#everyone wants a piece of sasha (correct and true)

[ratatatastic]

THATS AN INSANE THING TO SAY BOBBY??? FIRST WE SAY HED BE A GOOD DMAN BUT PAUL WONT LET HIM. NOW BOBBY IS GOING HED BE A GREAT GOALIE :)

[folklorelise]

That one time the kids called you “mom”

HC / OS (i don’t know) about that one time the kids called you “mom” and that one-time Jean called Captain Levi “dad” (not related with the “being a mom to the survey corps” -- you’re a squad leader in this).

 -          Armin

Armin was a smart kid and he loved spending time at the survey corps library. Armin grew up with his grandfather and he had to work very hard to provide enough food for the both of them. When Armin’s grandfather died, he was still a kid. When they all joined the survey corps, Armin instantly loved you – you would always be in the library, reading different books every week. He obviously wanted to come to you and talk about books with you, but that boy was too shy. You were a squad leader which meant that you were his superior officer.

You would notice Armin of course. He would always read and study strategies sitting in front of you. Sometimes he would open his mouth, thinking ‘today I’ll talk to her’ but he never did. Once you decided that you would start the conversation, but as soon as you put your book down, Armin ran away. After that, you told Levi, your boyfriend, what happened earlier.

“I think he’s scared of me.” You admitted.

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Why did he run away then?”

“Maybe he needed to take a sh!t. Like really needed to so he ran away.”

Meanwhile in Armin’s bedroom, with Eren and Mikasa.

“Why did you do that?” Mikasa asked.

“I don’t know!” Armin inquired, “I’m so embarrassed right now.”

“That was a weird move.” Eren admitted, “Next time just say something, anything really.”

That very next day, Armin was determined to tell you how much he wanted to discuss books with you. He saw you at your usual place and he took his. He repeated his sentence over and over, ‘squad leader Y/N I’ve seen you here multiple times and I’d like to discuss books together.’ But before he could say anything, you started to talk.

“Why did you run off yesterday?” you asked.

“Books.” Armin shouted which only startled you a little, “I like books and you do too.”

“I do like to read.”

After that, Armin was more and more comfortable around you. You would always read together before an expedition or after an intense training day – it became your little tradition.

A few weeks later, Armin wanted to talk to you as soon as possible. He has read a book that he knew you would like, and he needed to tell you about it. He was eating with his friends and when he saw you and Captain Levi entering the mess hall, he shouted “MOM! I-“and stopped immediately after.

Everyone was staring at him and all Armin wanted at this moment was to be eaten by a titan. You on the other side were just smiling widely at Armin.

“You look like a creep, stop smiling.” Levi told you.

After dinner, you went to the library and found Armin sitting at your usual table, arms crossed on the table with his head on his arms.

“Armin, hey. How are you feeling?”

“Embarrassed. I – I don’t know why I called you that.”

“It’s fine, you don’t have to worry about it.” you reassured him.

“But I embarrassed you too!”

“Who said you did?”

“Everyone was laughing.” Armin guessed.

Then, you spend your night like you always do which is reading together until Levi came to bring you back to bed.

“Good night Armin.” Levi told him before leaving.

“Good night Captain, squad leader.”

“Good night… son.” you finished before joining Levi, laughing slightly.

 —————

-          Eren

Eren was outside with all the others resting after training with Levi. They were discussing their skills after Levi made them do hand to hand combat to know who could have a day off from cleaning duties (it was your idea – Levi would never give a day off for cleaning).

“I am obviously the best here.” Jean acknowledged.

“Mikasa won against you!” Eren screamed back.

“Yeah, but I’m talking about us. Today, I won!” Jean replied.

“That’s because I was too tired from the titan experiments!”

“Riight. You are a titan. You shouldn’t even be tired!”

“Yeah because you know everything!” Eren shouted even louder.

Both were ready to fight, but they were expecting their friends to stop them, but they were just talking between them, ignoring their little dispute. Both of them just stared at each other, waiting for something to happen or someone but nothing – so they just stared at each other awkwardly. Eren spotted you not too far away and screamed at the top of his lungs:

“MOM! WE NEED YOUR HELP!”

You were taking a walk with Levi as one of your rituals with him since during daytime, you could hardly see each other. You both looked at Eren surprised but still walked towards him and his friends.

“Yes? What did you need me for?”

“Eren said he was better than me at hand-to-hand combat which is obviously not true.” Jean explained.

“You agree with me, right?” Eren said to you.

“Hm…” you turned to Levi expecting help, but he just had a smirk on his face, waiting for you answer too. “Well… I mean…” you paused each time a word was said, “I just want to say that I love you guys but it’s late and I’m tired,” you tried to avoid the topic of the conversation. “Levi, let’s leave the kids.”

“But m-“ Eren suddenly stopped his sentence and thought ‘wait, did I just almost called squad leader Y/N mom? Did I call her mom earlier?’

“What’s wrong Eren?” Mikasa asked.

“Nothing, squad leader Y/N,” Eren insisted on these words heavily, “is right, it’s late, let’s all go to sleep.” Eren then run to his bedroom.

“Such a weirdo.” Levi stated before walking away with you.

In the middle of the night, Eren was still awake thinking about what he said. He was moving loudly, and Armin woke up very annoyed.

“Eren stop moving so energetically!”

“I’m not.” Eren mumbled.

“What’s wrong?”

“Did I call squad leader… you know.”

“Did you do an Armin? Yes. You call her mom. Welcome to the club! Now sleep.”

 —————

-          Mikasa

Mikasa was hanging with Eren and Armin outside after dinner. Eren and Armin were frenetically about Eren’s next prank on Jean.

“You always prepare something either too dangerous or just normal dangerous. Jean could get hurt!” Armin protested.

“That’s the idea I was going for. Plus, it’s not that dangerous.”

“You want to push him off the wall!”

“Yeah, but he has his gear on and we’ll just all laugh at this anyway. Right Mikasa?” Eren asked her friend.

“Jean could die if he doesn’t use his gear.” Mikasa observed.

“He’s not that stupid.” Eren replied.

“Ask mom then and look at her being disappointed by you.” Mikasa told them.

They both turned their head towards Mikasa and glared at her, with a shocked look.

“What?”

“You just called squad leader Y/N ‘mom’” Eren burst out laughing.

“No, I didn’t. I said mom… as in…” Mikasa tried to correct herself.

“Yeah right, what other mom you possibly could be talking about?” Eren pointed out.

“It’s because you two keep calling her that! And I just forgot her name and…” Mikasa defended herself, “It’s your fault!”

“It’s fine, that makes the three of us in the club!” Armin shouted.

 —————

-          Historia

Everyone just discovered that Historia was the rightful heir to the throne, and no one knew what to do.

“Fine. Then run.” Levi said taking Historia by her blouse collar.

“Oh my, Levi!” you screamed rushing towards Historia. “Let her go!”

Levi let her go and left. You took Historia in your arms as she was ready to collapse on the ground.

“Are you okay sweetie?” you questioned her worried. She just held you close and thanked you. “Levi didn’t mean it. I’m going to ask to apologise.”

“It’s fine. He’s right. I should do something about this.” Historia waited a few minutes before saying “thanks mom,” blushing.

Everyone else wanted to throw a comment but no one dared after seeing you glaring at them. Only Armin whispered “welcome to the club” for himself.

 —————

 -          Annie

Instructor Shadis sent you a letter asking you a favour. He was feeling ill and asked you to substitute him while he recovers. You obviously agreed to it. You were surprised at how Annie was at hand-to-hand combat.

“Who taught you that?” you asked marvelled by her technique.

“My father.”

“Well good job!”

The whole time you were here you would constantly compliment her. You would really compliment everyone on their asset.

One night, Annie was outside with Reiner and Bertolt, talking together.

“I like squad leader Y/N, she is nice.” Reiner said in a moment of silence.

“Or she could just pretend to be nice so we wouldn’t try so hard when she’s here and that’s how we fail.” Annie pointed out.

“She’s not like that.” Bertolt insisted, “She seems genuinely nice. Never felt that supported in such a long time.”

“Yeah.” Reiner agreed.

Annie did not want to say it, but she agreed with them. You were always so supportive, always encouraging people do to better. Always telling them that they did a great job when they messed up. Annie wanted to add something, but she heard footsteps and she turned around ready to fight but it was only you.

“Mom! I was ready to fight you.” Annie yelled.

“What did you just call squad leader Y/N?” Reiner asked surprised.

“I– I said mam.”

“No, you said mom.” Reined laughed.

“NO! I said mam as in sir but for a woman!”

“I just wanted to make sure you guys were alright,” you admitted, “it’s late and I don’t want you guys to be tired since I know how instructor Shadis can be.”

“Instructor Shadis?” Bertolt asked.

“Yes, he’s feeling much better and he’s coming back tomorrow. I also came to say goodbye since I’m leaving tonight. I wish you luck and I know you guys are going to be amazing!” you end your little speech with a hug to each one of them. “I’ll probably see you around if you ever decide to join the survey corps.”

Annie was right, she was going to miss you.

 —————

-          Sasha

Sasha was a great kid, a great fighter but more importantly, she was a food lover. She never had enough food at lunch or dinner. She would always ask her friend for their bread or a piece of their meat when they did eat meat.

Once, Sasha was late to dinner because she had cleaning duties and she was a slow cleaner which made her late. Being late meant no food too but she still came to the kitchen hoping for leftovers – there were none. She went to the mess hall and collapse on the table. She heard a person sat down in front of her but did not move.

“You should eat Sasha.” she heard.

“No food.”

“Look up.”

She did and there was a tray with a bowl of soup that was still hot and two pieces of bread. She gasped and started to cry tears of joy.

“Thank you, mom! I was so hungry!” Sasha thanked you with her mouth full of a mix of soup and bread.

“You’re welcome, next time you can come to me and I’ll help you clean alright?” you told her.

You waited for her to be finished before going back to your bedroom. In the middle of that night, Sasha suddenly woke up, panting.

“What’s wrong?” Mikasa asked ready to fight an intruder.

“Nooo. I’m in the club now too.” Sasha realised.

“What? You called squad leader Y/N mom too?” Mikasa joked.

“Yeah…”

 —————

 -          Jean

Jean had cleaning duties in the equipment area. He and Connie were talking and being careless as usual when they were cleaning. So careless that Jean somehow caused a shelf full of heavy books to fall on his leg.

When Connie explained to you what happened you rushed to where Jean was. You and Connie helped Jean out and took him to the infirmary. Jean was now on bed rest for at least a week since he could not move his right leg anymore.

“How am I going to live now?” Jean complained after hearing the news.

“I’m taking care of you until further notice.” you reassured him.

Levi decided that Jean would still be attending training even if that meant only watching. After two weeks, Jean was still hurt – according to him anyway. Which the nurse found weird because that type of injury did not last long if he was resting correctly which is something you made sur of. Levi told you that it was suspicious, but you believed Jean.

“Your love for this kid is making you blind! Jean is obviously fine now!” Levi told you desperately every night.

“He’ll get better, if he’s still hurt and he goes back training then he might not be able to fight at all.” you explained.

You should have believed Levi because one day, you were stuck in a meeting with Commander Erwin which meant you couldn’t stay with the cadets training. Thankfully, the meeting ended sooner than you thought so you went to see the kids, only to find Jean perfectly healthy, on his feet, fighting Eren.

“JEAN KIRSTEIN YOU SON OF A B–“ you yelled.

“NO!” Jean screamed collapsing to the ground dramatically, “It’s not what you think mom! NO!” Jean put his hands on his mouth.

“Oouh Jean called squad leader Y/N ‘mom’” Eren chanted.

“Now that they almost all called you mom,” Hange stated coming out of nowhere, “does that mean Levi is their daddy?”

 —————

-          That one-time Jean called Captain Levi ‘dad’

It was during one of the expeditions outside. You brought tents and prepared them but none of you wanted to sleep yet. You built a fire, and all sat around it. The cadets took turn telling horror stories and once Jean was done, you all applauded him.

“That was great.” Levi complimented him.

“Thanks, daaa–ptain!” Jean corrected himself hallway through his sentence.

Everyone burst out laughing and Jean was blushing hard, while Levi was only smirking drinking his tea.

“Jean, it’s official, you’re their kid now.” Hange kept laughing.

“I’m so embarrassed.” Jean grunted, “I’m sorry d– captain! What is wrong with me!”  

 —————

From then on, they wouldn’t even hide the fact that they all called you mom from time to time. At one point, new recruits thought that it was you name so some of them would call you “squad leader mom”.

MASTERLIST

[erwinsvow]

𝐚𝐨𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐠𝐞 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐝𝐜𝐚𝐧𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐩𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐭𝐰𝐨

note: part two to the college headcanons! part one can be found here! i had a lot of fun writing these and i hope everyone enjoys them :) teacher/student dynamic warning for zeke and hange's, and i guess bullying for annie's :/

𝐩𝐨𝐫𝐜𝐨 𝐠𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐢𝐚𝐫𝐝

the very definition of kind-hearted frat boy who doesn’t fit the stereotype he’s been assigned at all

starts off with accounting before realizing he hates math, moves into business management and marketing

the linkedin profile is absolutely popping, 500+ connections and details about every club and organization he’s ever been a part of

the friend that helps everyone find internships and fixes their resumes while offering helpful advice and not being condescending… anyways so that’s how you meet porco

he works at the career center 100% and does various coaching/prep help, and you, pieck’s friend, are in desperate need of an internship

so you’re complaining to your friend as usual, when she tells you to stop by the building and ask for a “pock”

so you do just that, walking in and asking for “pock” and porco is a little stunned by this pretty stranger calling him by a nickname reserved for his close friends, and even then he just barely tolerates it

but he doesn’t want to correct you, especially since you’re being so sweet and he can tell you need some help

so a meeting at the career center slowly turns into facetime calls to review applications and last-minute edits, stopping by your dorm to help you fill out paperwork and walking together to mail it out

i have a feeling porco doesn’t wanna be too forward, and he thinks he’s being very aloof and casual, when he really just seems oblivious

and you cannot tell for the life of you if he likes you or he’s just being friendly since you’re close with pieck

finally after you land the internship and won't have your normal excuse to spend time with him, you get the guts you've been searching for

you tell him about the position later in the day, stopping by the center for hopefully the last time

"by the way, my number's on my resume if you're ever gonna ask me out."

leaves pocky-boy flustered and red and scrambling to ask you out, and you have been happily dating since

𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐞 𝐬𝐩𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫

oh boy

conny is a very typical college kid in the sense that he will sleep through every 8 am class he has, blow off class to go wait in line for the nacho bar, and has adopted the mantra ‘c’s get degrees’

but he is an extremely lovable education major with a focus in history

rarely seen without his shadow sasha, but now that she started dating niccolo, she thinks that conny could use a relationship too, and that it might do him some good to be with a funny, down-to-earth person

thus begins the most grueling two weeks for every girl on campus, as sasha hunts down girls that she thinks would be a good match for her best friend

this includes airdropping a photo of conny to the lecture hall with the caption “would you date this man? serious inquiries only”

creates a fake tinder complete with a google form to narrow down the options

however, none of this is necessary because sasha bumps into you in the smoothie line and causes your triple berry blend to go flying

she helps you clean up and idle conversation leads to you talking about dates and so forth

“well, i’d love to set you up with my best friend? how do you feel about a blind date?”

yes, conny met you, the love of his life, on a blind date set up by sasha with a stranger

it’s one of those funny stories that people don’t believe when you tell them, because how ridiculous is that, but you both think it’s perfect since you get along so well and it made all the waiting worth it

bonus: double dates with sasha and niccolo! fondue night at their apartment, going to the arcade and having to lug up sasha and her food baby while niccolo parks the car, just overall a grand time :)

𝐳𝐞𝐤𝐞 𝐲𝐞𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐫

zeke yeager, ph.d. started his new job at university with one rule in mind: absolutely no illicit affairs

he also coaches the club baseball team, because why not get involved on your campus

he really believes that he’s gonna stick with it too, despite the overwhelming number of students who come to his office hours with questions that his less handsome teaching assistants could answer

but no, he doesn’t want to earn a reputation as that professor, and so he heads into the new semester with absolutely no lingering thoughts of an exciting little dalliance to get him through the monotonous days

he knows his huge lecture classes would always come with a few pretty students, but it’s the smaller, upper-level psych class he’s teaching when he meets you for the first time

zeke has you all figured out, or so he thinks. sitting in the front row, raising your hand for questions he wasn’t expecting anyone to actually have an answer to, neatly handwritten notes in a color-coded notebook. he wouldn’t peg you for the type to jump and take the risk by starting a relationship with a professor.

but he soon realizes that he didn’t have you as figured out as he thought he did.

you avoid the gaggle of freshmen during office hours by scheduling meetings instead, sometimes right before class, coming to him with two cups of coffee and a wide smile that actually had him fooled into thinking you were here for academic reasons

this facade quickly fades though, because after a semester of interactions with you and getting more and more comfortable with each other, to the point where coffee orders are memorized and it’s zeke rather than professor yeager, you’ve had just about enough

he knows he’s fucked when you come visit him at practice for the baseball team, bringing him a drink and engaging in conversation while the players watch their coach flirt with you

he’s especially fucked when he realizes he’s looking forward to practice just because there’s a chance you’ll stop by on your way to your next class

you submit your final paper early, nearly a week before it’s due and of course the first in the class to do so, and waltz into his office the next day with another steaming cup of his favorite drink

“you submitted your paper pretty early, you know.”

“i know. i also know that it means i’m not your student anymore, so if you were going to make a move, now’s the time.”

no, he definitely had underestimated how much he knew about you.

𝐦𝐢𝐤𝐚𝐬𝐚 𝐚𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐚𝐧

mikasa is a forensic sciences major and is still debating on the minor- she’s torn between criminal justice or history like armin.

she loves her major classes, but she just wants something else interesting to look forward to as well, so armin suggests sitting in on a couple classes early in the semester and getting a taste for it.

so you don’t really think twice when she claims the empty seat next to you on the first day of classes, smiling politely and paying attention to the professor. you do notice, however, that she’s not writing anything down or looking at the syllabus, leading you to strike a conversation on why that is.

she explains herself and then before you even know it, the lecture ends and you spent the last forty minutes talking to mikasa about anything and everything.

she’s sitting in on another class tomorrow, and absent mindedly invites you to come along, to which you agree all too quickly, because why wouldn’t you

numbers are exchanged, times are fixed, and mikasa leaves wondering why she’s so excited at the idea of sitting with you in class again.

you two hate the history class she had chosen, with the professor droning on and on and you being focused entirely on the conversation you’re having with mikasa

until the professor kicks the two of you out for not shutting up, that is

you’re both laughing hysterically once you reach the hallway

“i’m gonna have to discourage you from doing that history minor if that’s what all the classes are like.”

