#tma big bang 2021

[theyellowmistress]

(to the tune of the mr grinch song)

🎶 You’re a Monster, Mr. Sims 🎶

Had an absolute blast doing these illustrations for @tmabigbang fic “It’s What’s Inside that Counts” by @jack-fruit! Nothing better than getting to draw a bunch of eyeballs 👏🏻 If you need some Monster Jon in your life, def go check it out!

IDs by @franzis-frantic-thoughts under the cut

Top Image

[ID: A black and white digital drawing of Jon and Martin from the podcast the Magnus Archives. The painting is in portrait format and in the style of a printed etching. Jon and Martin are depicted in a dark alley with bare brick walls. Martin is sitting on the ground with his back to the viewer. He is a fat man wearing dark trousers, a light, knitted sweater and has a short, slightly curly haircut. There is a satchel on the ground next to him and he is clutching a short pocket knife in both hands, with which he is threatening Jon. Jon is depicted as an inhuman monster of the Beholding. He is made up entirely of unblinking eyes assembled in the vague shape of a thin human standing in the dark corridor, close to where Martin's feet are. Tendrils of eyes lift up around Jon's "head", giving the impression of long flowing hair being caught in a breeze. The background around Jon is entirely black, showing that the alley continues into unseen depths behind him. /End ID]

Bottom Image

[ID: A digital illustration of Jonathan Sims and Jane Prentiss from the podcast The Magnus Archives. Jane is in the foreground, kneeling on the ground in a pile of white worms and is clutching her face with both hands and crying out in fear and pain. She is outlined in black and colored in green. Worms are crawling from holes that riddle her body and dress, tangled in her lanky black hair, and filling her mouth and empty eye sockets. A semi-circle of lines branch out from her head emphasizing her pain. Jon looms behind and over her, depicted as a black silhouette littered with staring white eyes. Jon's hair flows out in each direction, providing more eyes with structure to cling to. The eyes here are aligned in concentric circles, their corners all pointing towards the middle of Jon's face. Jon's head is framed by a large poisonous green eye, his head and hair taking the place of the pupil. All of Jon’s eyes are trained on Jane in the form of a green cone of light that shines down and frames Jane. More large eyes staring at Jane dot the dark purple background. The purple of the background fades into black. /End ID]

[yellowvixen]

I can finally post my piece for the incredible fic This Is Not The End by @monstermasc for the @tmabigbang! Go read it!! And check out all the other amazing art and fic too!

(Thank you to @franzis-frantic-thoughts for the ID!)

[ID: A semi-realistic digital painting of Jon and Martin from the podcast The Magnus Archives embracing on a bed with a carved wooden headboard. The picture is fully coloured and in portrait format. Jon is depicted as a thin British Persian man with brown skin and dark long hair that falls over his shoulders. The hair as well as his goatee are streaked with grey. Jon is wearing purple sweatpants but no shirt. The artist has depicted Jon’s canonical scars: a cut to the throat, various scratches, rope burn around the wrists, a burn on his right hand, circular worm scars on various spots, a lightning-like scar on his left forearm and a large explosion burn on his left upper arm. One top surgery scar is also visible. Jon also has a bleeding wound in the center of his chest and blood dripping from his lips. Martin, a white man (British, Polish, South African heritage) with stronger shoulders than Jon is depicted with wavy ginger hair and a full beard. Both his beard and fringe are tinged with white. He is pale and has freckles over his face and a scar on his neck. He is wearing blueish grey plaid pyjamas and is holding Jon in his lap. Martin supports Jon’s back with his right arm and covers the other’s bleeding wound with his left hand. Jon is grasping this with his right one while cupping Martin’s jaw with his left. The two are looking at each other. Jon has a small smile on his face while Martin is frowning and crying gently. The picture is lit from the top left in warm yellowish light and the artist’s signature is visible on the left, it reads “Yellow Vixen”. /End ID] 

[littlemushroomboi]

art for the @tmabigbang event!

