secretly living in the Archives ever since. Sorry. Erm. Am I in trouble?

DECLAN (THE ARCHIVIST)

Statement ends. [Sighs.] No, you’re not in trouble. John doesn’t seem to mind. And Martin… I don’t think he’s noticed.

MATHIAS

I have evidence. For the research. I have photos on my phone. Of the TV and of the cartoon. Probably would be better if I had a video…

DECLAN (THE ARCHIVIST)

No, no. That’s great, Mads. Obviously it’s best you don’t investigate personally, since something clearly wants to hurt you. And you can’t go back home. So. Yes. I think- we can set you up a proper bed in the Archives. Have some security watching out for whatever is doing this. Are you… Are you okay, Mads?

MATHIAS

I suppose so. [Breath quickens and there are tears in his voice.] I want my things. I want my things here and I want them not to be covered in web. I want my home back. I want it to be clean. I want-

DECLAN (THE ARCHIVIST)

Hey, hey- [Shuffling due to him moving to hold Mathias.] I know, I know Mads. It’s gonna be okay. We’ll deal with this. And I’ll keep you safe.

MATHIAS

[Sniffs.] Guess I can’t say all the statements we get are bullshit now, huh?

[DECLAN LAUGHS]

[CLICK]

[phynoma]

Me: I'm trying to write a Magnus Archives-style statement, and it's surprisingly hard

Fiancé: Like, smutty?

Me: No, it's a regular old scary statement

Fiancé: (practical) Well, you've got to write about something *you* find scary. Not like...spiders.

(He says this because he is the one who tells me with terrible portent that he saw a spider go into the closet and disappear, and I am the one who lovingly picks it up in my bare hands and transports it to a safer place while cooing at it)

Me: (taking his face in my hands) My dear. My beloved. I have OCD. Do not doubt my ability to use my own imagination to make myself utterly terrified of something that I've never found scary in my entire life. This is my superpower

[thatmoththoth]

I have about three paragraphs so far, I’m going to have to force myself for this, to not be super finicky about previous chapters and getting sick in the dreaded rewrite loop

You know what FUCK IT I’m making spiderverse Annabel Cane real >:3

[shanarra-story]

We always discuss how fears in the TMP are not exactly fears from TMA, but it such a powerful writing move. We still assume that we know something about fears after 5 seasons and then comes the new episode and our thoughts are going:

oh "mother always says", this should be The Mother of spiders - the hause filled with spiders, so Web checks out - wait, the house that has "too many rooms" - spiral? weird architecture? - she looses her mind, so that's also could be it - "no-one's here now. No-one ever will be" that's some Lonely vibes - "I wander lonely"

And just like that we aren't sure anymore. We still don't actually know what's happening