“well, i have to do criminal justice so we can have that class together, anyways.”

𝐚𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐨𝐧𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐭

true to form, annie goes into one of the most difficult majors: cheg. definitely flies through intro courses with straight As and minimal effort, but that’s also mostly because all she and bertholdt do is study

reiner tries his hardest to get her to go to a party every once in a while, but usually to no avail because she always has an exam to study for

you’re a tutor, and honestly, you’d say you were pretty good at your job. you can answer questions and explain reasonings fairly well to confused students. but when annie comes to your office hours with some complicated problems and she’s asking for explanations that you just don’t have, you literally feel your face burn with heat for the entirety of the time she’s there

long story short, your first encounter is embarrassing, to say the least. you’re stumbling over words as you try to look through your old notes and piece together an answer for annie, who you cannot even look in the eyes.

anyways, she leaves eventually and you want a hole to open in the ground and swallow you up, but at least she won’t be back next week, right?

wrong.

miss leonhart doesn’t know how to express her feelings any better than you, so her way of flirting is spending time with you in the tutor center as you fail to answer her questions time and time again

you want to scream at her to stop coming because she and you both know you’re not helping either of you with this

but also you really don’t want her to stop coming because you don’t have any other ways to see her outside of class

both of you reach your wit’s end on the same day, her coming to you with the absolute easiest problems she could find in the textbook, and you with every intention of asking her out to dinner

she opens her book, and you reach and close it quickly

“unless this is the only way you know how to flirt, something has to change now.”

𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐞 𝐳𝐨𝐞

dr. zoë teaches, just, way too many classes

we’re talking multiple chemistry labs and upper-level research courses as well

you’re just a ph.d. student doing rotations as per usual, and you’ve heard the comments from students senior to you about dr. zoë, who makes every student in rotation say hange instead of the formal way you’re used to

you’ve heard everything from crazy to genius and everything in between

what you weren’t expecting was… so good looking, and young? and comforting? and talking about all the things that you didn’t have the guts to bring up with other people, like how you always feel a little left out in the field and that you think no one cares about your research interests that much—a lot of stuff that you find yourself pouring out to hange on your very first day in the lab

you’re wondering why it’s so easy to talk to them, and why none of the other rotations ever felt this comfortable

and then you realize you’re spilling your guts to someone who probably doesn’t even care, and has way more to deal with on their plate than a ph.d. student with imposter syndrome

so you’re apologizing right after you’ve finished, when you’re met with the warmest look and a reassuring hand on your shoulder

it’s so easy to fall after that, with weekly meetings and regular check-ins, and you know it’s wrong to have this strange crush on your superior, but hange really feels like the one person you can count on here

you hide the crush in favor of getting the mentorship you desperately think you need, but it’s not long until you’re onto the next rotation and the next lab’s work is even closer to the stuff you love

you hate the way you feel, that you’re not gonna have any reason to keep in touch and you never even got to explain how you feel about them—and that you didn’t even get to experience hange’s energy because she was always listening and helping you out

it’s not until you get a text the night before your first day in the new lab from hange, filled with reassuring words and asking for a coffee date later in the week to talk about how it goes, that you realize just how well hange understood you

𝐩𝐢𝐞𝐜𝐤 𝐟𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐞𝐫

last but not least, miss pieck is double majoring in french and public health

absolutely obsessed with her majors and loves the subjects, but works herself to death to keep up with it all

you don’t even realize that the pretty, studious girl you’re seeing in the library all the time is the same girl you spot with some of your friends from class

pieck is as oblivious as they come. you invite her on study dates after you two are introduced by reiner, invite her to get coffee after a particularly late night of studying, pretty much start spending most of your days together

you can’t help but be disappointed that pieck doesn’t see you in that way, because you’ve slowly been falling head over heels, but you accept that maybe it just wasn’t meant to be, and you still love the friendship you two have

it takes a while for things to click for pieck, but they do right as the semester eases up

once exams are over, you two decide to go to these famous parties porco and reiner never stop talking about

it’s not the usual scene you’re comfortable with, but what’s wrong with letting loose a little, especially after midterms? no harm in having fun, right?

wrong again! you definitely get plastered way too quickly, and eventually pieck takes you to a room to settle down

drunk confessions of love aren’t usually the way to go, but you can’t help but reveal everything you’ve been feeling for the last few months when pieck is taking care of you in your current state

you definitely wake up hungover and ignorant to last night’s shenanigans, but you’re in your dorm, with a bottle of water and ibuprofen on the nightstand, phone plugged in and shoes off

pieck comes back with breakfast, coffee and your favorite pastries, and checks up on you

“so.. about last night..”

“i’m so sorry, did i throw up on you?”

“no, but you did say you were in love with me. was that just a drunk thing, or is it a sober thing too? because i think i’m in love with you too.”

[rosy-cheekx]

I Want To Be A Real Fake

@kaiserkorresponds said: Black and White + "I want to be a real fake" + formal clothing <3

Prompted fic that I haven’t been able to stop thinking about since I received it! Hope you like it, Kaiser!

-

Jon would not consider himself fashionable. He has a distinct sense of style, yes, but that style lately has been Tired-Academic-Works-in-a-Cold-Office,-Steals-Sweaters-When-Necessary-core. Not exactly suitable for the business casual dress code The Magnus Institute “requires” (no one seemed to pay attention to the Archive staff’s choices of attire), but certainly not suitable for the small rectangle of cardstock Elias Bouchard hands him, on a quiet spring morning in the Archive.

“What’s…what’s this?” Jon asked, staring at the neat, printed text as if it was Greek. (If it were Greek, at least, he could decipher parts of it. He was an English Lit student, after all, and he had really enjoyed etymology.) The card was a stiff black and white, with the black owl logo, the symbol of the Magnus Institute, printed in the top middle. Glancing down at it, he saw a date, and the words: “black-tie.” Shit.

“My apologies, I forgot how tired your position tends to leave you.” Elias’s voice was prim and polite, but Jon still winced inwardly. “As a head of a department, you are now strongly encouraged to attend the fundraiser I host in April each year. Our donors are fascinated by our departments, and especially the Archives. Gertrude’s disappearance has raised questions as to her successor, and I trust you can assuage the concerns of our donors at your accomplishments in the position.” Jon chose to believe that Elias’s keen eye didn’t sweep the mountains of paperwork that surrounded his desk as he surveyed the small, poorly lit office. “I’m certain you’ll be able to find appropriate attire for the occasion.”

He turned on a heel, halfway to the door before seemingly considering something. “Ah, and Jon, one more thing. Gertrude always requested she bring an assistant. Would you like to do the same? I am happy to accommodate one more for the catering count.”

Jon snapped his mouth shut, utterly dumbfounded by the responsibility just thrust upon him, and nodded mutely, before clearing his throat. “Ah-um, yes, I would appreciate that. Does it matter which one?”

“Someone who can make a pleasant impression, please.” Elias raised an eyebrow, nodded almost imperceptibly, like he had made a decision, and rapped his knuckles on the doorframe on the way out. “I trust your judgement.”

Jon counted to thirty, to be certain Elias wasn’t coming back, and slouched into his office chair, scanning the save-the-date again, without the immense pressure of Elias’s eyes on him.

“The Magnus Institute Fundraiser Gala,” it read below the embossed owl, within a thin black border. “23 April, 7-10 pm. Black tie. Catered.” Jon traced the owl with the pad of his finger, flipping the card over to see, in Elias’s thin cursive: Make a good impression, Jon.

God, this is going to suck.

-

“Sasha, come on.” Jon wasn’t one to beg, but desperate times and all that. He had cornered her in the breakroom, while Martin was on a research trip and Tim was getting takeaway from the chippie down the street. “It’s only three weeks away, and you’re the one I trust the most. Please.”

“Jon,” Sasha sighed, smoothing her skirt patiently. “I would if I could, I swear to you. But my sister’s wedding has been planned for months, I’ve already requested time off, and I can’t undo all that for a work party.”

“Fundraiser,” Jon corrected instinctively, even as he signed in resignation. “Fine. I just really didn’t want to go alone.”

Sasha scoffed, shaking her head to herself as she opened the fridge and pulled out her bagged lunch. “You have two other assistants you know. What about Tim? Or Martin?”

Jon wrinkled his nose at the thought of bringing nervous, rambling, doe-eyed Martin to the gala. “God no. Martin would be too much; I need someone who can handle themselves and hold a decent conversation. I need someone who can attend a black-tie gala and look more at-home than me.” A withering look from Sasha.

“So why not Tim, then? He can do all those things.”

“Do all what things?” Jon jumped and spun around to see Tim, carrying a grease-spotted bag in one hand and a paper soda cup in the other. He surveyed Tim in a moment: the button-up shirt, red and printed with tiny black balloons, sleeves rolled to the elbows. Sunglasses pushed to the top of his head, dark black hair artfully mussed. High cheekbones dotted with freckles, and what Jon swore could be the faintest bit of eyeliner.

“Tim, would you like to go to a fashionable, catered work party with me?”

“Boss,” Tim lowered himself to a knee and held out his soda solemnly. “I thought you’d never ask.”

“Tim, that’s backwards. The kneeler isn’t the one who accepts,” Sasha chuckles helpfully.

“You’re just jealous of our love, Sash!”

Good Lord.

-

Jon was really hoping the food would be good. He was in Tim’s flat, in the toilet, checking himself in the mirror one final time. His hair was carefully braided, courtesy of Tim’s deft hands and coiled into a thick bun at the base of his skull, gold and emerald hairpin snugly in place. His suit was nice: a respectable white shirt, dotted with tiny lime-colored flowers he had to strain his eyes to see, under a dark green suit jacket and matching trousers. The suit itself was cut in a rather androgynous style, pulling tight at Jon’s waist in a way he rather liked, and contrasted beautifully, he thought, with the smooth brown of his skin. He flicked an invisible piece of lint from his thigh and, satisfied, stepped into the hall to tell Tim he was ready to go.

“Tim, I’m all-woah,” the exhale was accidental. Tim’s suit was certainly not subtle. He was wearing a deep blue turtleneck, hair perfectly coiffed. Over the turtleneck, the suit jacket was white, a spray of water-color flowers in all shades of blue and purple shifting with every movement. The navy blue heeled suede boots on his feet accentuated his already-tall frame “Tim, you look good,” Jon breathed.

“Ouch. No need to sound all surprised. I know I clean up well; I dirty pretty damn good too.” Tim chuckled and adjusted his sleeves. “You don’t look so bad yourself, Mr. ‘I don’t want anything too crazy.’”

Jon grinned shyly, rocking on his heels of his own, less intimidating dress shoes. “I like it, I think. It feels nice.” The excitement over how good he felt in the clothes had, all too briefly, suppressed the impending doom he was feeling about the evening’s events. “Are you ready for tonight?” he asked for what must have been the fiftieth time, spinning the solid black ring he wore around his finger.

“Yes, Jon. Talk about the reorganization process as a structural renovation, converting files to audio formatting for future accessibility, don’t talk about artefact storage even a little, don’t get caught up with anyone too pretty, I get it.” His voice was flat, bored by the repetition. “This is going to be fine.”

“What-what if it isn’t, though, Tim? What if they ask about Gertrude or how their money is being used, o-or how the restructuring is going? I can’t bloody well tell them I’m using a tape recorder that’s probably older than I am.”

“Jon,” Tim’s well-manicured hand was on his shoulder, nails the same blue of his turtleneck. “Take a deep breath. For Gertrude: be honest. It was a tragedy, and you hope she’s found, but until then you’re doing your best to act on her wishes as her replacement. And for the rest, be vague. Restructuring is going ‘as well as can be expected’ or ‘is running quite smoothly with the help of your three wonderful assistants.’” He winked. “And tell them you’re using a multimedia system, that’ll confuse those old boomers enough to move topics. And it is technically true. Laptops and a tape recorder are multiple medias. Anything else we can riff, you know? I can talk with the best of them.” He eyed Jon meaningfully. “This will be fine. It’s one night. And we’ll get chips after. Promise.”

Jon nodded and closed his eyes, breathing steadying. He was grateful Tim had been available. Maybe this wouldn’t be so bad.

-

“So, how did you know what black tie meant?” Jon asked, eyeing Tim across the seat of the cab. They’re on their way now and Jon’s hands are steepled tightly, pressing his fingertips against each other until it hurts to do so. “I had to Google it last week when I went shopping, in case we had to wear literal black ties.” He needed to talk about anything, anything but this stupid fundraiser they drove steadily towards.

Tim grew silent for a moment, considering his words. “My brother was an extra in a movie once and started dating a stylist for one of the leads. He fibbed his way into getting us tickets for premieres, so I’ve made my way through a few high-fashion events.” He shrugged, fiddling with a thin silver bracelet along his wrist, were Jon knew the letter D was carved in delicate cursive. “I like it, too, you know? Dressing up for events. It makes me feel debonaire, like a spy.”

Jon shook his head in disagreement. “Makes me feel fake,” he mumbled, eyeing the lorry floor beneath them. “Like everyone knows I don’t belong. I hate having their eyes on me and knowing they’re better than me.”

Tim prodded Jon with his elbow gently, raising his eyebrows in a comforting manner. “That’s it though, isn’t it? We aren’t fake. We worked our way here. Hell, you’re the boss of an entire department, Jon. We’ve gotten to where we are in the Institute because we deserve to be here. And anyways, everyone at that party next week is gonna be fake. They’re pretending to care about our jobs, and we pretend to care about their money, and they pretend they’re even the ones who write the checks and not some snooty financial advisor in Wales.”

Jon shrugged, trying to keep himself from biting back that he wasn’t enough, didn’t earn this spot, that Sasha deserved it more than he did and was doing nothing to prove to Elias he was up to the monumental task of being the Head Archivist. He didn’t, though, and instead took a steadying breath, nodding to Tim’s comforting words.

“And anyways,” Tim continued, shrugging. “Even if we have to be fake for a night, it’ll be fun. We get to be a part of ‘the queen’s high society,’” he added in a high-pitched, overly fake RP accent, eliciting a chuckle from Jon. “And Rosie said the catering Elias orders is divine. Apparently we should keep an eye out for tiny samosas?”

As if on cue, the cab shuddered to a stop. Jon thanked the driver, paid, and followed Tim out.

-

The Institute looked different under the pretense of wealth and success. It was still the same building of course, but the floor was clear of the rain mats and the smooth marble floor paved the way to the library, the main sitting room of which had been cleared as a rather respectable grand hall to host a party. Tables lined the cordoned off books, hot plates and silver trays steaming slightly. Bottles of wine lined a bar, behind which a vested individual with slicked-back hair was pouring small glasses and taking orders. A quiet orchestra completed the scene, cello and piano in a delicate duet. Before tonight, Jon couldn’t have imagined this many people in the Institute alone, least of all the library. Not that it’s packed. There’s maybe thirty or so well-dressed individuals milling about, the din of conversation white noise in comparison to the floating of the music.

Tim’s hand is on his back, pressing kindly into his spine. Oh yes, he remembers dimly, and nods, allowing Tim to guide him into the library and hand him a glass of wine. They stand out a little, two beacons of color around what is a pretty drab spectrum of black and grey, save for a few spectacular dresses in the crowd. Jon finds he doesn’t mind it, except that it may lead to unwanted conversation. It’s not his looks he fears being judged on, but that he be found wanting when it came to his capabilities. He was always selectively self-conscious like that, some things utterly meaningless, others inexplicably important.

Jon isn’t a huge fan of wine, but he finds himself clinging to the glass as a lifeline as he and Tim meander through the crowds, largely ignored. The music is intoxicatingly simple; he finds himself caught up in the deep reverberations of the cello as they walk, feeling it deep in his chest. There were, in fact, samosas, as well as small cannoli, and he and Tim piled plates as high as they could without garnering stares.

There weren’t many people Jon recognized; he didn’t even see Elias as he scanned the crowd for faces. Wine in one hand, a plate in the other, he thought maybe the night wouldn’t be too bad.

Jon shivered, the sensation of being stared at prickling the back of his neck. He spun around, trying to appear casual, and spotted Elias at last. He was standing with a large man, broad and wearing a deep blue suit, scruffy beard a mix of tawny and white. Elias crooked his finger, smiling primly. As Jon made his way over to the pair-who he could’ve sworn he hadn’t seen previously, he was intercepted by a short bald man in a plum velour suit, leaning heavily on a cane.

“Ah, Archivist,” he smiled warmly, extending a hand to shake before seeing Jon’s hands were full, and nodding his head instead. “Congratulations on your promotion. Elias has told me he expects great things from you.”

Jon smiled politely, glancing over to see Elias and the other man gone again. Regretfully, he turned his attention back to the man. “It’s a shame about Gertrude, yes, but I’m hoping I can do her proud,” he said in a practiced tone. He glanced over his shoulder. Where was Tim? He was just with him.

“Of course, of course. I was hoping I could have a word?”

“W-with me?”

“Yes, you see, I was rather concerned when I heard Gertrude’s position had been left open. When Elias said you yourself where at the junction to take over, I wanted to meet you for myself. I worry about the Archivists in your institute, so many of you do such monumental work for so little recognition. Do you worry your work to be meaningless?  Your name insignificant when it is all said and done?”

(It is this conversation he remembers, months later, when he demands to record Prentiss’ attack. He refuses to be another mystery, a name on a placard to be wondered about.)

“I-ah, yes? No?” What was the right answer here? Jon stammered out a half-assed reply about doing his best, midway through when he felt a hand firmly on his shoulder, where his neck and collarbone met. Glancing to his peripheral, he saw a golden ring, an eye, and was frustratingly grateful to hear the cool tones of Elias Bouchard over his shoulder.

“Now Simon,” he said, voice even, “you aren’t trying to scare my dear Archivist, are you?” He gave the shoulder a squeeze but remained put. “Jon, I believe you’ve heard of Simon Fairchild, a significant donor to our establishment.”

Jon nodded wordlessly, not really listening to the two bureaucrats delve off into some topic or other, craning his neck to look for Tim. The music had picked up, he registered dimly, a orchestral melody led by a violin, sharp and whimsical.

“Jon?” Another squeeze to his neck, and Jon tried not to wince. “Wouldn’t you agree,” Elias asked, voice patient at surface level. “That the best way to move forward is to restructure the Archive?”

Jon nodded, trying to recall the answer he had rehearsed. “Yes, ah—my team and I have worked quite hard at recording the statements a-and organizing them in a way that will last long-term.”

“Ah, what a delight,” Simon—Mr. Fairchild—said warmly. Jon was reminded of the voices adults would use when they spoke to him as a child, when his inane facts about space or etymology had moved from endearing to obnoxious.