the fic is “After everything is said and done (somehow you are still the one)” by @martinbelovedblackwood and it’s amazing, seriously go check it out<33

 https://archiveofourown.org/works/34759393/chapters/86547919

[ID: a black and white lined digital drawing of Jon and Martin from the Magnus Archives, wearing formal outfits and dancing. Jon is a think Pakistani person with long dark hair in a braid, wearing a flowy dress dotted with stars at the bottom of the skirt. Martin is a tall, fat Polish man wearing a floral patterned suit. Martin is dipping Jon while blushing and smiling, and Jon is grinning back up at him and saying, “you’re horrible.” In the background is an outdoor party: lanterns hung up on a string, plants around them, and large outdoor tents framing the image. END ID]

[fricklefracklefloof]

road to a new home.

one of my pieces for the @tmabigbang, based off the jonmartin roadtrip fic by @neliakey (linked above)

and go look at the other pieces by fellow artists @pocketsizedquasar (x) (x) and @theineated (x)

[image description: a digital drawing of martin and jon, their backs facing the viewer, in a car on a road with grass on all sides. jon is at the driver's seat on the right with one hand on martin's, while martin stares off into the distance. martin is a fat, light-skinned mixed filipino man wearing a pale blue hoodie. his hair is short and dark. jon is a thin, brown-skinned pakistani person wearing a purple sweater. his hair is long and wavy and streaked with grey. end id]

[captaincravatthecapricious]

For the wonderful @banashee everyone go read the fic! It’s great!!!!!! https://archiveofourown.org/works/34891501 for the @tmabigbang I had a wonderful time!!! Image ids under the cut! Image 1 ID: a digital drawing of Martin and Tim sitting with each other from the chest up. Martin, on the left, is a Polish and Japanese man with glasses, freckles, and short straight mussed hair. He’s wearing an oversized sweater. His hands are up over his face to rub at his eye and upper lip, hiding his right eye and mouth. His eyes are closed, looking queasy. Tim, on the right, is a Filipino, Melanesian, and Irish man with short messy straight hair, a faint mustache and goatee, circular worm scars over his skin, and ear piercings. He’s wearing a long sleeved shirt and holding a glass in his right hand. He looks at Martin with an open expression, mouth open as if talking. The pair are only shaded slightly by light blue, and the background is light green. In the top right corner is the artist’s signature, @ capataincravatthecapricious. End ID. (ID by @caedogeist-rights) Image 2 [begin ID: a digital line-art drawing, with blue shading, depicts Jon and Tim. Tim, a Filipino, Melanesian, and Irish mixed race man, is in the forefront on the left side of the image, from the shoulders up. He is wearing a jacket and has short, messy hair, a small beard, and three piercings in his right ear, as well as worm scars on his face and neck. He is looking toward the lower, left corner, shoulder hunched, with a slight frown. Jon, a Jordanian, Pakistani, Indian, and white mixed race person, is standing in the background on the right side of the image. They have long, curly hair pulled up into a half-bun, and is wearing square glasses, a hoodie tucked into a long, plaid skirt. Jon’s right hand is resting on a cane, the left is resting on the doorframe of an open door. A small speech bubble floats next to the right side of Jon’s head, which reads: Tim? The artist’s signature, @ captaincravatthecapricious, is in the top, right corner. end ID] (ID by @notesofarichlycolorednight) Image 3 [begin ID: a digital line-art drawing, with a pale red shading, depicting Jon, Martin, and Tim all cuddling in bed. Jon is a Jordanian, Pakistani, Indian, white mixed race person with long, curly hair pulled up into a loose bun. They are wearing a jumper and have bandages on their face. Their arms are around Martin’s middle, nose pressed into Martin’s back. Martin is a Polish and Japanese mixed race man with short hair, also wearing a jumper. He has his arms around Tim. Tim is a Filipino, Melanesian, Irish mixed race man with short hair, has ear piercings, and is also wearing a jumper. He has his head tucked into the crook of Martin’s neck. The artist’s signature is in the top, left corner: @ captaincravatthecapriciou. end ID] (ID by @notesofarichlycolorednight​)

[vanroesburg]

ecstatic to be working with @janekfan again for this year’s @tmabigbang! please check out their fic Revenant!! it’s lovely hurt/comfort for jon once more, heart wrenchingly terrific

