#cause i know it was floating around in the brainspace before that post i made

[sparky-is-spiders]

Pleeeeease tell me about the time travel jonsasha fic. I'm assuming it's jon who goes back in time? From where, end of s5? 👀👀👀 Is it preestablished js, or canon compliant until the time travel? Are they going to try to kill elias......

Alright. So. This answer doesn't need to have context but I'm going to provide anyway, so buckle up for several paragraphs of rambling. Under a cut for length.

Anyway so last year I made this post. It's not required reading but it is relevant. Basically, in my first six months(?) or so in the fandom, when I was big into jm, I read a buncha time travel fix-its. I've sorta moved away from them (heads up this fic will NOT be a fix-it) but at the time I really enjoyed them.

(To clarify, nothing wrong with liking time travel fix-its or not wanting to touch the implications. Time travel identity theft isn't real and we're all here to have a good time. If that's your jam you do you)

Now. The Thing With Time-Travel Fix-Its is that there's going to be a past version and a future version of your intrepid time-travelers and you're going to have to Deal With That, and a common method of Dealing With That is the time travelers waking up in their past bodies. Pretty normal, not unusual, dodges some complicated tangles re: having two versions of certain characters floating around, a perfectly understandable choice that nontheless carries Implications.

Namely: what does it mean to take the place of your past self? For you? For them? For the person they could be? For the people around you (who may as well be interacting with a stranger)? Is that really you? Are you really them? Could overwriting your past self count as murder/identity theft/Bad?

And I thought about it. And I thought about it. And I thought about it. And then I got super into jonsasha dual archivists AUs.

Okay. Context over. We can (finally) talk about the fic.

So, I am a simple creature and Jon is my darling beloved. So I didn't want to just kill him off before the fic even begins (although. hmmm. tempting, actually). But i did need him replaced by s5 Jon. So. What if he was just... displaced? Shoved out of his own body by an imposter? A ghost invisible to all? Alone? Afraid? Watching his friends interacting with an unknown but possibly malicious entity? And thus, the Time Travel Nonsense AU was born!

So there's no outline and it hasn't had a lot of Rotation Time in awhile, but I do have a series of loosely connected Ideas down so you can have those.

Something else is living in S1 Jon's body. He doesn't know what it is, or what's happening to him. He can't really interact with his surroundings, either. Can't be seen, can't speak to anyone, can't do anything but watch. Even the thing puppeting his body doesn't seem to know he's there. And it behaves... strangely. It has some of his mannerisms, and it acts like him, but a little to the left. It's uncanny, watching something that is him-but-not-him like that... and it's lonely.

(S5 Jon is going to be an "it" because S1 Jon is perceiving S5 Jon as a monster/creature (although I do believe in it/its Jon supremacy, to be clear)).

He tries to figure things out on his own. Tries to signal for help. Tries to take his body back. Tries to speak to the new occupant. Nothing.

The fic initially opens with a transcript of his statement regarding the experience. It's technically for everyone but it's addressed to Sasha specifically. I don't know what happens with it after though.

At some point, he does manage to make contact with Elias. It's So Weird how only his boss can see him, but it's something at least. Especially because he's so goddamned lonely.

He's a ghost at his own job and in his own house. He hasn't spoken to anyone in weeks. The others think his replacement is behaving a little oddly but seem to be getting along better with it than they ever did with him. It's revealing things about him as if it was him. It feels horribly invasive, and lonely, and frightening, and awful. His only source of comfort is Elias, and they start a sort of weird situationship sorta thing. It's a good thing Elias is so helpful and trustworthy huh?

Maybe Sasha finds the tape. Maybe she just thinks Jon is acting Weird. Either way, she gets to snooping and is drawn closer to the Eye.

Elias, meanwhile, is trying to get Jon marked, and closer to being the Archivist, and back in his body, AND trying to figure out what it was that replaced Jon. Jon is trying to do the last two. Idk what s5 Jon is doing. Maybe finding ways to break whatever binding will cause Elias' death to hurt other institute employees?

Anyway, after a certain point, Sasha is connected enough to the Eye (and Looking hard enough) that she can see S1 Jon, and they start working together too. Maybe they try to keep it secret from Elias? Idk.

S1 Jon will get his body back, and S5 Jon is eldritch enough to probably not need one.

Ok honestly by this point things are reaaaaally vague if I'm being real. So, lightning round:

The JE situationship breaks off due to Elias'... everything really (I mean, once its revealed that he's evil and sinister and stuff).

Jonsasha's misadventures trying to get Jon's body back result in them racking up marks.

Sooooo much of this is me being enamoured w/ outsider PoV... time travel but from the perspective of someone who ain't travelling. Another important aspect is S5 Jon trying desperately to fix things but failing because the whole project is Doomed and he is being sabotaged from the start by an invisible force (himself).

Also S1 Jon accidentally making things worse for himself because all the information available and his general situation push him to do so.

Sasha survives the Not!Them (obviously) (how? good question!!)

Jon and Sasha have a weird complicated Thing. Their research into S5 Jon sort of separates her from the others and they kinda become drawn into their relationship and stuff. Also from the whole "same master same monster" situation they got going on.

There's going to be a short tape transcript of Jon telling Sasha about his situationship with Elias. Idk if I'llbe able to indicate it over audio transcript but they are both sitting on the floor or cot or whatever and Jon's head is on her lap.

Jonsasha are t4t and autism4autism.

I have a really specific image in my head of them running out the institute's front doors while holding hands, very near the end of the fic.

They do run off somewhere (maybe Scotland still idk) and they do read the 160 statement. Together <3.

And yeah that's everything. Got vague and floaty near the end there but to answer your questions: yes, yes, canon-compliant until time travel, and maybe at some point idk.