The conversation lasted for what felt like days, Jon feeling rather like Mr. Fairchild’s cane: a statement piece, contributing nothing to the conversation but unable to find a smooth exit. Leading questions from Elias led to thankfully rehearsed answers before Simon found his own exit and walked away smoothly, eyes wide and taking the room in.

“I-I really should find Tim,” Jon muttered, glancing around the room anxiously.

“Nonsense. He’ll be back,” Elias said, releasing Jon’s shoulder and taking his elbow in turn, “I would like to introduce you to a few dear friends of mine. I believe Tim is keeping one occupied at present.” Jon sighed inwardly (and maybe outwardly as well) and allowed himself to be led around the room. His wine glass was empty, as was his plate and he found it snatched away by a member of catering. He had nothing to cling to, to keep his hands busy, and was struggling not to pull out his delicately-placed hair pin just so he could fiddle with something.

Jon was taken on a tour of old rich people of England. Names flew past him, conversation buzzed around him, and still Jon felt like nothing more than a well-dressed trophy to be ogled at. Did Gertrude do this every year, he wondered dimly. No wonder she disappeared. He fiddled with the ring on his finger, nodding and smiling at the appropriate times, speaking when needed, and feeling the swirl of the orchestra build up in pressure behind his eyes. The music was beautiful but hard to listen to. Something about it was ugly, hiding a dark secret behind the innocent melodies.

Eventually, the evening was so much of a blur that he couldn’t even begin to fathom how much time had passed. It may have been weeks, may have been merely twenty minutes. Jon glanced down for his watch before realizing he had taken it off at Tim’s flat and never strapped it back on. Pity. It only added to the dreamscape reality he seemed to be participating in.

At last, Elias led him towards the large burly man that was suddenly in view (hadn’t he always been? Jon wasn’t quite sure. The wine must have affected him more than he thought with the nerves) and Jon saw Tim, similarly trapped in conversation as he had been. He smiled apologetically as Jon and Elias approached and the larger man smiled warmly at the newcomers.

“Ah, Archivist. I hope you don’t mind I stole your companion away briefly. I was curious about the nitty-gritty of your Archive. Timothy here was very informative.” Tim winced at the use of his full name and a part of Jon smirked, relating to the sentiment of being called Jonathan or worse, John.

“I’m glad he can answer your questions.” Elias spoke before Jon could open his mouth. “I’m quite proud of the Archive staff. Jon chose well and I am sure the four of them are going to do great things together. Jon, you remember the Lukas family?”

Jon nodded, confused for a second before the man in front of him extended his hand. “Peter Lukas, at your service.” The hand was cold, and a feeling of dismay washed over Jon as he shook it. He couldn’t help the feeling that the shake of that hand was a seal of his fate.

The orchestral music had picked up, a swirl of strings and piano, ascending in pitch until it grated at Jon’s ears. No one else seemed to react to it, however, as the manic notes pulling at something inside Jon’s brain, something he couldn’t explain. It was almost like a migraine, but sharper and deep in his spine and in his ears. Elias let go of Jon’s arm at some point during the conversation with Peter Lukas, a discussion about boats, maybe? Travel? This was the conversation Elias was so keen on Jon being a part of?

As Jon felt that grip relax, the glint of the ring on Elias’ finger seeming to wink at him, Jon took a staggered step backwards. “Mr. Lukas, ah-Peter, it’s been a pleasure. Elias, ex-excuse me.”

Jon turned and dashed out of the library, feet carrying him on instinct through the winding halls and down the stairs of the institute, deep into the Archives. He stopped when he felt his feet echo against the cold, solid lino of the archival storage and bent over, hand on the wall, gasping in shallow, rapid bursts. It was too much, it was too much, he thought he could do this but it was too much and he wasn’t enough for them-

“Woah-boss.” Tim was there. When did Tim get here? Was he speaking out loud? Shit. “Jon, yeah-hey, Jon. I’m here. You’re okay. Take some deep breaths, okay? You’re going to black out if you’re not careful.”

Jon felt his suit jacket being shrugged off of him and the newly allowed freedom of his shoulder helped. He took a deep, sputtering breath, the sweet oxygen flooding his system and sharpening his thoughts.

“The-the music and the talking,” he said under his breath, Tim craning to listen without infringing on his personal space. “Too-too much.”

“The music? Jon, hey, hey, just focus on calming down, okay? That was a dick move of Elias to separate us immediately. I was talking to that Lukas guy for way too long. Not even sure what we talked about. I think he’s just one of those guys.” Jon smirked to himself as he focused on the floor beneath his feet, breathing slowly until his heart rate had resumed a normal rhythm.

“Says you,” he mumbled, eyes closing as he pressed his warm cheek to the cold wall.

“You bastard!” Jon felt a light swat on his shoulder. “I listen to people! I have meaningful conversation; just ask Martin and Sasha and Alexa from Library and Calvin from Artefact Storage. I am practically a professional listener.”

Jon smirked, satisfied with his jab and turned around, now pressing his back to the wall. “God, Tim, I do not want to go back in there.” It was hard to admit out loud, even if the evidence was written all over his face.

“Okay. So, we won’t.”

“What?” the answer was so mind-bogglingly simple, Jon reeled.

“We don’t want to be here. We’ve talked, we’ve eaten. Let’s just leave. I can tell Elias I had an emergency and you had to escort me home, like a true gentleman.”

“Lie to Elias? I feel like that cant end well.” The offer was tempting, Jon hadf to admit.

“I mean, Sasha has keys to my flat. I could ask her to start a fire, if you think that’s sufficient?”

Jon barked out a laugh at that. “Ah, no, lets save a fire for something big. Yes. Let’s-let’s go, Tim. And-er, I suppose I should thank you. For coming tonight. I know its not an ideal way to spend an evening.”

“Are you kidding?” Tim did a twirl, Jon’s own jacket slung over his shoulder. “I look hot. You think I’d pass up an opportunity to dress up like this? You’re dreaming.” He smirked and took Jon’s arm, leading him back up the stairwell. It felt different than Elias’s touch. That had been a cold tug, directional and leashed. This felt…snug, more like a link in a chain than anything else. Comforting, reassuring.

(Luckily, they weren’t laughed out of the Nando’s they popped into late at night. Lemon and herb and spices covered their hands, but they were careful to keep their jackets clean. Jon, when looking back on the evening; remembers this moment, talking and laughing and letting the fresh night air was over them. Elias, Lukas, and Fairchild be damned. He’d deal with that tomorrow.)

[haberdashing]

Debating All Your History

Martin notices how odd Jon’s been acting since gaining memories of the future. A sequel to Unravelling All The Mystery.

on AO3

Jon kept acting weird around Martin, and Martin wasn’t sure why.

Okay, so Jon kept acting weird around everyone, but after that impromptu explanation at the ice cream parlor, most of it actually sort of made sense. It was still weird to see Jon looking at Tim like he was seeing a ghost, or doing a double-take when he hears Sasha talking, but he had his reasons for it, and they knew those reasons now, and that was fine, that was all fine.

Well. Maybe Tim and Sasha didn’t think it was fine, but it was better than the alternative, anyway.

“The alternative” in this case being how Jon was still acting weird around Martin in a way that he hadn’t explained, that didn’t make sense even with his whole spooky future memories thing going on.

Jon kept... kept looking at Martin, sneaking glances at him when he thought he wasn’t looking, always with the same strange expression on his face that Martin couldn’t quite decipher. Sure, it was better than when the only expression on Jon’s face looking at Martin was something like disgust or hatred, but that was a pretty low bar to set there, and Martin kept wondering if... if maybe he’d done something wrong, in the future that only Jon knew about.

Martin kept thinking back to what Jon had said about the future he remembered, trying to fill in the blanks, put together the pieces there. Jon hadn’t actually said much about Martin then--he’d found Gertrude’s body, apparently, and also something about “the Lonely,” whatever that was? Granted, Sasha and Tim mostly got mentioned because they died, and Martin wasn’t asking for that, of course not, but...

What was his future like? What was he like, in the future? Did he do something to set Jon off in the future that he doesn’t even know about in this timeline yet, something that would explain all those surreptitious glances his way? He wasn’t one of the bad guys or something like that, was he?

Martin thought about asking Jon about it, but never quite managed to actually do so. For one thing, it sounded so minor when he tried to actually put words to it, made him feel like maybe he was just imagining it all. For another, he was worried that Jon really was hiding some big future secret about him, and bringing it up would just shatter the fragile façade of normalcy that Martin was so desperately clinging to.

Instead, when Jon bumped into him in the archives, Jon stammering out something about not knowing Martin was there but then just standing in place and staring at him again as Martin kept sorting through the files, Martin just... snapped.

“Why do you keep looking at me like that?”

Jon paused, then, blinking a few times as Martin stepped away from the files and returned Jon’s stare with one of his own.

“Like what?”

Did he honestly not know what he was doing when he stared at Martin like that, or did Jon just not think Martin would notice?

Either way, Martin didn’t hesitate to respond. “You look at me like, like you’re trying to solve a puzzle in your head or something, like I’m one of your precious mysteries instead of an actual person! What’s the deal with that, honestly?”

Jon shook his head, a soft sigh escaping his lips. “I, uh... maybe we should talk about this.”

“Yeah, I think we should, Jon! That’s why I brought it up!”

“I mean, er, I think we should talk about this-” A brief but meaningful glance in the direction of the stairs leading out of the archives. “Outside.”

Ah. Meaning the ice cream parlor. (Jon never seemed to want to mention it by name in the institute, seemed to think that might make it easier for Elias to track them down, though if even half of what Jon said about Elias was true Martin highly doubted something that simply would actually make a difference.) Meaning this was tied to the future Jon had memories of after all. Brilliant.

“Should I go get the others? I think Tim just went on his lunch break, but Sasha-”

Jon shook his head again. “No, no, this is probably best kept between the two of us.”

Martin’s stomach lurched at the sound of that even as he went through the motions of grabbing his things and following Jon to the ice cream parlor. They trusted each other, the four of them, they had to trust each other--Jon had made that much very clear. What kind of revelation did Jon have in store about Martin’s future that was so weighty he didn’t even want to share it with Tim and Sasha?

The two of them didn’t say a word to one another during the walk over, didn’t make small talk in between their orders (Martin got chocolate peanut butter this time, while Jon got rum raisin again--really, somebody who regularly ate rum raisin ice cream had no room to criticize his taste in ice cream flavors!), but once they sat down at a table, Martin spoke up before Jon could.

“Is this about that- you called it ‘the Lonely’, before? Is that what all this is about?” It was a shot in the dark, admittedly, but given that Jon had still said previous little about what the future had in store for the rest of them, it seemed like as good a guess as any.

“No, no, it’s not about that, though...” Jon let out a shaky laugh, shaking his head before continuing. “I suppose it is connected, in a way, that’s sort of where it started and all...”

Martin gulped down some ice cream. “What is it, then?”

“Well... I should, I should probably start by making it clear that just because something happened in the future I remember doesn’t mean that, that it has to happen again now, or that it should happen again-”

“I mean, that future involved the world ending, right? So I’d certainly hope it all doesn’t have to happen again.” Martin’s heart sank as a thought occurred to him, as he considered its implications. “Is that what this is about, the end of the world?”

“No, it- it isn’t that, either... although again, it’s not entirely unrelated, really, that did, did have something to do with it as well...”

Jon let out another shaky laugh, and Martin tapped his spoon against his cup a few times to get his attention.

“Look, maybe the Martin you remember would understand all these vague little hints you’re dropping here, I get that, okay? But I’m not that Martin, and I don’t know what it is you keep dancing around here, so I’d really rather you just get to the point already.”

“Right. Right, I’m sorry.” Jon sighed a little before speaking up again. “It’s, uh... after the Lonely, after the end of the world, after everything, we... we were together. The two of us.”

“I know, we were the only ones left, because Tim and Sasha, they-”

Martin was actually kind of grateful that Jon cut him off then, because he really hadn’t been looking forward to the end of that sentence.

“I mean, yes, but also no, I didn’t mean it like that.”

Martin sighed and let out a soft “Jon...” before he continued.

“I don’t just mean we happened to be in the same place when the world ended and we stuck together after that. I mean we were...” Jon made a vague hand gesture. “We were together. You and I.”

It took Martin a moment to process that, and another moment to second-guess what he had just processed, wonder if he was just hearing what he wanted to hear.

“Together.” he echoed. “As in... dating?”

“Not sure if that’s quite the right word for it, given the circumstances...” Jon’s face was coloring oddly, turning a bit redder than he normally looked--was he blushing? “But essentially, yes. I mean, we were boyfriends, certainly. And the, the L word was used.”

“The L word.” God, this was not the conversation Martin had been mentally preparing to have here, and now he was left flailing about. It was only a bit of a consolation that Jon seemed barely more put-together than he himself was. “You mean... love. One of us said he loved the other.”

“Both of us said it.” Jon corrected emphatically. “Multiple times over, in fact. But like I said before, just because it happened in the future I remember doesn’t mean that-”

Martin couldn’t help himself then, bursting out into soft, shaking laughter that he almost thought Jon didn’t notice until Jon’s stare became a bit more of a glare directed at him.

“Look, I know things are different now, I know I’ve been an arse to you and all, but is it really that absurd that in some other future, under wildly different circumstances-”

Martin waved his hand around as if to wipe Jon’s assumptions away. “No, no, it’s not that, it’s just... well... when you told us all about this whole memories of the future stuff, I figured that’d make it even less likely that we could get together down the line.”

Jon was definitely blushing now as he diverted his stare to his now half-melted scoop of ice cream. “Oh, I... I see.”

“Though I cannot promise that I’ll be breaking out ‘the L word’ on our first date or anything like that.”

Jon huffed offendedly. “I wouldn’t expect you to. I know you’re not that Martin... though sometimes it’s surprisingly easy to forget that.”

“...but you’re fine with the ‘first date’ part of that hypothetical, then?” Martin wasn’t sure if Jon hadn’t noticed that bit of what he’d said, had glossed over it, or was in fact trying to avoid it.

“Oh! Oh, yes, I- honestly that’s one thing we never really got to do, before, between being on the run and then the world ending, just go on a normal date. But Martin--I don’t want you to feel like I’m pressuring you into this, or anything like that--you would be willing to go on a date with me?”

Martin couldn’t help but let out another shaky laugh; of all the fantastical scenarios he’d imagined that ended with Jon asking him out on a date, this had most certainly not been one of them, but it would do just as well as any of the rest.

“Yes, Jon, I would very much like to go on a date with you.”

[toomanyfamdom]

Many Shades of Green

I have to say some thank yous before I post this.

Thank you to @jane-fucking-seymour , @ichlugebulletsandcornnuts , @millie1536 and @bessie-bass-on-the-bass for being inspirations to me. Without them I wouldn’t have thought of starting to write. They never got mad if I sent them random messages and goodness knows what time for them and have kindly corrected me when necessary. So thank you.

But the person I owe the most to is @the-quiet-winds . I’ve talked most closely with them and they are an incredible writer and the first person to encourage me to basically get myself together and write something for goodness sake. They’ve been incredibly kind, never minding the annoying messages I send them and giving me her permission to write my own interpretations of her stories some co-written with @ichlugebulletsandcornnuts . So for this, I thank you.

This is my first publicized work and I’m open to constructive criticism. This is based on the personal head cannon I mentioned about Anne Boleyn so I decided I would just write about it instead. Please be patient with me. This may seem a little unrealistic but bear with please.

Also, does anyone want a tag list?

Tw: none that I can think of

Word count: 1318

***

All was calm in the queens household.

Which was weird, especially because the ladies-in-waiting were over for the evening for their monthly get together.

It wasn’t the only time the ladies were in the house, they only lived two doors down the road but it was the only scheduled, constant gathering.

They were all gathered in the living room, watching a movie, eating - or in some cases throwing - popcorn when one of the phones began to ring. Catherine, being the closest got to it first.

“Hello?” she answered, face brightening as the other person spoke, “Sasha! Give me one second, I’ll put you on speaker.” Sasha was their manager so if she phoned the house, it was something for everyone.

“Hello?” Sasha’s voice came through the speaker.

“Hiya love, you have all of us here,” Jane told the woman.

“Great, makes my life easier,” they all laughed, “I have some very exciting news for you all.”

“Don’t leave us hanging babes, tell us,” Anna laughed.

“You’ve been invited for a European tour.”

Silence. Then all hell broke loose.

“Are we really going on tour?”

“It would be so nice to go back home.”

“That I agree with, Bess.”

“I’d love to back to France.”

“Same but with Spain.”

“I’d love to go where you grew up Catherine.”

“How cool, we get to travel and still perform. Awesome!”

“Agreed, Kat.”

“That’s a lot of new rigs to learn.”

“You’ll be fine Joey.”

“Where are we going, Sasha?” Jane was the only person with something sensible to say.

“You’ll be starting in Portugal and working your way through Spain, France, Italy, Germany, the Netherlands and ending in Sweden.”

“That’s so many places,” Kat was in awe.

“So many different languages,” Cathy noted.

“We’ll have to see about getting interpreters,” Sasha added.

“Well you have Anna, Catherine, Anne, Maggie and I who can speak German, Spanish and French respectively,” Cathy said, “And Bessie-”

“I can speak Italian,” the bassist confirmed.

“Right,” she nodded, “so it’s just Portuguese, Dutch and Swedish we’ll need help with.”

“I’ll look into interpreters but no promises,” Sasha’s voice was uncertain.

“I’ll learn them.”

Every head turned to the queen who had just spoken.

“Are you sure, Anne? That’s a lot of work,” Maria questioned her friend.

“Well I’m already learning other languages and from what I’ve heard Portugese and Spanish are kind of similar and German, Dutch and Swedish come from the same family of languages so I wouldn���t mind. If it gives us some piece of mind,” Anne scratched her neck and giggle slightly, “I’ve been looking for some new languages to learn anyway so this just made my search so much easier.”

Only if you’re sure sister,“ Maggie looked concerned.

"I’m sure,” the woman in question affirmed, pulling her sister into her arms, “I promise if it gets too much, I’ll stop. Is that okay with everyone?”

Various affirmations were made and Sasha said, “Thank you Anne, that’s one less thing to worry about. Just letting you know, your opening date is in six months. Bye.”

“Thank you Sasha, bye,” Catherine hung up the phone, “well then, let’s get back to our movie, shall we?

***

Four months later and the ladies-in-waiting were over again. Maria, Joan, Jane and Catherine were all in the kitchen making the dinner together, Anna, Kat and Bessie were playing an intense game of Mario Kart and Anne, Maggie and Cathy were in Anne’s room.