[ID: A digital painting of Jon and Martin from the podcast the Magnus Archives. The painting is fully coloured and in landscape format. Jon, a Jordinian man, is depicted with light brown skin and long, curly dark hair streaked with grey. He is thin, wearing a loose dark green t-shirt, dark purple pyjama bottoms with pink cartoon cats on it and white and pink striped socks. He is sitting on a bed with his rectangular glasses lying beside him on the mattress. His left knee is drawn up and he is leaning forwards into Martin's shoulder. His right hand rests on Martin's chest while he holds Martin's right hand with his own left. Martin is depicted as a thick set mixed hispanic man with darker skin than Jon. He has short curly chestnut coloured hair, dark brows and large round glasses. He is wearing a light blue jumper with white cartoon sheep on it and brown trousers. He is looking down at Jon in concern. Jon has his eyes closed and seems to be crying. The two characters are surrounded by a soft glow that is mirrored by the glass pane in the door in the background. There is indistinct writing on the glass. The background is kept mostly dark and simple in muted tones of brown and includes a shelf of labelled boxes. /End ID]

[call-of-the-ocean]

(un)seen

Here is my second piece for the @tmabigbang, for the fic “(un)seen” by @janekfan! it’s such a beautiful fic with an incredible writing style and interesting concepts to the role Jon plays as archivist, and the beholding, and focuses on jon’s and daisy’s friendship and i’m just absolutely soft for it, and so happy to have made art for it! (i might even make more art)

[ID: a digital painting of Alice “Daisy” Tonner, Basira Hussain and Jonathan Sims. Jon is laying on the ground, curled up in a fetal position with his back to the viewer. He’s a brown man with long, brown greying hair and pockmarked skin. He’s wearing a white jumper and washed out jeans, his feet are bare. Basira is kneeling on her right knee next to Jon’s head, one of her hands feeling the back of his head, her expression concentrated and worried. Her other hand is resting on her left leg. She’s depicted as brown woman wearing a yellow hijab black puffy jacket and black shirt, tan pants and black boots. Daisy is standing partially in the shadows behind the two, hugging herself and looking down at Jon and Basira with concern. She is a short, thin white woman littered with scars and freckles. She has stringy blonde hair with streaks of white down to her chin and is wearing a grey hoodie, black shorts and white sneakers. On the wall beside them hangs a painting of a man in a pinstripe suit in an ornate frame, the face is not visible but a sign below the painting reads Jonah Magnus. A golden plaque with an arrow pointing to the hallway branching off behind the three hangs on the same wall as the painting, close to Daisy’s head. END ID]

[quillmasblog]

A little concept art of moth Jon for @monstermasc 's amazing fanfiction, 'From the Cacoon' as part of @tmabigbang. It's the first of 3 artworks I did.

(1) (2) (3)

[ID: 2 semi-realistic digital painting of Jon from the podcast The Magnus Archives standing in a dark forest. The pictures are fully coloured and in portrait format. Jon is depicted as a British Pakistani moth-man hybrid. He has two large wings and four arms. Jon is depicted as a dark skinned British Pakistani person with long, flowing brown hair, short goatee and mustache. Jon is wearing a white shirt with a cartoon duck on it beneath a turquoise cardigan with puffy sleeves and a leaf pattern, as well as a long dark green skirt but no shoes. The artist has depicted some of Jon's canonical scars, such as the cut to his throat and worm scars on his face. Jon is not human in this. He has black eyes with glowing green irises and cross-shaped pupils, pointy ears and four arms, two of which are hidden beneath his cardigan. He also has large, dusty brown moth wings with a total of four glowing yellow eyes near the joints. Jon is holding one of his left arms out to the side and is looking in that direction too. 1st image has a background that is kept in various shades of dark blue and shows a nighttime forest. The Artist's signature in bright green is written across the bottom left quarter of the picture and reads "Quillma". /End ID]

[theyellowmistress]

My two illustrations for @cuddlytogas‘ fic “Missing Presumed Dead” for @tmabigbang 

Consider these a sneak peak to some very spooky encounters, so what are you waiting for and go start reading it!