"This is incredible,” said Cathy from where she was sitting on the floor by Anne’s desk with the queens many notebooks sat surrounding her, all in different colours and languages ranging from English to German to Swedish, “How many languages did you say?”

“Nine,” Anne said, looking up from where she was lying upside down off the edge of her bed reading some Greek poetry, dangerously close to kicking Maggie in the face from where she was drawing in a random sketch book she found, “and I’m working on a tenth, although it’s a little harder, see that dark blue one behind you? I’m not fluent, that would be impossible in four months but I’ll be able to help in most situations.”

“That’s amazing,” Cathy smiled at her, “now, come help me put these away.”

Anne closed her book and set it gently on the floor putting her hands down and kicking herself off the bed and over onto her feet. She took the books from a laughing Cathy and went round the other side of the divider she had put in her room and came back around to the girls, flopping at Cathy and Maggie’s feet, back to her original position.

“You’re gonna hurt yourself one of these days,” Maggie didn’t even look up from her drawing.

“I know,” Anne winked at Cathy to have the pair laugh at her despairingly.

“You’ll have to teach me some of those languages when we get time,” Cathy said, “Its so nice to see this other side of you and I’m so happy you feel comfortable enough to show me this side.”

Anne sat up, “You two are my nearest and dearest, how could I not be comfortable around you?”

The trio smilled at each other and all of their phones buzzed.

“Did you two get this as well?” asked Maggie.

“From Sasha,” Cathy had already read the message and was looking at it with wide eyes.

“Is it bad or?” Anne’s phone was out of reach.

“The tour’s been cancelled,” Maggie told her.

Anne bolted up straight. “What?! What do you mean?” she asked increadiusly.

“Exactly what she said.”

“What on…” Anne trailed off then jumped off the bed and running downstairs, “Familly meeting in the kitchen!”

Anna jumped when she heard Anne’s shout. The German looked over at her two companions.

“If Anne’s calling a family meeting,” started Kat.

“Something is definitely wrong,” Bessie finished.

“Better not keep the hurricane waiting,” the three went to the kitchen, meeting Maggie and Cathy in the hall and were met with a pacing Anne Boleyn.

“Perfect, we’re all here now,” Anne said, “Have a seat.” She gestured towards the table.

“Anne, what’s wrong?” Jane asked as softly as she could.

“Nothing’s wrong per say, just changes, I don’t like sudden changes so yeah,” Anne muttered to her self. She stopped took a deep breath then said, “Check your phones.”

They all did - except for Maggie and Cathy who tried to calm Anne down a bit. “I have a message from Sasha,” said Kit a bit confused, “why is she messaging me?”

“I have one too,” said Maria

“I think we all do,” Jane said in a grim voice, reading the message.

“Is it bad?” Joan looked over to her former mistress, scared to read it.

Anne took a deep breath, “The tour’s been cancelled.”

“What?!” Katherine almost jumped out of her seat, “But why? All the prep was going so well and we were getting venues just fine.”

“Says here that our sponsor backed out,” Anna said, “If that’s true, there’s no way the tour could be funded babes.”

“You did all that learning for nothing,” Catherine realised the root of Anne’s distress.

Anne visibly deflated, leaning against the counter top, head in her hand. “Its not even that. Well, it is that a little but,” she sighed, “You may not know or remember this from our past lives but I thoroughly enjoy learning. Languages especially, they’re challenging. But I also love learning with a reason. I probably would’ve learnt the languages anyways but the tour gave me a reason. It gave me constancy. And that’s been torn from underneath my feet.”

Suddenly there was a Kitty sized person embracing Anne. “I think its really cool how much you’ve managed to learn Annie. Nine foreign languages? That’s incredible!”

“Well, now I have an excuse to keep learning yeah? Look on the bright side!” Anne returned her cousin’s hug, “Thanks sister.”

[soveryanon]

Reviewing time for MAG146 /X_X/*

- Replacing things chronologically, what Jon was doing vs. what he was saying and telling the others throughout the season? (Not suuuure about the first having happened before MAG124, though, since. Yeah. We had squinted at that comment, back in MAG125. And it could take on A Very Special Meaning if that actually came just after Jon’s first victim.)

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: … The first was a supermarket cleaner. Em, ended up lost for a week in an endless warehouse. I didn’t even…! I–I just went in for some shopping, and he was there, and I–I just… asked.

(MAG124) ARCHIVIST: It’s been a week and… Melanie’s attitude towards me hasn’t softened. And Basira, though she is very willing to talk, still doesn’t seem to trust me enough to let me in on whatever plans she might have.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: Regardless, I’ve hit another research dead end with this. It’s… frustrating, to be honest. I finally feel myself, I feel… focused, and ready – and I find myself basically alone.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: The second was, uh, it was after I got… stabbed by Melanie. MELANIE: You are not putting this on me! ARCHIVIST: No, that’s not what I meant! [SIGH] I was walking the streets, I–I thought I was trying to clear my head– DAISY: [DELIBERATE] But you were hunting. ARCHIVIST: … Apparently. I found a woman who… every year on her birthday, wakes up in a fresh grave. Just for her.

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry Basira, I–I will try to keep anything I learn about you to myself. My priorities haven’t changed; I hope you can believe that. [SIGH] I’m still on your side. You can trust me.

(MAG128) ARCHIVIST: You can trust me, Basira– BASIRA: Stop saying that.

(MAG146) DAISY: And the third was after the coffin. ARCHIVIST: A man rejected by all who knew him, searching ever-darker places for love. When he told me his story, he started… weeping maggots.

(MAG133) ARCHIVIST: Look, I’ve… been where you are. BASIRA: Have you? ARCHIVIST: Yes, I have. Like you’re the only one responsible for everyone, the weight of all their lives on your shoulders: it leads to bad decisions. […] Fine. I don’t care if you trust me, but I think I’ve proven at the very least that I’m useful. So use me. Because if you go it alone, you are going to die. Even Gertrude worked with people. We make bad decisions when we don’t communicate…

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Jess Tyrell, the woman on the tape… [SIGH] She was the fourth. I–I just tried to… I was weak, r–ravenous, I–I didn’t feel…

What Jon did would have warranted the others’ anger anyway; but I think what made it even worse is… that he spent the season taking the higher and stable ground, assuring them that he could be trusted, that they had to communicate and work together, and actively complained and presented himself as… a victim who was tragically cut out by the others? And in the end, Basira was right from the start, without knowing it: he was actually untrustworthy, and unreliable to us listeners.

And it’s not even a New Jon thing! He hid himself to the tapes back in season 1, covered up his true feelings and played pretend because he was afraid that acknowledging the supernatural and the feeling of being watched would only make it more real.

- So, personally? I felt so relieved by the girls’ reaction: yes, it’s irrational; yes, it’s confrontational; yes, it’s not constructive; yes, they’re probably making a series of mistake again. But after MAG142 (and the fact that Martin was partially refusing to believe it was Jon-Jon behind it, then presenting Jon as someone who needed to be protected rather than protected from, and Daisy who was also prompt to highlight how Jon had suffered himself), I… think I really needed characters to be horrified and disgusted by what he had done; to express something raw, leaking betrayal, hurt, disappointment and disgust.

The setting of The Intervention 2.0 is especially interesting since… it’s once again something that Martin, though reluctant, slowly planned or at least contributed to put into motion:

(MAG058) MARTIN: Look, look, you just got to let me work through this. Alright? I suggested therapy, but he just says no, so– TIM: Well, we need to do something! MARTIN: Yeah, maybe.

(MAG059) ARCHIVIST: Supplemental. Everyone is avoiding me. They’ve taken to working farther away from me than normal, and when I call them for any reason, they’re always keen to leave as soon as possible. They share furtive glances when they think I’m not looking. I don’t like it. I feel like they’re planning something.

(MAG060) ARCHIVIST: You don’t mind if I record this, I trust? ELIAS: Well, to be honest– TIM: –That’s kind of one of the things we wanted to talk about. MARTIN: This is an intervention. ARCHIVIST: Excuse me. [CHAIR] ELIAS: If you’d rather it was an official disciplinary hearing, Jon, we can arrange it. ARCHIVIST: … Fine. Say your piece. NOT!SASHA: We care about you, Jon. And you’ve been rather erratic since the Prentiss’s incident. MARTIN: And we’d really like– ELIAS: To not have to fire you. MARTIN: –to make sure that you’re doing okay.

(MAG142) MARTIN: [SIGH] Th–the worst part is I don’t even want to talk to him about it. I’m just… [SIGH] I suppose I’m just getting comfortable with the distance. […] I should probably try to get him this tape, let him know what happened, that someone came in to… But then, ahah, would that just come across as an accusation? Like, because I don’t wanna… And then, then I guess he’d… hear this bit as well, so… I… I… [LONG EXHALE] What do I do…?

(MAG145) BASIRA: Martin left a tape for us. [SHUFFLING NOISE] ARCHIVIST: And what exactly is on this t– … Oh… MELANIE: Yes.

(Martin had tried to partially lead the “intervention” back in MAG060: the way he had corrected Elias was especially impressive, given how Elias was “just” his boss at the time.)

But now, it’s an entirely different team confronting Jon about his actions than in MAG060 – from Martin, Tim, Not!Sasha and Elias, to Melanie, Basira and Daisy: back then, it was half composed of people who… were not being honest to the others about who they were (Elias was scolding Jon for his behaviour and paranoia induced by Gertrude’s murder, when he was the one responsible for it in the first place, and knew about Not!Sasha; Not!Sasha was gleefully pouring salt over the wounds while she had killed Sasha a few months ago, while the others didn’t know yet). Now, unless twist, the three new assistants have made mistakes of their own but are not “toying” with Jon, and are genuine about their feelings; and, more importantly, the three of them have been victims of Jon’s statement-induced nightmares. Daisy had deemed them bad enough to knowingly sign an employment contract, to get immunity from them even though it meant trapping herself in work for Beholding. They all know, from experience, how difficult to bear the dreams were, for victims.

(Not even counting the additional symptoms described by Jess in MAG142. And I can’t help but think that there is something a bit… stronger, for women, to hear about a woman who was terrorised by a man, who happened to be someone close to them. MAG142’s whole setting had made me viscerally uncomfortable more than horrified (“story about a woman being preyed upon while on a date, cornered once alone, pressured to do something painful, then receiving the thanks of her tormentor” was… Heavy) so, although it’s a sheer emotional&personal response, hearing characters-who-are-women unambiguously denouncing what happened without searching for excuses for the perpetrator, meeting him with nothing but coldness and anger… was reassuring. Yes, narratively and strategically, it’s probably not going to help the characters. But emotionally, if felt, to me, like a necessary reaction.)

(And it was even more significant, in the story, that amongst these three characters, Melanie has always been leaning a bit towards denouncing oppressive social structures (her rant about Elias in MAG117 was… yeah.), and the two others… used to be police officers. Basira, especially, led the intervention as an interrogation against Jon; being firm, pushing him to confess, not allowing him to dissimulate or minimise the hurt – though she also made herself partially a judge, in this case, by claiming what Jon was, and I think that was her emotions pouring out.)

- I’ll try to cover the statement first: it was a very interesting case, time-wise, because it intertwined multiple lives and events. The doors had haunted Marcus McKenzie for most of his life, but his father ended up pursued by one and was the first to leave his statement, on August 24th 2003 (MAG027). Marcus left his statement a week later, on September 1st  2003 (MAG146), in reaction to his father’s. Jon stumbled upon Paul’s first, but already learned at the time, through the follow-up work, that Marcus had also given one:

(MAG027) ARCHIVIST: Martin made contact with the son, Marcus McKenzie, but he declined to talk to us, saying that he’d “already made his statement.” This leads me to believe that Marcus McKenzie may also have a statement lurking somewhere here in the archives, lost among the mess and misfiling.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … So it seems we did have Marcus McKenzie’s statement after all. I spent so long looking for it, back when I found his father’s, and… no luck.

And Paul had died “of a stroke” two months after leaving his statement (MAG027), which was confirmed by Helen (MAG146: “And technically, I didn’t eat the old man. He passed away from terror!, before I even had the chance to open properly.”)… while Marcus had been fine for almost fifteen years, given how Jon’s team had been able to contact him, back in (April or earlier) 2016, but this wasn’t the case anymore as of now (June-July 2018):

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: And his son Marcus, he… he was fine, when I found his father’s statement two years ago – but now, suddenly, I can’t get through to him! HELEN: No… I imagine not~! I decided it was time to finish that game a few months ago.

So things kept going, Spooks kept on terrorising innocents, and this time it was one who is… closer to Jon. The first statement Jon had read at the Institute post-coma had already been about someone who got snatched while he was already in charge:

(MAG123) ARCHIVIST: […] I did do some light searching myself on Gregory Cox. … Vanished, unsurprisingly. Sometime in late July 2016, which is… [CHUCKLE] two years ago. … That doesn’t seem right. It doesn’t feel like… … There’s just this… great… gap of time, where I wasn’t. No notes or follow-up here that I can see, just… [SIGH] It looks like the statement came in just after Gertrude disappeared. Another gap. And whoever took it didn’t do any follow-up, just… filed it away. I may be the first person to actually read it, so… sorry Angie, I suppose.

Most of the events involving innocents have been taking place during Gertrude’s era: there were sometimes pleas of people knowing that they were losing someone, or on the verge of being eaten themselves (which was the case for Paul McKenzie in MAG027: “I guess that’s why I’m here. This is what you people do. You investigate these things. You know what to look for and can identify the signs of things that… aren’t right. You know, not of this world. I’m not saying it’s a ghost or anything like that, it’s just… that well, if it was a ghost, you’d be the ones to talk to, right? I just need it to stop. And I don’t want to be put in a home.”), and we were getting glimpses of their gruesome fates from a later point in time – Jon and his team digging through a distant or recent history, but overall covering events that were absolutely unrelated to them. They didn’t know anything while it was happening, and they couldn’t have done anything. But in the case of Gregory Cox, there had already been the fact that the statement had come in when Jon was (on the verge of, or just) beginning his work as the new Head Archivist, and that Gregory disappeared while he was already well-installed; now, with Marcus McKenzie, it’s someone who he had been in contact with, through Martin. It’s the slow dissolution of one of Jon’s own eras, too: because back in MAG027, the Archival Assistants were Sasha and Martin (who had worked on this peculiar case) and Tim, and now, only Martin is left alive, and Jon’s current Archival Assistants are three completely different people.

And indeed, it’s not Team Archives’s responsibility to save everyone; but it’s still someone they had interacted with, and who got consumed since then. It’s closer. It feels more personal, hence, probably… Jon’s franticness: because in the same episode, he acknowledged the fact that he has attacked five people himself, and is confronted to the fact that he hasn’t saved any statement-giver, either.

(- And… remember what Jon had said about Elias in MAG017? “I know he’ll just give me the old ‘record and study, not interfere or contain’ speech again”. The Archives have never been about helping or saving people, nor has the Institute in general, it’s been proven again and again – but it’s something else to be confronted with so directly. In this case, since it was someone Jon’s team had been able to contact, and who got snatched by Helen, who is present in the Institute and has helped Jon occasionally, telling him that she has decided to help him… and there was, obviously, a gigantic echo about deception/relying on (or trusting) someone close, who had repeatedly stated that they were on your side and ready to help you, before you learned about their crimes, with Jon learning what Helen had done, and the Assistants learning what Jon himself had done.)

(- This bit is more gratuitous and solely due to the wording, but I couldn’t help but think about Martin, too, because of the “I’m sorry he’s so lonely, truly I am; I try to see him as much as I can, but I have my own life, and I can’t be there all the time. And I don’t like being manipulated. I don’t like being lied to.” bit (Martin had told Peter word-for-word, in MAG126, “I don’t like being manipulated.”) + the boat painting. Peter Lukas has ruined me for those forever. The familial situation and dynamic was fairly different this time around (… MAG144 was much closer to Martin’s own), but hearing Jon read a statement about someone saying that x was “lonely” because the statement-giver was not around enough also  reminded me, a bit, of the whole Jon-Martin deal.

+ obviously, the ~not liking to be manipulated~ is relevant to Jon as well given his hatred of spiders and his overall Web-related trauma.)

- It’s also amusing because, as much as I relistened to old episodes, I never labelled MAG027 a Spiral episode (and more specifically, a Distortion one) in my mind. Relistening to it, yeah, obviously, it was a Spiral episode, with the statement-giver being aware that others thought he was delusional or getting too old, but back then… there was the door, indeed, but I kind of remembered it as a Dark statement for some reason? The feeling of empty houses, the reflexion about noises and how you become aware of all the strange little things when you’re alone in it, and the fact that… something could come for you from within? I think it comes to the fact that, back then, Michael was not so strongly associated with “doors”, and also because MAG026 had already been about him – it’s rare to get two episodes in a row involving the same person/monster/manifestation unless Jon is actively researching the subject.

- … Jon’s… nostalgia of a simpler time? felt accidentally funny to me, though, because I did remember that I had found Jon especially savage with Paul McKenzie, back in MAG027:

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: … I never thought I’d miss those days, when I could throw out some half-baked speculation about drug abuse or mental illness, and whoosh, away all the statements went. There is… nothing in the world more reassuring than ignorance which we can mistake for certainty. But no. Almost every one of those statements, those… people… that poor old man… [HUFF] Like I can talk…! Like I’m in any position to mourn the suffering of the innocent.

(MAG027) ARCHIVIST: I want to believe Mr. McKenzie, I really do. I am not entirely made of stone, and am apt to be moved by the plea of a scared old man as much as anybody. I mean, dementia is, of course, the most likely explanation, and he admits himself that he has no proof of any of it. Yet part of me still wants to believe him. Perhaps this job is making me sentimental.

And I knooow, Jon was lying and hiding because afraid, but. Still. It had been one of my biggest “OOOH, SHUT UP?!” moment in season 1. How low can you be, to be melancholic about a time when Jon Was Like That.

At the same time, it’s interesting how… Jon’s fake detachment, back in season 1, although absolutely biased and deliberately anti-supernatural, made him sound more… like how you could picture a neutral-uncaring-Archivist. Even in season 2, he was mostly obsessed with the threads going on, the mysteries of the Archives, of the monsters, of Gertrude’s murder. Compared to season 4 in which… with the exception of some recent statements, and although it was just revealed that he had been harming people all along, he was also shown to be softer, more philosophical, more emotional over the victims, sparing a thought for them – and acknowledging their status. More human, in a way, than he had been when he wasn’t this deep in…? (Although still self-centred, in a different way, but more on that later.)

- On the subject of echoes and the situation feeling closer: there was also the fact that… Marcus McKenzie had done absolutely nothing to earn what had happened to him, that his targeting was absolutely unwarranted and began when he was just a little kid (“… The first door I remember seeing that shouldn’t have been there must have been when I was five or six. […] So one night – it was in the Christmas holidays, so I must have been six… I wake up. There’s a noise in my room, like something being… dragged along the floor.”) – just… like Jon, who was only eight when he stumbled upon A Guest For Mr. Spider. And we had the proof that Marcus was pursued and toyed with (before eventually getting eaten) throughout his entire life; so what does it say about Jon’s own situation…?

(- And in the list of things just plainly sad: Marcus’s “and I watched my most treasured possession disappear forever, as the door closed behind it, and I ran back to bed.”, accompanying the end of his innocence – since the door kept popping up, more and more sneakily and/or threatening, starting with this incident.

In the list of “aouch” and conveying a lot in just a few words: “all that remained of my worldly possessions were packed up for yet another return to childhood.”)

- Smaller echoes: the way Marcus was, at first, trying to hide that he had seen another door fairly recently (“But they were just… specific, weird little hallucinations that have long since stopped! Haven’t had one in… Well, it’s not important.”) before finally telling about a last encounter that had taken place recently, after fifteen years of nothing – just like Jon had been hiding his current streak of victims (and even gave the lower number before admitting the actual one, when cornered).

- Slow build-up with Jon introducing the statement with a beautiful circumlocution… and finally calling a spade a spade:

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: Statement of Marcus McKenzie, regarding a series of… unexplored entryways. […] But there is one thing I know an awful lot better now, than I did when I read his father’s statement: I know an awful lot more about doors…! [CLICK.]

And… more concerning:

(MAG146, Marcus McKenzie) “And as I passed that empty space of grass, there it was – a pale yellow door, stood all alone, like the entrance to a house that I just couldn’t see. It had no frame around it, but I was sure that if I grasped its handle and twisted… it would still swing open, silent, and inviting. […] The street was silent, but I could feel it screaming at me to open it. I just about managed to not do. I was… just about able to walk away. […] Sometimes, you just have to leave. Even if what’s on the other side scares you.”

And ooooh, do Jon does have his own “doors” – Mr. Spider’s, which he almost knocked on; Michael/Helen’s (and the fact that Elias had described how, in his dreams, Jon “knows the dream it used to lead to; he knows it well. But that’s not where it leads anymore. He does not know what is behind it anymore, and he is deathly afraid of finding out. The Archivist turns away.”); his own inner door of knowledge, with the danger of drowning…

- And Marcus’s case was big enough for Jon to… finally knock (bang.) on a door, which, I think, was the first time we ever heard him do? He was especially adamant about not knocking on this particular door?

(MAG131) ARCHIVIST: Oh. This, this door… It shouldn’t be here. MELANIE: Yes. ARCHIVIST: I, uh… I don’t want to open it. I’m not going to. [MELANIE SIGHS, KNOCKS ON THE DOOR]

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: Haven’t seen Helen much. The door is… sometimes there, sometimes not. … I haven’t knocked. I’m never going to trust it. Trust… her. … Trust it. [DRY EXHALE] And I shouldn’t. Whatever its relationship to the person who was or is Helen… assuming that I can ever know its motivations is a mistake.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: [BREATHING HEAVILY, FRANTICALLY BANGING ON A DOOR] [A DOOR CREAKS OPEN] [DISTORTION SOUNDS, BRINGING CONSTANT STATIC] HELEN: You rang~?

I didn’t keep tabs in season 4 but I think it was still a Thing that nobody ever knocks on Jon’s door when they expect him to be inside (… Georgie did in MAG145, but she was pretending to not know), although the assistants did, between them. And of course, knocking on a door might have a special connotation for Jon! It’s what almost got him killed when he was a kid, and ~compelled~ to knock by a Web book!

(And I just realized with this episode that, doors-wise, Martin and Jon actually make the worst combination possible. Jon would have been snatched by Mr. Spider if he had knocked on its door; and on the other hand… Martin stayed holed up inside of his flat while harassed by Jane Prentiss’s constant regular knocking. Jon having a trauma related to being forced to knock to go inside; Martin having a trauma related to something knocking and threatening to come inside.)

- One of the themes mentioned by Arthur in the previous episode also poured into this one: the perception that we have of a person, and how “many” of that same person there is.

(MAG145) GERTRUDE: What was Agnes like? […] ARTHUR: I… [PAUSE] I don’t know. Not really. You got as many answers to that as… folks who met her. Never really knew what she felt ‘bout any of it! Not really. Not in her own words. […] At the end of it, you’re always just the… point of someone else’s story. Everyone clamouring to say what you were, what you meant, and… your thoughts on it… all don’t mean nothing.

We could see a glimpse of that idea throughout Marcus’s statement: in Marcus’s point of view, his father was obsessed with the idea of protecting him, and had made up the story about his own door to try and manipulate him into going back to living with him. That point of view… didn’t age well: Helen confirmed that The Distortion had gone after both father and son, so Paul’s words were likely genuine (and there was nothing about an obsession with his son in his statement). And the theme was, once again, present within both Jon and Helen deceiving people: Helen, who had been fairly benevolent towards the Archives (trapping Jared and neutralising him, allowing Jon to go inside and offer him freedom against what he needed, announcing that she would help the Archives, fetching Jon and Basira back from Ny-Ålesund, swallowing Manuela) was also revealed to have embraced the “feed what feeds you” lifestyle and to be killing innocents without any remorse. In the same way, Jon, whose “monsterhood” had mostly been existential and manifesting through his abilities in the first half of this season, was revealed to have attacked and condemned five innocent people to his nightmares since he woke up – and hid that from both the Assistants and the tapes.

- (“Jack… I was wrong… I was so wrong…………”) => I really wanted to believe in Helen, damniiiiiiiiiiiiit ;; I'd been hoping that Jon was wrong to not trust her, but he was right…

I had hope that Something Had Indeed Gone Wrong with Helen becoming the Distortion, since she had mentioned that Helen hadn’t been “ready” when she had supplanted Michael, and that eating a man had made her feel “wrong”… It looks like she’s not getting second-thoughts anymore about these kind of things. Was it deception, back then? Was it an unavoidable process? Or did it happen partially because Jon pushed her away that time? As far as monsterhood goes, does it have to do with the nature of the Distortion itself? The Distortion sounds like a very particular case, since Helen uses “I” to refer to itself/herself, but also identifies with Michael Shelley and Helen Richardson, while also being able to detach itself/herself from them and refer to them in third person. It… fits The Spiral, obviously, and the whole identity-is-hard, and there is the question of how much what happened to Helen Richardson (being eaten/fusing with/being consumed by The Distortion) can be relevant to Jon’s own experience of… ~becoming~ The Archivist. Back in season 3, Jon had already regarded The Distortion as a “mantle” and was fearing that the same might apply to him – but Jon… did keep his personality, when Helen indeed doesn’t sound much like Helen Richardson anymore/is becoming more and more like Michael and an overall function…?

Though what remained (… officially, unless misleading/lying) is that Helen wanted to help and talk with Jon because Helen Richardson liked him. So, is Helen genuinely trying to “help” Jon by encouraging him to embrace his need to feed, because it’s indeed making him feel bad right now?

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: You… Why…? HELEN: Not sure. I suppose Helen didn’t have quite the same attachment to him as a project. I’m not quite as much for decades-long campaigns of subtle terror, these days. ARCHIVIST: [QUIET] … That’s horrible… HELEN: Is it? We do what we need to do when it comes to feeding, don’t we? … Don’t we, Archivist? ARCHIVIST: … Yes… HELEN: It would be better if you embraced it. ARCHIVIST: … It’s not… […] Were you controlled? HELEN: What a delightful thought! … I don’t believe so, no. But the Spider’s strings are subtle, so I suppose it’s not impossible. Why? ARCHIVIST: I–I want to know; can The Web control another avatar, one that serves a different power? HELEN: [HELEN LAUGHS AND LAUGHS, ECHOING] ARCHIVIST: Make them do things they don’t want to, make them… [BREATHING FASTER] find victims, feed? HELEN: [SLOWLY STOPS LAUGHING] Perhaps! Perhaps not. Would that make life easier for you? ARCHIVIST: [SHAKY EXHALE] HELEN: Are you so sure you didn’t want to? ARCHIVIST: [FRANTIC BREATHING] HELEN: [HELEN LAUGHS AND LAUGHS, ECHOING] [THE DOOR CREAKS CLOSED]

Or is Helen getting her kicks from tormenting him, because he’s confused, unsure of what is happening and of his own actions (=> food for Spiral)?

- Alright so: yeah, no, I don’t think it’s The Web, Jon. At most, She made him leave the Institute when he needed to feed and/or led him towards people with stories (possibly because She knew thanks to the Chelicerae?), through the lighter or something else. But then, Jon talking to them and getting their “stories”? Not, it’s The Eye, it’s The Archivist, it’s Jon, it’s his new status, it’s what his “choice” meant, and he’ll probably have to acknowledge it and come to terms with it (that he’s not only an “existential” monster with powers, but something who feeds from others’ pain). And it’s an influence, but Daisy had showed us that it’s not absolutely unavoidable… as long as you acknowledge the parts of you which are responsible for it.

- It’s not The Web, but we already had proof that She can manipulate avatars:

(MAG121) OLIVER: Honestly, I’m… still not exactly sure why I’m here. But… you know better than anyone how the spiders can get into your head. Easier to just do what She asks!

But not for Jon’s particular case, most likely. (And it’s… really the ideal culprit, for Jon, who hates spiders, who has been traumatised by them when he was just a little boy. But… probably not The Web here, and most likely having to do with himself. I don’t even think that Jon is actually fearing that he is controlled: as Helen highlighted, it would be more of a relief. Would that fear feed The Web although The Web did nothing? And what is the fear of learning that it was you all along, not something else making you do atrocious things?)

- Elias had told Jon he knew that Jon “had problems with moderation” (MAG092), there was the talk about Jon relentlessly seeking knowledge (MAG092, “In a hundred ways, at a hundred thresholds, you pressed on. You sought knowledge relentlessly, and you always chose to see.”), even Georgie reminded Jon that he tended to be the one asking dangerous questions (MAG093, “You were always the one who pushed too far, and asked smart-arse, awkward questions.”)… so yes, he was a recipe for disaster re:spooky influence and addiction dealing a god of knowledge.

But the biggest question is HOW did Jon manage to stop smoking, around the time he joined the Institute? (MAG080 “I’m going to have a cigarette. […] Sorry, I’ve been quit for five years now”.) He began smoking again at an unknown time (Elias’s “He’s not smoking again, is he?” in MAG039, Jon had cigarettes on him in MAG080, MAG091 and MAG111…) but. He had stopped, once upon a time. Disaster who affirms that he Cannot Stop at every turn had managed to stop, a few years ago. How.

(Or was it “Ahaha, I’ve quit!” while he was still smoking five cigarettes a day, and in denial about that too.)

- Jon’s way of “defending” himself also tied in with bits that we had already seen previously, and which are In True Jon Fashion: rejecting responsibility when confronted, minimising, etc. It’s… a bit like what he did with Tim in MAG065? He tends to be fiercely defensive when called out about things that he did directly (while more easily accepting blame when things happened due to his inaction, or peripherical to him)…?

(He. Tends to really react like a kid, sometime, and. It’s really Jon. It’s the same Jon, reacting in Jon’s fashion.)

- Fun Thing: we began the season with “zombies” and here we are.

(MAG122) ARCHIVIST: [EXHALE, INHALE] Statement of… er… Lorell St John, regarding… zombies. […] Right… Well, I guess we should probably… let one of the nurses know I’m awake. I’m sure they have all sorts of… tests to do. Make sure I’m not a… zombie, or…

(MAG146) BASIRA: I’ll tell you all what I find. Don’t let him eat anyone’s brain while I’m gone. ARCHIVIST: That’s not what I do.

(And, well. Basira had seen what he had done to Breekon, live.)

- I… am not 100% convinced yet that Martin indeed sent the tape to the Assistants, himself and deliberately. Because true, he was hesitating about finding a way for the tape to reach Jon:

(MAG142) MARTIN: I should probably try to get him this tape, let him know what happened, that someone came in to… But then, ahah, would that just come across as an accusation? Like, because I don’t wanna… And then, then I guess he’d… hear this bit as well, so… I… I… [LONG EXHALE] What do I do…?

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: Been a while since you’ve all come to see me together. I assume it’s… not good news. DAISY: No. MELANIE: What the hell have you been doing, Jon? BASIRA: Martin left a tape for us. [SHUFFLING NOISE] ARCHIVIST: And what exactly is on this t– … Oh… MELANIE: Yes.

… but on the other hand… we know that Martin can begin letters without sending them (MAG042 and Jon finding “an unfinished letter, addressed to his mother in Devon”), so… the most likely is that Martin indeed chose to send it, but I’m not shutting off other options: even if there was a message with it or something, it doesn’t mean that he had indeed sent it, and either Peter either The Web could have arranged for it to reach the Assistants’ hands given the… consequences of hearing the tape.

In any case, it’s probably Not What Martin Wanted, given how he had ranted about Jon jumping into danger at every opportunity, back in MAG142. (I’m curious about how he will react to this one.)

(- I’m glad that “Jess Tyrell” has a name! I was super-uncomfy with the “Bystander” back in MAG142 – and it’s… quite significant that Jon was able to tell her name, while Helen hadn’t been able to identify her victims with theirs. Though: how did Jon understand what the tape was about, in this episode…? Was there a label? Was it accompanied with the complaint? Martin himself didn’t know her name, so he wouldn’t have been able to write it on the paper, but then, Jon could immediately tell what it was about. How…?)

- Basira’s dryness, coldness and harshness towards Jon make… a lot of sense. Jon repeated time and time again that she could trust him, although she was extremely wary of him when he woke up. Her reactions in MAG143 (telling Jon that he didn’t have to face the Dark Sun) hinted that she had either warmed up to him since then, or had been forcing herself to be cautious all this time – at the very least, she wasn’t ready to see him sacrifice himself, she wasn’t ready to “use” him. And now, it turns out that… she had been partially right, when she was berating Jon for being a monster or not being what he seemed.

She snapped at him for taking Floyd’s statement in MAG141 but still allowed it to happen; The Dark’s ritual turned out to have been a bust, encouraged by Elias; and previously, Elias had sent her around on wild goose chases, explicitly acknowledging that he just wanted her to leave Jon alone to allow him to go inside of the coffin (… and Jon coming out of it was followed by a third victim). She’s been played by Elias; she accepted Jon’s actions; and turns out she didn’t manage to accomplish anything since Jon woke up. I’m not that surprised that she decided to rush it to Hill Top Road – Daisy had told Martin that she was prone to improvising, and in this case, it’s probably reinforced by her own personal frustrations? I don’t think that she believes that The Web is behind Jon’s actions – maybe she’s hoping, maybe she’s not; or it could be sheer anger at Jon and the desire to put him face-to-face with the fact that he did it all, that there was no Hidden Spider Forcing Him To Do Things. Or maybe a mix of everything. I don’t know.

- Now that Jon’s activities are known, I wonder how long it will be before the others learn that Basira’s intel had been Elias… I’m not sure that Jon hasn’t picked up on that (since we now have confirmation that he had been hiding things from the tapes for months). Daisy didn’t know about Floyd (which means that Basira had hidden this one from her, already), but making it known that she had been in contact with and listening to Elias all along… won’t go down easily with either Daisy (who had been coerced into working for him, with Basira as blackmail, after her own blackmail when Elias told her “statement never given”) or Melanie (the fact that Elias trapped her, and MAG106… ;;). They… still haven’t picked up on the fact that trying to keep Big Secrets in Beholding’s temple, while Elias is able to spy on them, is an ESPECIALLY bad idea, uh.

(;; And now, I’m afraid that Melanie and Daisy also have their list of Dirty Secrets accomplished during this season…)

(- I HATE HOW THIS SEASON BASICALLY FEELS LIKE ELIAS WINNING AT EVERYTHING, AAAAAARGGGG.

Because Bastard most likely knew and witnessed Jon feeding from people and extorting their statements?! And he mostly used Basira to cultivate Jon into using his powers: isolating him and extending the status quo until Jon would go inside of the coffin, playing on Jon’s uncertainty about The Dark’s activities to get him to meet the remnant of the cult.)

- About Hidden Activities: I’m really not sure that Melanie knows that Helen has been eating innocent people? She disliked Jon, but I doubt she would have been so casual with Helen in MAG131 if she had known?

- Meanwhile, yes, Basira is utterly biased about Daisy, but… she kinda… had a point…

(MAG146) MELANIE: [EXHALE] So. What do we do, now? ARCHIVIST: I don’t know. BASIRA: You’re a danger, Jon. A monster. You’re hurting innocent people. ARCHIVIST: So did Daisy…! BASIRA: Shut up! It’s not the same thing at all. DAISY: Basira… [EXHALE] He has a point. BASIRA: You didn’t know what you were doing! DAISY: [SIGH] BASIRA: And since you did, you’ve spent every waking hour resisting. He knows exactly what he’s doing. ARCHIVIST: I don’t–! Uh, it’s not that simple, it–it feels… [BREATHING QUICKENING] … I don’t know if I can control it, I don’t know if it’s even me doing it…!

Because unlike Daisy, Jon had the knowledge about monsters: Elias excluded, he was the person in the Institute who knew the most about them and what they did. And he kept telling the others to trust him, while hiding the harm he was causing from them. Since she came back, Daisy took responsibility, insisting that it was her, although she wasn’t proud of it and was regretting it; Jon… is currently trying to shift the blame on something else. Daisy made sacrifices since she came back (not going with them to fight The Dark, avoiding thinking too much about Elias…); Jon… didn’t even try at all…? And I really think that it wouldn’t hurt the others as much if Jon hadn’t shown some understanding of their situations, encouraging them to get better, while he (Jon “One thing I’ve learned, Daisy, is that we all get a choice. Even if it doesn’t feel like one.” Sims) himself apparently didn’t try. Even for unspooky things: while Melanie went to therapy, Jon only passive-aggressively confirmed that Georgie wouldn’t accompany him, when she brought it up. Even Jess… had recalled how she had fought to heal and get better:

(MAG142) JESS: So. It… It took a long time to get over that. I mean… That’s not weird, right? I mean, it was a bad time. You know? It–it stays with you. I was signed off for, what, probably about six months, with the injuries? I had pretty bad, uh, nightmares, claustrophobia, I mean… Obviously, right? But, uh, but–but I did my physio, and, you know, talked wi–with the counsellor they gave me? Look, I did everything I was supposed to, and–and yeah, I… I guess I was fine. You know, once the bruises were gone, I… Well, it’s easy to blame memory, right? You know, ha–hallucination, coincidence, all the… classic shite you tell yourself. Look, life went back to… normal, I… I was fine. Until… [CHOKING] about two weeks ago. MARTIN: And that was when you met J– … Er, one of our employees. JESS: … That’s when he showed up.