Image Descriptions under the cut

Image One

[ID: A digital painting of the corridor leading into the archives of the Magnus Institute from the podcast The Magnus Archives. The painting is fully coloured and in portrait format. The three-point-perspective shows the corridor tapering off into darkness, a row of old-fashioned lamps hangs from the ceiling, all of them are turned off. There are doors visible to either side of the corridor. They are labelled "Head Archivist Jonathan Sims" (left) and "Break Room”(right) respectively. A much better illuminated door is half-closed in the foreground. Its window reads "VES" (presumably cut off from "Archives"). A brown-skinned hand (meant to be Jon's) with a white sleeve is gripping the door knob, pulling it closed. The vague black shape of a tall, broad shouldered figure is barely visible in the depths of the archive's corridor. It is indistinct and can only be identified so much as to be considered human. The painting is kept in muted tones of green-grey, except for the Archives door and Jon's arm. It is set on a white background with fraying edges, giving the impression of an unclean polaroid picture. The artist's signature is visible on the white frame at the bottom right. It reads "RMS 2021". /End ID]

Image Two

[begin ID: a digital, monochromatic drawing, depicting the shadowy figure of Martin's ghost knocking on the door from inside Document Storage. Martin is just a silhouette with round, white circles for eyes. He's looming in the window of the door, labeled in white lettering, Document Storage. The sound of the  knocking is emanating from the door in large circular ripples. White fog billows out from underneath the door. Text overlays the bottom of the door: Knock, knock. end ID]

[yellowvixen]

My second piece for the @tmabigbang, this time for the fic By Candlelight by @splitting-infinities!! I’ve been so looking forward to finally showing this piece off, I’m super proud of it. If you like the movie Stardust (and who doesn’t) you’ll love this fic!! Go check out all the other art and fic too!

(Thank you @franzis-frantic-thoughts again for the ID!)

[ID: The first image is a semi-realistic digital painting of Jon from the podcast The Magnus Archives. The painting is fully coloured and in portrait format. It features Jon, a fallen star who is depicted as a brown skinned man, riding a huge peacock away from the viewer. The scene is set in a meadow of blooming violets at dawn. Gently rolling hills are visible in the background where the sun is rising into a peach coloured, lightly cloudy sky. Two large trees frame the picture. Jon has dark skin, long, flowing brown hair and a goatee. He is wearing light blue robes that hang down to his feet and are tied at his waist with a dark blue belt made of stars. He is looking over his right shoulder back at the viewer with a pensive expression. The peacock is looking back too. It is fully rendered with detailed head and tail feathers. Its tail fills the bottom left quarter of the painting and trails from view. The bird’s body is dark blue, dappled with lighter spots. Its wings are brown and its tail turquoise with the typical large orange eye-pattern. The artist’s signature is featured on the right hand side about mid-level of the painting. It reads “Yellow Vixen”. 

The second image is a crop of the first, showing a close up of Jon and the peacock’s head.

The third image is another crop of the first, showing a close up of the top part of the peacock’s tail. /End ID] 

[tifaria]

I’m so honored to have gotten to work on these illustrations for @gruhukens amazing fic, On the Subject of Our Former Selves, as part of @tmabigbang! Do yourself a favor and read this amazing, heartbreaking, hopeful story as soon as you can. I kept coming back to this one as when the summaries were released, and I am so happy that I was able to work on it.

Thanks to @gruhukens @fricklefracklefloof @jawbonemage for all of their help with reference images and feedback for how to depict Martin as explicitly Filipino and how to accurately show Jon using a cane. Also for their patience as I finished these up last minute and for help with the image IDs! Seriously, this was an amazing team to be on, I couldn't have asked for a more supportive group.

Why are you still here? Go read the fic!!