And both Daisy and Melanie, who had been under influence, acknowledged their feelings and actions as their own:

(MAG131) MELANIE: And then, one day, I suddenly have this thing that takes all that rage, and it holds it. Tells me it’s right. That it’s me. It didn’t stay in my leg because of some Ghostly Masterplan; it stayed… because I wanted it.

(MAG142) MARTIN: Oh, that can’t– that can’t… I mean, it’s not him, is it? Not, not really? It’s, what, addiction, instinct, maybe mind control, something like that? I… can’t believe he’d choose to do something like that. … No, no, I, I can’t think like that, though, I, I can’t let myself, ‘cause I mean, if, if he’s already gone, then all of this is just…

(MAG142) MARTIN: It’s alright. Wasn’t you. [INHALE] Not really. DAISY: No, it was. I hate… a lot of what I did back then; doesn’t mean I’m not… responsible for it, doesn’t mean it… wasn’t me.

Of course, Jon has his issues. Daisy was right about him having PTSD, being self-destructive, being plagued by survivor’s guilt. He’s probably depressed, hence the aimlessness and his whole sinking (the fact that Martin cut all ties was stated multiple times to make him brood). And he’s still acknowledging that what is happening to innocent people is wrong (and it is genuine, and not only a reaction to match the Assistants’ outrage: he was upset, before, both on his own and in front of Helen).

But Jon is not “only” a victim anymore, like he was in season 3: now, he actively causes harm, he hurts people. The way Jess described her life in MAG142, it got utterly ruined and there is likely no fixing (she was in obvious distress, she couldn’t work anymore, couldn’t function; even if she’s supposed to live like this for the rest of her life, we just got Helen mentioning that one of her victims had died of “natural” causes due to his terror – with the amount of stress Jess is put under, she probably won’t live long, and if it’s manifesting like this for the four others… neither will they?).

- That said, I DON’T WANT TIM TO HAVE BEEN RIGHT ABOUT IT, GDI…

(MAG114) TIM: So, why don’t you “Archivist” me, then? Just pull it straight out. ARCHIVIST: Because I don’t want to! I am not your enemy, Tim. TIM: [DISMISSIVELY] Like that matters! These things aren’t human. It’s… instinct. You can’t not. ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I’m still me, Tim. [TIM HUFFS] I’m still… me.

And getting confirmation that no, it’s nooot The Web making him feed, could act as a wake-up call? Or… actually listening to Jess’s tape could, maybe. Because the portrayal she made of Jon was especially upsetting:

(MAG142) JESS: But he just starts talking. Slowly. But real intense. He says he works here, at the–the Magnus Institution and I say what even is that, and he says he wants my story. He says he needs to hear what happened to me. And I… I wanted to tell him to–to–to to go away, I–I wanted to–to to kick him, and run. But… I… [SHAKY DUMBFOUNDED EXHALE] I sit down. […] It felt like… like I was throwing up all those feelings again, and I wanted to, to scream, but instead I just… sat, and calmly told him my life story, and he just watched me. His eyes, like… his eyes, like, we–were… drinking in every fragment of my misery. I can’t… It… [PAUSE] And then it was over. And he looked… he looked at me like he’d just eaten… like, a perfectly cooked steak. You know what he said? He said: “Thank you.” “Thank you,” just like that. Like… like reliving the worst parts of my whole life were just a bit of a… a favour, that I’d done him. And then he left, and, and I… I just sat there, and cried for a while.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Jess Tyrell, the woman on the tape… [SIGH] She was the fourth. I–I just tried to… I was weak, r–ravenous, I–I didn’t feel… […] I don’t–! Uh, it’s not that simple, it–it feels… [BREATHING QUICKENING] … I don’t know if I can control it, I don’t know if it’s even me doing it…!

And the Whole Thing came up now, not at the end of the season. Which raises the question: why should Jon be kept alive…? The fact that the assistants directly confronted him is a proof that they didn’t totally antagonise him (they would have plotted and thought about a way to get rid of him if they genuinely thought he was… over and done with. There is still the coffin in Artefact Storage.) but… if Jon isn’t even trying to be kept in check, if he’s fated to target innocent people, if he’s not trying to find a way to control it (nor tried to warn the others about it, to be contained or monitored)… there is absolutely nothing differentiating him from the monsters we previously saw? And there is the added looming threat of The Watcher’s Crown? I don’t think the overall conclusion will be that yes, he would have been better off dying, and that Tim actively trying to die was The Only Respectable Way Out. I think there is probably still ways to do something meaningful in their current situation? But there is the fact that, right now, Jon isn’t paying the price of his powers anymore (his victims are) and that, as far as they know, there is nothing else than The Eye’s ritual in front of them.

- It feels like what’s currently happening also had to do with Jon’s overall passivity regarding his powers. He had told Georgie, in season 3, that he couldn’t stop his research. He had realised, in America, that he was indeed dependant of statements, and had decided, at that moment, to just accept it since he didn’t have the time to interrogate it (since there was The Unknowing coming closer – but after he woke up, Jon didn’t have… much to do, and it would have been the moment to ponder about it). It was highlighted with Jon’s passivity around the tape recorders, contrasting with how Basira had chosen to… woosh them away:

(MAG123) ARCHIVIST: And we’ve got an audience. Perfect. I thought you said you decided to throw them all out. BASIRA: Yup. And I did. And here’s another one. ARCHIVIST: Maybe it’s hungry. BASIRA: Seriously? ARCHIVIST: I mean, I did have a statement I was planning to record. BASIRA: Great. Perfect. You can get on with that, and I’ll just leave, then.

(MAG126) ARCHIVIST: [DRY EXALE] There was a tape recorder waiting for me when I sat down. They’re not even hiding it anymore. There weren’t any tapes from when I was… away – I checked. Whatever they are, they are here for me. I suppose I should be worried, but I have so much to keep watch over. So I’ve decided to let the tapes run. They’ve… proved useful before, so… [TINY CHUCKLE]

(MAG146) MELANIE: [EXHALE] Why didn’t you record them? BASIRA: Why do you think? Because he was ashamed. ARCHIVIST: No! I don’t– … I–I mean, I don’t record anything anymore, not… not really, I just… sort of assume they’ll… turn on, if it’s important. BASIRA: Well, they didn’t. ARCHIVIST: … No, I suppose not.

(Also: eff you, tape recorders, for not thinking that these people’s stories were Important :<)

And it was also shown in the way Jon… kept saying that he couldn’t control his Knowing:

(MAG127) ARCHIVIST: [STATIC] Look, I don’t know, Basira. I hope I’m still human, but it… but it’s seeming more and more unlikely. BASIRA: … I didn’t ask. ARCHIVIST: No, I suppose you didn’t. BASIRA: Don’t snoop in my head. ARCHIVIST: I’m not “snooping”, I’m not looking. That’s not… how this works.

(MAG128) BASIRA: You heard me. Don’t ask about them, and don’t know about them either. ARCHIVIST: I can’t exactly control that! BASIRA: Learn.

(MAG133) DAISY: [BREATHING HEAVILY] Basira said you could just… “know” all this now anyway. ARCHIVIST: Yeah, it’s… I–I can’t really… control it.

(And unless he lied to us about it too, he kinda managed to keep in check for Martin’s and Basira’s activities, in the end, when they pressed him to stop? So… maybe, sadly, being firm and cutting Jon on his bullshit is the only way to get him to actively try to hold on.)

- Daisy seemed to have picked up on a pattern regarding Jon’s feeding, though, which is that they happened after he used his powers in new ways and/or experienced another Fear and/or got hurt by spooks:

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Jess Tyrell, the woman on the tape… [SIGH] She was the fourth. I–I just tried to… I was weak, r–ravenous, I–I didn’t feel… … The first was a supermarket cleaner. Em, ended up lost for a week in an endless warehouse. I didn’t even…! I–I just went in for some shopping, and he was there, and I–I just… asked. The second was, uh, it was after I got… stabbed by Melanie. MELANIE: You are not putting this on me! ARCHIVIST: No, that’s not what I meant! [SIGH] I was walking the streets, I–I thought I was trying to clear my head– DAISY: [DELIBERATE] But you were hunting. ARCHIVIST: … Apparently. I found a woman who… every year on her birthday, wakes up in a fresh grave. Just for her. DAISY: And the third was after the coffin. ARCHIVIST: A man rejected by all who knew him, searching ever-darker places for love. When he told me his story, he started… weeping maggots.

So: first one after waking up from the “coma”, second after using his powers to see and remove Melanie’s bullet (and getting stabbed), third after coming out of the coffin, Jess Tyrell… after trying to peer through the Lonely (at the end of MAG139). There is still Floyd: why was he recorded? Is it because he had been involved with someone we already knew (Salesa)? And how come there was nothing after The Dark – is it because Floyd worked as a power up/healing by anticipation?

- I’m sad for Daisy!! ;; Daisy, who had spent time around Jon, who had shared things (The Archers!!) with Jon, and who was giving the impression that she was pulling him off… She sounded like she could understand the mechanism, but at the same time, Jon… didn’t tell her. Too ashamed? Not trusting her enough? So deep in denial…?

- DAISY CALLED MELANIE “MEL”!!! FRIENDS!!!

(MAG112) DAISY: Couldn’t find Tim, but he’s gone with Martin and… the other one. BASIRA: Melanie. DAISY: Sure.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: … So we’re going with her. DAISY: [SIGH] Come on, Mel. I’ll see if I’ve got a stab vest in your size. MELANIE: … Yeah. Sure.

Daisy came so far, with her ;w;

- On the one hand, it’s hilarious, indeed, that Melanie acts like a voice of reason.

(MAG146) MELANIE: Uh, okay, seriously. [CHAIR SQUEAKING] I–I’m going to have to be the one to point out that this is a terrible idea? BASIRA: Daisy? DAISY: … Be better if we could prepare. MELANIE: I–I just think that… we shouldn’t be exposing ourselves like this until we have a little bit more than a hunch…!

… On the other hand, we still don’t know if her therapist is a Regular Therapist or a potentially Web-y spook, so the fact that she was inciting the others to not go to Hill Top Road… could be due to an influence. … Or not, and it’s just regular therapy putting some common sense into her.

- The Annabelle mentions were interesting because:

(MAG146) BASIRA: … So you say you’re being controlled. ARCHIVIST: I–I don’t know. Maybe? Th–The Web, it– BASIRA: What, what was the name you said before? Annabelle Cane? ARCHIVIST: … Yes, uh, she’s… she’s been watching us, I–I’m pretty sure of it… DAISY: Jon… I’m not sure there’s actually the– BASIRA: No. No, if he is being controlled, we need to know. And we need to know now. Do you know where she is? ARCHIVIST: H… Not… not properly, I, I think she has some connection to Hill Top Road.

1°) … we have no connection between Annabelle and Hill Top Road as of now, except that both are Web-business. (Not all Spiders, Jon.)

2°) When Jon discussed about Annabelle Cane in MAG136, it was actually with Daisy! So either Jon has been sharing some thoughts about her with Basira, either Daisy told Basira (which would match with Daisy communicating overall!).

- On the one hand, Jon hypothesising that The Web could be behind the fact that he has been attacking people sounds like something he might have thought about because he just heard Gertrude (another Archivist) mentioning how she had been manipulated into doing what She wanted, in her own youth:

(MAG145) ARTHUR: Alright. Agnes: how’d you do it? Never did understand it, not really. GERTRUDE: Ah. That’s a fair enough question. [PAUSE] It was… The Web. I didn’t know it at the time, of course, and I would call it an accident – but it never is, with them. It’s only after the fact that you can see all the subtle manipulations. I was very new to it all, of course. I mean, I was, what? Can’t have been older than… twenty-five. […] Like I said, mm, I was young. Naïve. I somehow found just the right books, made just the right connections, and even got what I thought was a piece of blind good luck, when I found a tin box in the ashes of Hilltop Road, containing some perfectly preserved cuttings of her hair. Of course, what I thought was a “banishment ritual” turned out… not to be. The circle I constructed was more of a… an invitation. It let the Mother of Puppets bind me to Agnes, interweave our existences at some… metaphysical level, as it had with Fielding and the house. … It was the most painful experience of my life.

On the other hand, Jon… researched quite a bit about the notion of “control” this season, and thinking all along that he might be puppeteered could have been the reason behind that?

(MAG123) ARCHIVIST: The Web does seem to have a preference for those who prefer not to assert themselves. […] Perhaps a coincidence, just… people… shopping their traumatic event around… but I have to wonder… how much their actions were their own.

(MAG125) ARCHIVIST: In many ways, The Slaughter fascinates me. There seems to be, in all cases, a question at its heart about… control. Is it a mindless dance, dragging participants along by the beat of a drum or… is there a kernel of will in there, a lucidity and deliberateness to the random fury and violence? I suppose that’s the question with so much of “violence”, “war”: how much are you really in command of yourself or of others? I’m not sure what scares me more: the idea that deep down, everyone is in complete control of their actions, that everything is, on some level, intentional; or that ultimately, we don’t have any control of ourselves at all, and the rest is just… rationalisation.

(MAG129) ARCHIVIST: I don’t like this. I don’t like… not being sure what’s going to be in my mind. What thoughts are mine and what are from… elsewhere.

(MAG136) DAISY: You think I’m weak, just… [SIGH] ‘cause I’m not already chasing the next kill? You think I’m less me? ARCHIVIST: I… [SIGH] I don’t feel like I’m exactly in the best place to judge the… intersection [CHUCKLE] between free will and humanity. Still trying to figure that out myself. [SILENCE] DAISY: Jon… when you went into the coffin. Was it you choosing to do that? Did you actually think you could save me, or was… that something telling you to do it? [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: It was me. I was… drawn to it, I’ll admit, but it was my decision.

Though it was, once again, a consideration which was also relevant to his Beholding powers (the fact that he knew things unprompted).

- Since Peter mentioned his belief that The Extinction could have been born from The End, although taking an active form, I still wonder if that could have been the case originally between The Eye and The Web, or if they aren’t currently merging due to the information&control-related fears being especially overlapping with our era’s development of the means of communication…

There have been so many moments, this season, in which I wondered “is it the Web, or Beholding?”, and especially in the way Jon got dragged towards x or y statement. Trying to get an overview of season 4 regarding the nature of statements and how Jon stumbled upon them (when he was the one reading or listening), there are… recurring threads? (ha.)

* MAG121: Oliver’s statement, about choices; Web interested in Jon.

* MAG122: (Statement brought by Basira; feeling like the only person left in the world)

* MAG123: Web & Annabelle, link with the Institute

* MAG124: (Simon Fairchild casually feeding)

* MAG125: Slaughter statement, notion of “control”, led to Melanie’s surgery

* MAG126: Pre-Spiral ritual

(MAG126) ARCHIVIST: … I remembered Gertrude’s notebook […]. I’ve been staring at it for hours, in the hope something from it would just… come to me. And it worked well enough to point me towards this statement, which is… useful background, and perhaps gives some insight into how Gertrude formulated her counter-rituals, but… not much more.

* MAG127: Jonah Magnus & Beholding (Albrecht)

(MAG127) BASIRA: And what was that you were doing yesterday? ARCHIVIST: … When…? BASIRA: You were sat on the floor for like four hours. ARCHIVIST: … Oh! Er, n–n–no, I was, er, I was… listening. Y’know, it’s, trying to see if any of the statements… called to me. BASIRA: And? ARCHIVIST: [FLIPS PAPER]

* MAG128: Breekon’s visit, Jon “extracting” his statement; going towards Daisy’s rescue

* MAG129: Buried statement, notion of “anchor”, going towards Daisy’s rescue

(MAG129) ARCHIVIST: I don’t like this. I don’t like… not being sure what’s going to be in my mind. What thoughts are mine and what are from… elsewhere. Why I just know some statements are what I should be reading. I assume this one is related to the coffin. To Daisy.

* MAG130: Flesh ritual (Lucia Wright surviving it), nudging towards Flesh-as-anchor or Jared (kept in Helen’s corridors), towards Daisy’s rescue. Tape explicitly sent by The Web.

(MAG130) ARCHIVIST: I found this tape tucked in the corner of my desk drawer. [AGGRAVATED SIGH] Covered in cobwebs. I suppose subtlety is gone out the window a bit. And the question is now simply … how much I trust the Spider to have my… best interests at heart. … Hm. I suspect my assuming it has a heart might be a clue I’m looking at this the wrong way. […] what is it trying to tell me with this? Is it about… rituals? About getting Daisy back? About… about an anchor. What was it she said, “the siren call of Flesh”… Hm. It’s possible, I suppose.

* MAG131: Jared’s story (bit of Flesh ritual), notion of “anchor” through Jon’s ribs, going towards Daisy’s rescue

* MAG132: Coffin trip, Daisy’s rescue

* MAG133: Hunt ritual (Percy Fawcett surviving it)

(* MAG134: Martin reading Adelard Dekker’s letter about The Extinction)

* MAG135: Pre-Dark ritual

* MAG136: Web & Annabelle, link with the Institute

* MAG137: Slaughter ritual (Wallis Turner surviving it)

(MAG137) ARCHIVIST: There’s a box of tapes and statements in the corner. Obviously those Elias either didn’t feel he could trust me with yet, or maybe just the ones he was checking himself. […] So I just took the first one that called to me, and it’s… [DRY NASAL EXHALE] It’s good. I suppose.

(* MAG138: Martin reading Robert Smirke’s letter to Jonah Magnus, warning him about The Watcher’s Crown/Beholding)

* MAG139: Desolation, Agnes, Hill Top Road

* MAG140: (Statement brought by Basira; about The Dark’s ritual attempts)

* MAG141: Jon feeding on Floyd, statement regarding Salesa’s activities and (presumed) death. The tape recorder activated on its own.

(* MAG142: Martin taking Jess Tyrell’s complaint, about how Jon had attacked her two weeks ago.)

* MAG143: (Jon making Manuela give her statement about the failure of The Dark’s ritual)

(* MAG144: Martin reading an Extinction statement)

* MAG145: Desolation, Agnes, Hill Top Road, “anchor”, The Web manipulating an Archivist and tying them to another avatar in order to neutralise Agnes (/Gertrude too?).

(MAG145) ARCHIVIST: And here? I reached out, I took another tape, eh!, hoping for a bit of guidance, but… [HUFF] To be honest, this hasn’t helped.

* MAG146: Spiral-statement, Hill Top Road.

(MAG146) ARCHIVIST: So it seems we did have Marcus McKenzie’s statement after all. I spent so long looking for it, back when I found his father’s, and… no luck. But now, I decide to start looking properly into Hill Top Road, and all of a sudden… I’m drawn to rearrange a filing cabinet – and what do I find behind it?

When Jon “knows” something, it’s clearly Beholding, no problem. But when he feels the “call” of a statement, is it Beholding/the Archives, or is it The Web making him take one, and Jon rationalising that he had felt something? Most statements, this season, have involved Web and/or getting the means to save his assistants (/getting involved with other Fears), and/or learning about rituals – and now, about Hill Top Road. A lot of them seem possibly… pointed?

- Same old questions: we can guess that The Web has plans for Jon, hence the lighter, hence sending Handsome mlm Death Prophet Oliver to convince him to choose avatardom, hence the cobwebs following him around (Jon mentioned them in MAG123), hence revealing itself when sending him MAG130’s tape (and encouraging him to go inside of the coffin, and possibly helping him come out of it, if it was indeed The Web which made Martin set up the tape recorders around it?). But ~what does the Spider want~? Is Jon supposed to fix the “scar in reality” left by Agnes&Fielding’s fight, somehow, since he managed to do things that had never been accomplished before (getting out of the coffin) and has proven that he could “kill” powerful phenomenon (seeing the Dark Sun)? And what is Her stance on The Watcher’s Crown, amongst other things…? Is She just there to enjoy the show, is She worried about something (The Extinction?) or has She decided to jump on The Watcher’s Crown’s bandwagon, or does She want to make sure it doesn’t happen?

Georgie had been the one to recommend that Jon find “anchors”, back in season 3, but season 4 expanded the meaning of the word: “anchors” as a way to escape the clutch of a Fear, an “anchor” as a way to neutralise a Chosen One – and Jon likened his own situation to Agnes (MAG139), before learning that she had been bound to an Archivist to put the Desolation’s activities on hold (MAG145), by The Web itself. If The Web was indeed behind a majority of Jon’s readings and researches lately (after all, Gertrude highlighted how The Web had manipulated her through her researches, by orientating her towards specific books and materials!), everything could sound like it’s supposed to slowly introduce Jon to the concept of being, himself, bound to something/someone…?

(- We’ve been putting so much excitement on the prospect of seeing Annabelle, of thinking that Annabelle is currently pulling all the strings, though… that I can’t help but wonder. What if she is actually… dead. Because that would strike quite the blow on a lot of things re: who is currently in control.)

- Practical questions regarding the Hill Top Road trip, from London to Oxford

* Are they going by train? Or by car, and if by car, who’s driving (Basira and Daisy both can drive, it has been mentioned), and does that mean Melanie will get stuck with Jon in the back seats?

* Will they actually reach Hill Top Road, or will something happen before. (Web preventing them from doing so, or even… lonely endless road, courtesy of Peter, if Martin hears about the Expedition and threatens to stop doing his spreadsheets?)

* Will the tree still be there…? Anya had seen it in April 2009 (MAG114) although Ivo Lensik had uprooted it in November 2006, the night of Agnes’s death (MAG008)… (And there was the tree burning in MAG127, that Albrecht/~the master~ had wanted “dead”…)

* What or who will they find, if they manage to reach Hill Top Road? They certainly won’t take The Web by surprise, so if they meet some of Her agents, it will be because She consented to it. Annabelle herself? Another Web avatar? Melanie’s therapist, if she isn’t Annabelle herself? Oliver, once again as a messenger? Adelard Dekker? Weird ghosts from the past haunting the place (Agnes or Raymond)? A Giant Big Spider? Or nobody, and only an item? A message? A Guest For Mr. Spider, for Jon to have a breakdown? Elias and Peter’s 9th marriage certificate from the last four years? A tape or a statement giving them a clue?

Alriiiiiiiiiiight alright alright, unless we’re being dramatically misled, title for MAG147 promises ~Web stuff~. Part of me is a bit sad, because the… exact title had been used for a while by the fandom to refer to something/someone Very Specifically, and it probably means that past that episode, it will be entirely jossed and we won’t be able to use it the same way – but eh, that’s the deal with Speculation overall. Other part of me is “YIIIIIIIIIIIIH” because. Yep. That’s it. Something Is Coming.

Forms of the title have been roughly used by Martin in MAG117 and Elias in MAG106 (and other times, but those two uses stuck with me), but it’s probably going to be about… Annabelle? Although it doesn’t match her official title of ~the Story Spinner~ used in MAG123. It could be something else Web-related, though – we… don’t know much about Raymond Fielding except for how he was getting Babies in the house, technically? Or something else entirely?

As for Events… Martin meeting Peter’s friend (who is a “he”) is still pending, so it could be that, just to make us even more impatient about the Hill Top Road trip. Or it could also be Annabelle or another spider visiting him while the others are off. Or it could be the group at Hill Top Road, so soon. Any of these cases would mean: DREAD. /o/

[dndeviants]

The one who wrote the book

Linda followed the blond vampire in silence, thinking about the talk she had just had with Strahd. She couldn’t help but feel bad for all of his suffering...

But there was still all the accounts of the wrongs he had done, his evils...

Why? What is the truth? Those questions consumed her.

“Here we are,“ Escher opened the door of the tower room, and allowed Linda to browse freely.

It was large, but comfortable, with tall paneled windows that showed the whole western portion of Barovia...

Glorious mountain ranges capped with snow, glistening rivers in the moonlight, the silhouettes of small villages dotted the landscape... She saw the walls of Vallaki, and even the walls of Krezk, and the faint image of the Abbey looming over the settlement.

She stared out the window... The land was as beautiful as the castle she stood in-

At least the parts Strahd sees fit to care for, she reminded herself.

She returned her attention to the room. The guest quarter itself had two couches sitting opposed on the northern and southern sides, bookcases filled with various literature pressed against the eastern wall.

Books had always been a weakness of hers. She browsed the collection: political treatises, biographies of ancient peoples, exotic recipes, folklore, mythology, epic poetry...

This could keep me busy for a while, she thought. 

She turned to the consort, “So Escher, how did you come to live here?”

Linda moved to the northern couch and sat down. Escher joined her.

He leaned back, musing, "Well, I already told you that I was hired by lord Strahd. One thing led to another, and now I am here. His eternal companion and servant."

"You were hired..." She raised a brow, "To be a personal historian, right?"

He simply nodded.

"You wrote the propaganda piece,” she continued, “And earlier, I had asked you if you knew what in it was real."

 "Indeed. We were interrupted by Lord Strahd's arrival..." Escher folded his hands in his lap.

She nodded and looked to him, "Care to tell me now?"

"Where do I start? Let's see..." He rose from the couch and walked over to the bookshelves, extracting his copy of Barovia and its Histories, along with notes he had made decades ago.

He turned to her, "The beginning is often the simplest, correct?"

"Of course," she replied.

Escher sat down, and flipped open the book, "I took propaganda that survived from Strahd's homelands in regard to his conquest of Barovia. King Barov... chose Strahd to be a general. But had everyone around him think that Strahd was upholding his responsibility as the eldest son.”

He pointed a line to her, “'He was already highly decorated general...' This... is a half truth. Yes, he led his side of the civil war to victory, and he did develop the strategy that quieted rival households at age seventeen..”

He took out an ancient letter, and examined it:

“...but at the time, King Barov took credit for Strahd, and berated him for his 'failure to swiftly put an end to the war' and 'allowing him to be captured by enemies of state'... when he was rescued by Vistani."

Linda blinked in shock, "So that is why he said he lost his youth..." her brow furrowed, and her lips tightened, "His father doesn't sound too pleasant. Berating him for not winning fast enough and having to be rescued..."

"What do you expect from a child?" Escher turned back to his notes.

Seventeen... Timothy’s age. Linda shook her head as she thought,  Gods... I can’t imagine anyone that age being expected to fight, much less win a war... what was wrong with Barov? Shouldn’t he have been thankful that the Vistani rescued his son? Why did he send Strahd to war...?

An evil thought crossed her mind: He didn’t want Strahd to return... But why? It doesn’t make sense-

Escher’s voice snapped her back to the present.

"That is true... true, true, true... ah, the impalement...” Escher looked to her and shrugged, “Desertion was becoming a problem due to lack of resources given from the homelands to maintain a war... He thought that only a horrible punishment would deter further insolence. And it did... all of the rest is true for his origins listed here- save for one little thing..."

Escher tapped his finger on the page, "’Strahd vowed not to leave Barovia until the war had been won.’ That was a fabrication for political ends in Strahd's own homeland, but in letters I found... Barov would not tolerate Strahd in the homelands until the war had been won."

"What?" Linda’s eyes widened in shock, "He wasn't allowed to leave?!"

This is unheard of...

Escher waved a letter in front of his face to read aloud, "The 'acting general does not take leave for himself' is what the letter said. It was some kind of dishonor, or some rubbish like that. However, his lieutenants were allowed to take leave, and sire families and continue their households. Interesting little fact."

 She sighed and voiced her thoughts, "That's horrible and unheard of."

Escher was quiet, but continued reading, before pausing and turning to Linda, "You already know of the wedding massacre correct? I'm...not supposed to speak on the subject. But you carry his journal with you..."

Ah, so all the vampires can sense it... she nodded, "Yeah I read about what happened."

Escher smirked and continued, "Of course, Strahd's death is completely fabricated, so we can ignore those.... marriage, birth, deaths... although, he did put on grand shows to continue the masquerade of humanity. "

She leaned back, "I knew all of those were made up."

Escher paused, "Ah, Jander Sunstar... that is a sore subject..."

Linda raised a brow, "Why?"

Escher shrugged, "I think because it was one of the first people that Strahd considered a friend since turning... and one of the first to personally betray him."

Linda’s curiosity grew, "What happened?"

“Jander was a foreigner, like you...” Escher looked to his notes, “He called himself a Sun Elf... and was from a group of adventurers from a place he called Waterdeep. He was the only survivor of his party and was turned vampire... before coming here.”

“Strahd invited him into his care and swore to help him figure out the origins of a girl that he was trying to avenge... a girl named Ana. In return, Jander would teach Strahd what he knew... because there was a lot more Jander knew of vampirism than Strahd was able to know... Strahd is the First Vampire, but Jander was older, and wiser than he."

Linda folded her arms, "I still think time moves differently here..."

"I think so too. It seems slower here... but maybe its because I am bored..." the vampire chuckled.

He resumed the lesson, "Well, Jander grew suspicious of Strahd and abhorred his method of ruling, and Strahd's own ignorance of his power, and 'arrogance' turned Jander against him, and he plotted with a priest named Sasha Petrovich, in secret to try to destroy Strahd... especially after discovering that his 'Ana' was Tatayana... one who had been reborn outside the Mists. He held Strahd responsible for her broken state... even though it was the elf himself that killed her."

Linda blinked,  "Petrovich, like Lucien and Lydia in Vallaki?"

Escher tilted his head in acknowledgement, "Descendants. Strahd showed mercy to the priest after Jander died, and after Strahd recovered from the battle. They had used the Holy Symbol of Ravenkind against him... and the priest took it. They made an arrangement. The priest would not return the symbol to Strahd, but keep it hidden for eternity, and take the secret to his grave... so long as Strahd swore not to harm him of his descendants."

She blinked at the revelation, "Oh, I see. Well, we found it."

"And it is in Ruki's care, I know.... " Escher returned to reading, musing, "He does favor impalement as a message, doesn't he? True... another birth, death, marriage.... Ah, Azalin. Another tough one..."

Linda folded her arms, "A lich, right?"

He nodded in affirmation, "Strahd's mentor, and partner when trying to find ways to escape. They may have done it too, but it isn't certain.”

Escher lazily raised a hand, “Rahadin thinks they succeeded briefly, as they both were missing from Barovia for a while, but neither of them could remember the experience. It was all for naught anyway. As soon as Azalin got his own realm... he turned on Strahd and sent this country down the warpath. Ultimately, Strahd won, but he lost a friend in Aldrick Wachter along the way."

Linda nodded, and thought aloud, "I wonder how they did it, if they did escape..."

Escher shrugged, "Who knows for certain? Ah... this is when Strahd's psyche began to slip... the despotic, tyrant mage..."

Escher held up a hand, "He theorizes that when he sacrificed himself to sever Barovia from other realms, he also sacrificed some of his mental stability and well being. He became a monster, truly. Rahadin had taken over for him, but Strahd was fixed on seeking vengeance... on what, he cannot remember, and I do not know.

Linda blinked. It wasn’t uncommon for vampires to lose their sanity over time, but Strahd now seemed to be stable. This was perplexing. 

"How odd... what else is there?" she asked.

"Well... Lord Strahd came to his senses only after being killed again. By foreign adventurers... and then things went back to normal... for a time. There was the whole Lord Soth thing, that was more an inconvenience for everyone involved."

"He was a death knight?" recalled Linda.

"From another world,” Escher replied, “The Mists tested Strahd's patience with him. But he managed to redirect the death knight's wrath until he could get him to flee into the mists... and another dread realm formed."

Escher turned to the last section of the book, pity in his voice, "Ah, poor Volenta... And dare I say poor Strahd. His diplomacy was doing well- until Metus tried to assassinate him, and had poor Volenta killed as well."

Linda blinked, "So, that is the same Volenta?"

The Volenta killed in the book is one of the other consorts?

Escher nodded, "She was not created in the usual manner, if I recall. She died tainted by Lord Strahd's blood, when Malik speared them both through..."

Escher sighed, "Strahd became even more paranoid of traitors and assassins and his secret coming out at this time.... Anyone who conspired with Metus was killed. Anyone he thought a traitor was killed...”

“Some beheaded... particularly bad ones impaled. It's eased in recent times..." Escher looked to Linda, trying to gauge her reaction.

She rubbed her temples and sighed, folding her hands in front of her. He had done truly terrible things. She didn’t doubt that. But he had terrible things happen to him... and it didn’t excuse him, but...

I understand why now. 

 "It seems, I didn't know half of what has happened to Strahd. I see why he is like he is even more, now."

Escher tilted his head and closed the book, "But it doesn't make for good propaganda."

She chuckled, softly,  "I would assume not..."

Linda raised a brow and looked over the dandy, blond consort. This slender, pretty man seemed to know how to speak to Strahd and persuade him to tone down his anger at the very least...

It would be useful to know that.

She coyly looked to the man, "So how did you woo Strahd?"

Escher laughed at her, "It's not that hard when you know what to say, and more importantly, how to say it. You just have to know him well enough."

She tilted her head, "And what does that mean? How do you say things?"

Escher stood and made a flamboyant gesture, "I say things the way they need to be said to get the results I want. "

She pursed her lips,  "And how did this woo Strahd? I don't think you did it."

Escher gasped, offended, "Lady Linda, I am far more charming than you give me credit! Far more charming than yourself, even..."

He put a hand over his chest, emphasizing, "I radiate charisma."

Linda toyed with him, speaking bluntly, "I don't see it."

The man pouted, "I would say more, but I am not permitted to harm the guests."

He huffed and crossed his arms, "Fine. You want to know how I did it? Even when my life on the line?"

"I do."

Escher raised a hand, flippantly, "I didn't try to pretend to be invulnerable for one. I told him that I knew that he had every right to murder me for betraying him, and going where I was not permitted to go. And then thanking him for not allowing me to die..."

Escher looked to Linda, "He didn't even seem to realize that he was the one who rescued me from being devoured by Mila, Ana, and Volly. And that was the thing... I appealed to the goodness in him."

Escher made a gesture, "A man like Strahd knows what makes him evil. A man like Strahd will go out of his way to be the cruelest, wickedest man to ever walk the surface, because a man like Strahd doesn't believe that there is goodness in him. But... as soon as you point out those small flaws in his evil overlord persona..."

Escher raised his hands, gesticulating, "Would an evil overlord go out of his way to save a man who had just betrayed him? Offer shelter to a woman that he unknowingly brought into his dark world? Rescue children from hags and were-creatures? Perhaps he would... it doesn't make him any less evil..."

Escher looked to Linda, weaving his poetic words, "But, it may- for a moment- remind him that his heart isn't truly black. And that he is capable of much goodness and love..."

Escher shrugged, "It was enough to woo him in the moment. He hungers for goodness to be shown him, but is not in the habit of showing it to others first. No, that would make him weak."

Escher folded his hands behind his back, "Point out the goodness genuinely. Don't try to make the lion a lamb. And keep it honest and gentle. Those are my rules when speaking with Strahd. And... if you desire his... favor... "

Escher winked at the woman, rakishly,  "... you will do the same."

Linda smirked to hide her blush, "So how else do I become as charismatic as you?"

"Well, join a guild or practice. I do recommend studying the classic poets. But that is a personal preference..." Escher looked to the door.

Volenta entered the room with a tired looking Aric and Jeeves. They chatted briefly before retiring to the room beyond. Volenta folded her hands over her skirt and walked over to Linda and Escher.

She spoke lightly,  "How are we tonight?"

“Just splendid,“ Escher replied.

 "Doing well, just speaking with Escher about Strahd..." Linda looked up to the masked woman...

She was murdered... and Strahd’s blood turned her... and now she is here. She seems happy enough...

Volenta shrugged, "Lot's of people talk about him. You should hear what they say in the towns...” She looked to Escher, “But Mila wanted me to tell you that dawn approaches..."

Escher nodded and put the book back on the shelf,  "I will be down soon. No worries."

"It's that time already...?” Linda was shocked, “Sorry if I am keeping you. I should probably get some rest too."

Escher looked to Linda, "Do not worry, Lady. You aren't keeping me from anything. But I will tell you..."

Escher inspected her, "You may want to take down your hair and brush it... use some water to wash, make yourself a little more presentable... it will help your natural charm greatly.... and if you need help on your charisma..."

He turned back to the bookshelf, and pulled out a tome, "Here... The Diplomat. This book is probably best for learning what you want to learn."

Escher presented the book to her. Linda took the book and showed her gratitude.

“Thanks...“ she set the book beside her, took off her hat, and let her hair down. She turned to the vampire, “Better?“

Escher tilted his head, "Getting there. A wash is what it needs. You got black stuff in it."

Linda sighed, "Probably gun powder.... I'll wash up. Is there a place for that in here?"

Escher pointed to a table, "You will have to use one of the basins on the table...” He looked at the copy of The Diplomat, “...But I think you will be able to grasp the book easily."

Escher bowed to her, "I shall have to take my leave. Thank you for pleasant conversation."

Linda tilted her head, "Thank you for your insight. I hope you both rest well."

As Escher and Volenta retreated from the room, she rose and pulled out her mirror. She grimaced... I looked like this? In front of Strahd-

She hurried over to the basin and washed her face and hair in the cold water- the temperature waking her up a bit...

The water was murky gray with the powder residue. She sighed and took out her mirror again...