[Image ID: A digital painting of Martin Blackwood from The Magnus Archives. Martin is depicted as a fat tan-skinned Filipino man. He has streaks of gray hair in his bangs and the rest is his natural dark hair color. He wears rounded glasses and has a confused expression on his face. He wears a green tshirt and stands at the window of a London tube train car. The window has a thin black border, and the rest of the train car is red. Behind Martin is a blurry background of other train passengers. /end ID]

[Image ID: A digital painting of Jonathan Sims from The Magnus Archives. Jon is depicted as a dark skinned South Asian man. He has curly black hair with graying strands, and wears slightly squared glasses. He wears a light lavender-grey dress shirt, a dark purple waistcoat, and a rust colored brown dress jacket. His right hand grips the handle of a cane and his fingers are pressed against the window of a London tube train car. The window has a thin black border, and the rest of the train car is red. Behind Jon is a blurry background of other train passengers. His expression is shocked and distressed, with wide eyes and mouth hanging open. /end ID]

[littlemushroomboi]

another art for @tmabigbang​!

for the amazing fanfic “Missing, Presumed Dead “ by @cuddlytogas​​. i can’t recommend it enough and you can find it here��

[ID: A digital painting of Jon and Martin from the Podcast the Magnus Archives. The picture is square in shape and rendered in greyscale. Jon sits at his desk in his office, a paper bin is overflowing beneath it. He is shown as a young, thin man with short dark hair, rectangular glasses and business smart clothes. He is asleep with his head resting on his right hand which is propped up on the elbow. There are notes and books on his table, a PC screen and two mugs. One reads "Best Boss" and is steaming, the other has a post-it note reading "Remember 00113005" on it. Martin is standing to his left, looking at him. Martin is surrounded by wafts of fog and is drawn semi-translucent. He is thick set, has curly hair / an afro and is wearing a jumper and long trousers. To either side of the two figures, there are stacks of boxes and files and behind Jon, there is a notice board on the wall. It features multiple overlapping papers, a picture of Martin and a map. One of the papers reads "Do you know about the Archive's Ghost?" in all caps. Another reads "Curriculum Vitae Martin K. Blackwood" with the line "Education" beneath, followed by some indistinct bullet points. There is an indistinct table and some papers are connected by a piece of string as well. /End ID]

[fricklefracklefloof]

flowers never bend with the rainfall by @jawbonemage

one of my other pieces for the @tmabigbang! it's for mordecai's fic about a jmart selkie au, it's a really sweet concept and i love it to bits <3 PLUS there is filipino martin. they are eating longaniza because mordecai is cool and sexy and understands mixed asian martin is superior

also go check out @call-of-the-ocean's piece :)

[image description: a warm-colored digital drawing of jon and martin eating longaniza and rice on the cot in document storage. jon is a thin, brown-skinned jordanian person with short dark hair streaked with grey, and he's waving around his fork in annoyance as he talks about something. martin is a fat, tan-skinned mixed filipino man with short dark hair. he's listening to jon patiently with his fork in his mouth and he is wearing a selkie coat. end id]

[bugeaterzz]

my contribution to the @tmabigbang for @shutupeiffel‘s wonderful fic ‘When I Grow Up’ (link is below). I had such a blast creating this- thanks for letting me participate :0)

https://archiveofourown.org/works/35062744/chapters/87335920

image ID:

[ID: A digital painting of Jon and Melanie from the podcast The Magnus Archives. The painting is fully coloured, cartoonish in style and in landscape format. The two characters are depicted as 8-year-olds sitting on chairs in a school hallway. Jon is abrown-skinned Jordanian boy, with floppy brown hair and large glasses. He is wearing a white button-down shirt, knitted green vest, dark trousers and brown shoes. He is holding a black backpack on his lap with folded hands. He is sitting on the second chair to the left and looking across one empty seat at Melanie with a nervous expression. She is depicted as white British with pale skin and an uneven, messy mousy-brown bob. She is in her school uniform (a white blouse, black skirt, white sockc and black shoes with a buttoned-up blue cardigan). Melanie is sitting eith one arm slung over the back of her chair and her legs crossed, displaying bandages on her shin and knee and a tooth gap as she speaks to Jon with an unimpressed expression. On the wall behind them, there is a cork notice board with various posters and papers. The Book Club meets on Wednesdays during lunch and the Library needs more helpers. There are two posters with spiderweb imagery and two posters with eye imagery. The eyes are all looking towards Jon. /End ID]

[tmabigbang]

on the subject of our former selves

“You got off the train,” the man says, as soon as Martin is close enough to address. He looks confused. “I — why?”

“You did too,” Martin points out defensively, stopping a foot or two short. “And you were looking for me? Just now?”

“Yes,” the man says, no hesitation at all. “Why?”

Martin, baffled, opens his mouth and then closes it again. “I don’t know. Why do you think I would know?”

“Have we met before?” the other man says, scrutinising him closely. “You’re from London? Where?”

“Firstly,” Martin tells him, ticking off his fingers, “no, I’m not. Secondly, fuck off am I telling a stranger where I live. I have lived in London long enough to pick up that much, at least. Thirdly, who are you? And how do I know you?

“I -“ the man says, frowning. “I don’t know either. But I know you.”

The simple, assured way he says it kind of devastates Martin. Because the unshakeable confidence on it mimics the exact feeling that Martin himself is bizarrely, incomprehensibly experiencing — he knows this man, he knows this man — but it contrasts so sharply with the other inexorable truth of all this. That he does not — cannot, by any logic — know this man at all.

--- --- ---

AUTHOR:

@gruhukens : if you saw me say i likely wouldn’t be writing for TMA again… in my defense i’m weak and i love jon and artists so extremely Good

ARTISTS:

@tifaria : Teacher by daylight, artist by moonlight. TMA has meant a lot to me over the years and I am so excited to get to illustrate this amazing fic! You can find me on Tumblr chaotically cramming all my interests into one blog and probably sobbing over Jonmartin.

@bisexualoftheblade : Hey y’all! I’m Cai and I’m here to make some bastard art with my pirated photoshop and my beloved audacity app

@horse-doevures 

BETA:

@iceeckos12 : Hi im grace/ice, and this fic makes my heart go doki doki. Incredibly honored to be on the team!

[janekfan]

Revenant

My first written contribution to @tmabigbang! It's been a joy! Thank you to the amazing @captaincravatthecapricious and the lovely @vanroesburg for providing beautiful artwork! And thanks to my best beta @gently-used-fairytale! I couldn't have done it without you guys!

Read on AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/34972735/chapters/87098077

If Jon didn’t acknowledge how much his kidnapping changed him, hurt him, he could keep all of his vulnerability and shame and grief hidden deep down inside him where no one had to look at it. No one would have to think about it; he wouldn’t have to think about it and it would all go away.

Right?

It wasn’t like he’d been beaten, or injured beyond where the ties bit into his skin as he struggled in vain. As far as kidnappings go, Jon rather thought his experience tame when compared to what could have happened.

Nikola could have kept all her many promises, could have taken his hide.

She could be wearing it right now, readying herself to dance the Unknowing.

Micheal could have killed him had Helen not so fortuitously appeared and whisked him away.

So, shouldn’t he be grateful? Focus on the positive; that he was alive and mostly well despite the tectonic shifting of his sense of self?

Wasn’t it ungrateful of him to take this gift and squander it, to feel sorry for himself when so many others never had even a chance? Stories already written once they drew the attention of that which crawled and choked and blinded and fell and twisted and left and hid and wove and burned and hunted and ripped and bled, and died. Like Tim’s little brother, Danny. He hadn’t a hope in the world once the need to know and to understand and to discover grabbed hold of him, leading him right into their claws.

Leading Tim right to the Institute.

Leading right to him.

Jon scrubbed a too-soft palm down his face, digging the tips of his fingers hard into his temples in an attempt to stave off his steadily worsening headache. Lord, he was tired, so tired of it all. Coughing lightly into his elbow, he curled up under the quilt, silently thanking Martin when it soothed the chills wracking him from top to toe. He was just rundown. That was all. Anyone would be after spending a month in those accomodations.

Inhale.

Hold.

Exhale.

Repeat.

And gradually, Jon began to sink, the exhaustion rooted in his marrow tugging him further and further away from document storage and into something adjacent to sleep. Underwater, rocked back and forth by an undulant current, Jon let it all go.

A veritable mountain of paper carpeted the surface of his desk and Jon wished he could lose himself in the work of untangling the myriad threads connecting each statement to another (to another to another) if only to stop his mind descending into darker thoughts. He drank the tea Martin provided, even ate a biscuit or two when he wasn’t paying close attention, and poured over hundreds of files with the feverish ardor of one living on borrowed time. The answers were here, in the tapes, in the pages yellowed with age. He just wasn’t quite certain of the question. Even now, the statements seemed random, and Jon wasn’t willing to ask anyone else to put themselves in danger poking around alone. The Unknowing was coming. Nikola would find another costume eventually and for that Jon was so, so sorry.