Much better... clean... I look like a proper lady now- It was odd for her that she even cared about such things... 

She pat herself dry and walked over to the couch, using her newfound energy to read.

[protecteugeneporter]

The Unexpected || Eugene x Reader

Summary: The reader and Eugene are married and living contently in Alexandria (in some AU where most people haven’t died and the Saviors were presumably not a thing). One day, however, after experiencing weird symptoms for a few weeks, the reader finds out she’s pregnant and is now tasked with breaking the news her husband. Fluff, some drama I guess. Just a plot bunny thing that occurred to me as I love putting Eugene into these situations.  

Kind of a downer gif but this piece taps into some heavy shit so!! aLSO USED WITH GIF SEARCH THAT LINKS TO ORIGINAL SOURCE I HOPE THAT’S OK I JUST DIDN’T HAVE TIME TO MAKE ONE MYSELF THANKS I LOVE YOU

You’ve spent the better part of a day glancing over at the test again, willing it to be different, hoping your eyes had seen something other than what you knew they must have. The symptoms had been there for while, but you were keen to ignore them, chalk it up to dehydration, possible malnutrition...who even knew? Everyone was prone to illness in the apocalypse, right? It was Maggie that finally took you aside and offered up the pregnancy test without much explanation other than a sympathetic smile.

That was about all you were going to tolerate anyhow. Just for the sake of it, you used it accordingly, if only to reinstate that which you already knew, that you definitely, absolutely weren’t pregnant. And yet...the test in front of you said you absolutely, definitely are pregnant. 

You spoke to Abraham first, as irony would have it, just as it was his turn to hold Tyreese, his and Sasha’s infant son. He offered the baby over and you took him, though with a new apprehension that you hadn’t experienced towards babies before. You had been a natural with Judith! Maybe now that it’s all becoming real you’re having your doubts. 

“You afraid of what Eugene’s gonna think?” Abraham asked.

“I’m afraid of what I’m going to think,” you corrected, as Tyreese grabbed at your necklace with his little chubby hands. “There’s so much to worry about now, so much that could go wrong...it wasn’t our intention. We, y’know...charted pretty meticulously...”

Abraham laughed heartily. “When death becomes nothing but a halfway point, anything is possible.” 

You didn’t share in the laugh. Abraham seemed to have picked up that you weren’t in the mood for humor, so he offered a bit of comforting wisdom instead. 

“In all honesty, yeah, it’s scary as hell, but that was parenting before all of this too. I had hoped once that there was getting over this, but...there isn’t. We gotta face facts, make the most of what we have while we have it. It’s good to start a family, especially now. Building a new life here isn’t just in putting up walls and growing vegetables. Eugene might be scared at first. I mean...he’s definitely gonna be scared, but he’ll come around. He always does.” 

Abraham knows Eugene well, sometimes better than you think you do, so you do your best to derive comfort from that promise as you wait for Eugene back home. He’s been spending most of the day working on solar panel maintenance for the community and, of course, this day of all days, he’s going to be home later than usual. 

He finally shuffles in sometime around 7 with the usual nod and “’evening” as he scrapes the dirt of his shoes off on the welcome mat. To him, it’s just business as usual, another unremarkable evening. You’re about to turn that on its head.

“We need to chat for a second, come sit with me.”

You lead him to the living room where he sits across from you on the couch, the confusion palpable on his face. You don’t like leaving him in the lurch like this even for a second, but blurting out the news as the first thing he hears when he comes in would’ve probably been too much. 

“I...need to tell you something,” you begin, completely unsure of how to go about this. “I don’t know if this is going to be good or bad news and I’m not really sure how to say this, but...it turns out, I’m, uh...I’m pregnant.”

He stares at you a moment. You can see the gears working in his head as he processes this information, not having fully heard or understood you at face value...so it seems. You wait in the agony of silence as Eugene searches for something to say. 

“You’re certain? Many pregnancy symptoms share co-morbidity with a great deal of things, including garden variety hormonal fluctuation- ”

“No,” you insist. “Maggie gave me a test and I’ve been experiencing symptoms for a few weeks now and...I’m pretty sure the test is right.” 

“Those tests can be faulty-”  

He’s grasping desperately at straws now and you’re getting frustrated despite yourself. 

“Eugene. No. I’m certain. I’m pregnant.” 

His gaze drops hard to the floor and he looks as if he’s studying something there with a furious intent. He shakes his head. 

“It doesn’t make any sense. Even with the comforts of hearth and home, better food resources and protection, the likelihood of ovulation at a regularity so frequent as to defy our efforts to work around it is slim to none. Malnutrition being what it is here-”

“I don’t know how to explain it either, but it’s happened and we have to face it.” You don’t know whether you want to yell or cry, but it really doesn’t help anything that he’s being so hysterical (for what that looks like on Eugene). “I’m going to keep it, by the way- just in case there was any confusion about that.”  

“Damn right you are,” he mutters as he stands up. “Given our medical resources, or lack thereof, the risk of terminating the pregnancy is far greater than carrying the child to term, so it would seem we’re between the devil and the deep blue sea. You picked your poison wisely.” 

He’s leaving now, to go where you don’t know, and you’re just about fit to be tied. 

“Where the hell are you going?” you shout after him, unable to remember a time you’ve been so angry with him. Even the revelation of the lie back on the road didn’t work up such a froth in you, such confusion with who you knew your husband to be versus what he was showing you now. “You think I’m not afraid, Eugene? You think I wanted this?” 

You’re following after him now, intent to get a hold of him but he moves faster than you, faster than anyone should be allowed to move, really. 

“I need some air,” he explains curtly, before ricocheting back out the door. 

You’re left in an awkward, impotent rage-fueled stupor, unsure of whether to be angry or sad or something else besides, so you remain stunned. The hell just happened? 

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

You give him about a half an hour before you’re following his ass back outside, looking everywhere for where he might have gone. He does know he can’t run from this, right? It doesn’t seem like something he’d do, no matter how upset...or so you hope. 

“I saw him meander just outside the gate a second ago,” Abraham tipped. “I wouldn’t worry too much about it, he won’t have gone far.” 

This turns out to be the case despite your crushing fear, as Eugene is just sitting at the edge of the forest where Sasha has been known to do target practice from time to time.  

Before you can say anything, he’s talking. 

“My father was what I think most people would assess to be a deadbeat. My mother was marginally more competent at parenting, but only enough not to have me taken away by Child Protective Services. Sometimes I think I might have been better off taking my chances in the system with people who were assured not to give a damn, than with those I was biologically related to. There was no familial affection there anyhow.”  

You sigh because you get it, you just wish it didn’t have to involve so much rigmarole. But that’s selfish, isn’t it? You sit down next to him on the fallen tree log and the two of you share a silence in which neither of you really knows what to say.

“Perhaps, all that considered,” he says after a while. “You can understand why I’m less than enthusiastic about this news. It’s not you. It’s not the baby, it’s me. This goes beyond simply being a parenting novice, this is a matter of a lack of proper parental affection in my formative years. I had no role model to speak of.”

You take a hold of his arm, cuddling into his side. 

“And yet, despite all this lack of love in your childhood, you had no trouble whatsoever giving your heart to me.” 

“Well, that’s not-...that’s not entirely true...”  

You roll your eyes and laugh softly. “Hesitation in the early days of courtship don’t count. You love me so completely, every day. Why would a child be any different?”

“Maybe it’s not a matter of affection, but how do I go about guiding him in this brave new world? Teaching him right from wrong? Being there when I should? I wouldn’t argue I’ve ever been the best at any of those things.” 

You frown because you’re not sure you have those answers for yourself, let alone Eugene. 

“I exactly wouldn’t call myself a great role model,” you say. “But...so what? Maybe I have to learn how to be that person on the job. You’ve always told me an eagerness to learn is just as important, if not more so than being competent.”  

Eugene doesn’t have an argument for this, instead he just leans into you and places his hand on your knee. After a while of sitting like this he says, “I’m sorry. I will be better, I just...I need time.”

“Well, we have nine months,” you tease halfheartedly. Comedy is the only way you’re going to muscle through the overwhelming anxiety of this. “Hey, how about we go back? It’s getting dark and we’re here without weapons.”

Eugene looks a little shocked that he didn’t think of that himself, being so caught up in the moment. He, of course, agrees, and the two of you walk back to the lighted, warm community of Alexandria, hand-in-hand the entire way. 

[spotlightsaga]

Kevin Cage of @spotlightsaga reviews… Ru Paul’s Drag Race (S09E03) Draggily Ever After Airdate: April 7, 2017 @vh1 @wowreport Ratings: 0.673 Million :: 0.3 18-49 Demo Share Score: 4.5/10

**********SPOILERS BELOW*********

Finally! An episode we can all sink our teeth into. No, this isn’t a ‘Drag Race’ best… But we’re finally starting to see who has that special something to make it to the latter half of this competition and who doesn’t. Slowly but surely the stakes are raising and the stars are rising to the top. 'Draggily Ever After’ as an episode and as an overall challenge knows exactly where it is in the competition. There are still weak ones and performers that aren’t fully realized as full on Drag Queens left in the competition, so the challenge is basic… But it demands the Queens to realize a concept and reach into their bag of tricks and show us their artistic side by having the contestants create Princess characters that are accompanied by an original sidekick and threaded together by a short storyline.

Everyone has their strengths and weaknesses, but it looks like, for the most part, that Eureka, Nina Bo'Nina Brown, Sasha Velour, Trinity Taylor and Valentina are all front runners for their own reasons. Shea Couleé could be a dark horse in the competition… And the judges seem to be pulling Peppermint in to praise her for something outside of this competition, as if Peppermint has established herself and put in work and therefore automatically deserves a little bit of spotlight and praise. I get it and I don’t get it. I just know I’m not looking at a winner. Charlie Hides does runway well, but the total package isn’t strong with this one. For some reason I can’t ever remember who Alexis Michelle is, was, or anything about her. It’s true I take a Xanax or two, but I’m going to need this girl to shine and soon. Maybe she just hasn’t had the met the right challenge yet? If someone or something doesn’t make an impression on me I can literally turn around, walk two steps, and completely forget they exist. What were we talking about again?

I hate that Drag Race is on Friday’s now. The weekend is not when I do my best writing as I’m always tired, running around, bartending or serving for extra money or trying to get an extra piece or two worked on for a printed publication or wherever I can fit in. Last week in my review on RPDR, I fumbled some words about the show of which Lisa Kudrow was quoting, it didn’t change the fact that she was one the show for 20 seconds to just say lines from one show that she did. They did say 'The Comeback’ in the show, and unfortunately I’m unable to post edit something I post on TVShowTime and I apologize for the mistake and it was corrected outside of this platform, but understand that I really try to come from a good place… And no, the show she was quoting didn’t change how I felt about the segment. Please don’t tell me to 'calm down’ or 'relax’, I am writer at heart and whether I’m making money or not, I love this community, you see what I write first, and it’s you who really get to see the true me, sans about 5 people in this world who I know are the definition of a 'real friend’, and only one of them lives here in South Florida. I am exhausted right now, I’ve been up since 5am yesterday morning working and I really hope that I can convey this next topic with the compassion and sincerity that I normally am able to convey with ease (just not Friday-Sunday).

As a Floridian, who had friends and co-workers in Orlando during the Pulse Massacre, this is a very difficult place for me to revisit, even with the amount of time we’ve all had to process what happened. I’ve been in a gay relationship for over 11 years now. I’m a natural born hustler in many aspects, I’ve always had multiple jobs, multiple passion projects, and for a good 3-4 years I was a 'Male Dancer’ in one of the most notorious Gay Strip Clubs in Ft Lauderdale, FL. I’ve always been on the outside of the gay scene, I never felt like I belonged, and that’s because I don’t, and that’s ok. During my time working there, I made a lot of friends that I never thought I would make. My intention was to go in, get money, and get the fuck out. I thought I had nothing in common with a lot of these people and hung with the other 'straight’ dancers at the club at first. I quickly found myself bored with those 'straight’ co-workers (no offense, trust me they were vapid and always overcompensating for something they lacked beyond physical beauty) and suddenly found myself very much amused at the more quirky, flamboyant boys who came to play. They were all hot messes, yes, but in a 'Party Monster’ type of way, you know… Before the whole murder…errr… Manslaughter twist ending.

There’s always been a huge part of me that has been terrified to seem anything less than masculine, even though my personality is very much 'over-the-top’, I’m haunted with the memories of my parents scolding and shaming me for a brief moment of 'sounding gay’ or displaying a trait that they found too telling. Suddenly I was worlds away from that feeling and those people (who I do love and know did have good intentions, just an ignorant approach) and I was meeting some of the most impactful and beautiful people who were very proudly 'gay’, something I had always equated with 'exploiting for money’ or 'shameful’. These over-the-top Latin and Black young men took a stubborn, scared strawberry blonde boy who was allowing myself to be the “token 'soulless ginger’ with a thick ass and athletic legs” and helped me shed the fear of just letting go and being 100% me. They really showed me how to live my life to the fullest in a way I didn’t know was possible. That chapter in my life is very much over now. You won’t my find me in gay clubs anymore, and my other safe haven, the rave scene, is long dead (since 2003/2004), and now I may attend a music festival once or twice a year if my schedule permits it… But I wouldn’t trade my experience with those incredibly amazing human beings for anything in the world and I try to take what they taught me with me everywhere I go and apply it to anything and everything. One of those people I lost to suicide, and no there was no 13-tapes to listen to afterwards, because suicide is an ugly spurt of the moment thing.

Not everyone is right for the strip club, it takes a special kind of damaged mess to navigate that world… But there were several young, unbelievably strong young men who showed me something beyond that for a few years… And I’m incredibly blessed to have a partner who knew I needed that experience and allowed me to do whatever I wanted, never wanting to impede on my personal growth, but still always put up somewhat of a fight… For good measure.

That 'safe place’ that Cynthia Fontaine talked about, I know that place, and the thought of a single man barging in one of those places with an AK where people are able to discover a different meaning and break the general mold of what is or isn’t 'the social and societal norm’ and gunning down as many people as possible rips my inner core into a million pieces. The night that it happened, I called my friends and coworkers in Orlando, over and over and over, wondering if they were alive… Wondering how something like this could happen.

Growing up with the bravery to admit that sexuality and gender isn’t as 'paint by numbers’ as everyone wants it so desperately to be is difficult, especially when you are a leader and you bear that cross during difficult times like middle and high school. Once you make it out of high school, it does in fact 'get better’, but now we have to face something like this… In a place that’s supposed to be designed to celebrate our freedom, a place that allows a select few a unique chance to come of age for a second time around… But instead that 'safe place’ was used as a hunting ground. People were lined up and shot one by one, bullets and blood, tears and pain staining the air with a stench of terror and death as good people who had amazing hearts and the ability to heal and teach and love and change people’s lives for the better… It’s impossible to truly make sense of… And something a fucking hashtag on social media will only stain further.

What we heard between Trinity and Cynthia was a real conversation about the direct effect it had on two people’s lives… Two people that were technically removed from the nightmare, but still very much a part of it in a very real way. It’s something we will never escape as human beings, as sexually free human beings and it’s fucking terrifying. Sasha urged everyone not to be scared to go out and live your life, and I don’t have the answers or the ability to even offer up a solution because I don’t ducking know why there are people in this world who want something like this to happen. I’m glad that I was able to experience the rave scene pre-9/11/2001 and the Florida Gay Nightlife pre-6/12/2016. I hate that people are scared to go out now, scared that someone could shoot up a nightclub, or drive a truck into a fair, or set off a bomb, or snipe people at a concert, but I don’t blame them… Fuck I’m scared to just ride the metrorail or congregate in a large crowd.

And on that note, I’m going to move back to the competition. I didn’t expect this very real, very fresh moment at the time to be captured on camera and shot straight forward, without the usual tongue-in-cheek editing the show is known for. They just really served up a raw recount of how these acts of terror, particularly this one on the LGBTQ 🏳️‍🌈 community affects us all, even if we weren’t inside that building holding a strangers hand, hoping to see tomorrow. Let’s move on… Because we have to… Because the world will keep moving even if we don’t…

The lip sync? Aja might paint like a clown, but it was clear there is something genuine inside of him… A fire that does burn for a win. She gave us a fun, energetic lip sync, especially compared to her direct competition, that screamed 'Give me another shot!’ Unfortunately that look, that concept, and that sidekick he created was indeed a pun that neither Ru, nor any of the judges, nor I can resist to crack… A PRINCESS DISASTAH!!! Aja is young and anti-glossy, the latter of which her Brooklyn Drag Sister used to her advantage in S8. Thorgy Thor gave us a purposeful unpolished polish and we ate it up. Aja just isn’t there yet, but I want her to be. It’s clear that there is talent and great ideas mixed up in this mess, and if you can’t see that then surely the good intentions are plain to see. Like Farrah Moan, he needs another 3 years or so to understand who he is. It’s not always about 'honing your craft’, even though that’s definitely a part of it, and that’s proved by Valentina who’s turning it out in the top group consistently now in the most spectacular of ways. Age may be just a number, but life experience and raw talent counts for something major… And at this point in Aja’s career, I think that’s exactly what’s lacking to make the package complete. He’ll get there tho, I’m sure of it.

Guess I won’t be eating my words… Will I, Kimora? Like I said last week, the only reason I believe Kimora was given a pass to stay was because Jaymes Mansfield was so damn terrified. I try to stay away from negativity, but Kimora doesn’t really bring the best out of anyone including herself. It’s that nasty attitude…She transparently played the 'dumb blonde’ (I guess in 2017 we call that 'Playing Kardashian’, but I have no reason to insult any of those women), and that overly confident schtick doesn’t translate when there is no substance or clever angle to back it up… Kimora is no Willam Belli. I know stupid, I’ve stared at it directly in the face… And even stupid knows what adjectives are. I just don’t buy it. Kimora is the product of a generation that eats, drinks, shits, and dreams of reality television… But this is reality tv competition and we see that you are attempting to play a part, and not even well. You wasted a spot. You sent Jaymes Mansfield home and as scared as that little bugger was, he was certainly more promising and more talented. I’m not being mean here, I’m being real. There was nothing fun about watching Kimora Blac and this is literally the last sentence I will ever write about him.

Thanks for reading. I know this was a long one. And yes, I think taking the time to share my views of the show as well as compare and contrast my life experiences was worth it, especially since we were able to cover Pulse, it’s aftermath, and what it means to me. This will be edited down as it moves to other platforms, but I think that you and you and you who have read this all the way through are worth my time and every word on this page, as ridiculously fucking long as it is. Spotlight Saga is my baby, my brand that I’m moving forward as my own online publication, who better to give the most honest and passionate piece of myself to than you?