Unfortunately, no amount of Martin’s tea seemed sufficient to clear away the fog that settled over his mind like clotted cream, thick and impenetrable. It was a wonder he could keep a thought in his head at all. The door slammed open, startling him enough he dropped his pen and scattered his notes.

“Here.”

“Uh.” Jon stared at the folder in Tim’s outstretched hand, bewilderment written all over his pallid face. If Tim weren’t so interested in his petty revenge, he might’ve worried.

“You asked for this.” He hadn’t. Hadn’t asked for anything lately. But Tim had been messing with him for days now just to regain some sense of control over this place. Let Jon be paranoid about something real for once.

“I, I did?” Nope.

“Figures.” Tim threw the folder down on the desk and watched Jon scramble to keep the pages together when they spilled across the blotter. “You don’t know what you’re doing, do you?”

“I. No.” Somehow, Jon’s face fell even further. “But I, I’m making progress! At l’least--at least I hope I am.” Watching Jon struggle because of him assuaged the creeping, crawling desire to lash out at anything that moved, and Tim reveled in it.

“And you,” Tim paused, articulation pointed and sharp enough to cleave, “think that’s good enough. That you’re the one we should be trusting to make decisions.”

“I don’t--” Jon cut himself off, a flipbook of emotions passing over his face too quickly to interpret. “I don’t.”

“Spit it out.” That earned him a stern look, some of the old Jon peeking through the veil.

“I don’t want anyone else to be hurt.”

“As if you have any say in that.”

“Maybe I don’t.” Jon drew himself up to his full, diminutive height in his chair, squaring his shoulders and furrowing his brows. He’d always seemed bigger than he was. His nettlesome personality was successful as both a mask and a barrier that kept everyone at arm's length enough to hide the deep well of insecurity growing at his core. Now, he just looked small, like a child playing make-believe against real monsters that would do harm. “It doesn’t mean I get to stop trying.” For all the good it did any of them.

“And what does that mean for us?” The force of Tim’s palms striking the edges of the desk triggered an avalanche of documents, the susurrations of shifting paper interspersed with collisions like thunder. Jon shrank back, all pretense of bravery gone, and Tim smirked. He’d done that. Made him afraid. In the quiet, the creak of wood under Tim’s grip echoed like a gunshot. "You're no hero." His bitter laugh was the last nail in the lid of Jon’s coffin, and he crumpled under the weight of Tim’s stare, turning away, bottom lip quivering. Tim left him gathering horrors with trembling hands.

“Going out. Get your coat.” Jon startled. Tim never spoke to him if he could help it. Not since before he'd been taken, and certainly not after their last conversation.

“Wh’what?”

“Pub. Martin’s coming.”

“Oh. Uh, alright then.” His assistant was already gone, Jon could hear him shouting at Martin from across the archives. It sounded good. Right, like a missing puzzle piece finally found and it lifted the weight sitting heavy in Jon’s stomach enough for him to breathe around the ache. Maybe this was Tim’s way of letting Jon know he was ready to forgive him. He pulled on an old uni jumper, now large on his lanky frame, and joined Martin at the door, offering up a tentative smile when he was greeted in kind.

“Glad you could join us, Jon.”

The walk was pleasant, Tim filling up the space with good-natured chattering while Jon hurried to keep pace. He didn’t want to think about how exposed he was out here, instead pressing as close to Martin as he dared, hoping the bigger man wouldn’t take notice. It felt safe, or something close to it, and Jon swiped his eyes as surreptitiously as he could in the dark when the sodium glare on the pavement began to blur.

It wasn’t a good idea, but Jon downed the shot Tim handed him anyway, losing himself in the burn of cheap vodka long enough to be pushed into a booth, a pint shoved into his hand. Martin took pity on him and slid beside him, his warmth rushing in, blanketing Jon in the faint smell of bergamot. He took a sip of foam.

Hours passed. Jon was pleasantly loose, head fuzzy, the sounds of other patrons a far-away hum. Tim was telling stories about their time in research; pranks he’d pulled at the expense of Jon’s pride, those times they’d taken turns dragging the other home after they’d gotten caught up in one project or another. Jon caught Martin grinning at him more than once, a flush drawn liberally across his face as if with a wide brush. Jon grinned back; shy. Blaming it on the drink to no one but himself. Good lord, he was tired, body heavy, the desire to just allow himself the relief of leaning against Martin, soft and shielded, becoming impossible to ignore. Surely, he wouldn’t mind. Would let him rest. For a moment, nothing more.

“--Sasha loved that.” Like a bucket of ice water, reality flooded in, sharp and sour. “Right, Jon?”

“Eh. R’right.”

“Never could leave well enough alone, could she? Our Sash.”

“Tim?”

“Jon here has some stories, I’m sure! Never been against a bit of rule-bending, ‘ey?” Tim’s inhospitable expression belied his jovial tone.

“Um. N’no.”

“And yet, for all your daring, she’s the one who’s gone.” Martin went stiff beside him, catching on in the time it took for Jon’s head to straighten itself out. “I mean. You’re supposed to Know everything.”

“No. It. I n’never--” Tim cut him off, voice even and razor-keen.

“It should have been easy, Jon. Did you even try to keep us safe?” Pushing himself away from the table, Tim scoffed. “I’m just trying to understand here.”

“Oy, leave off.”

“What? You don’t like it? The truth? Without you and me, Martin, he’d be completely alone.” Tim slugged back his drink, slamming it down with enough force to make Jon flinch, curl into himself in shame. “Who else wants anything to do with you?”

“Tim-!”

“N’no, Martin. He’s. I suppose he’s right, yeah?” Just please don’t leave him alone. He’d made mistakes. He understood. And even if Tim had planned this all along, even if he’d faked all his niceties, Jon preferred that to abandonment. He’d never recover if they left him. Please.

Please.

“Yeah,” Tim agreed, laughter limned with cruelty. “I’m right.” He reached over- sneering when Jon couldn’t suppress a tiny yelp of fear- to drain his pint too. “I’m always right and you always wanted this job.” Jon felt his jaw drop at the accusation, throat working uselessly. “You took it from Sasha because you knew, didn’t you?” The way he said it was so matter of fact that Jon almost thought it was true.

“No! That’s-- that’s not what happened!” Even to Jon’s own ears, it sounded as though he were whining despite the hoarseness of his voice.

“Sasha was better qualified than you and you couldn’t just let her have the thing she’d worked for her whole career.” Of course she was. Talented, beautiful Sasha whose face he couldn’t even remember without that thing in the way. “Gertrude saw her potential.” Tim leaned in, breath stinking of beer. Jon was trapped. Which was ridiculous. This was Tim. Tim wouldn’t hurt him. No matter how angry he was. “Just admit it, you’ll feel better.”

“I. I didn’t.” Didn’t he though? Hadn’t he basically asked Elias for the job by accepting that interview?

“Makes a man wonder just what you had to do, Jon. To get here.”

Martin may have made sure he got back to the Institute, but Jon didn’t remember the walk, just the numbness and trembling of his arms, like Jude hadn’t left well enough alone with his hand. Martin was gentle with him, more so than Jon could ever deserve, and he couldn’t even thank him. All the words he wanted to say were stopped up behind the lump in his throat.

Martin didn’t apologize for Tim, didn’t make excuses, and for that, Jon was grateful. It was already taking everything he had left in him not to break down and beg him to style; to admit he was scared of being alone because the fragments of himself were that much harder to keep hold of without the constant reminder of his presence.

Martin left him to the cot, slipping away with a quiet, “good night.”

Jon dreams.

He dreams that he’s still there and wakes with the taste of blood behind his teeth from his screaming. Nikola may not have taken his skin, but she may very well have taken the rest of him. He feels the phantom press of her plastic fingers as she draws imaginary lines across his skin, slick with lotion that overwhelms his senses, that floods the room with a smell he can’t quite describe but would know anywhere. Unscented. Not quite. Not when there was so much of it covering every part of him.

Like clockwork, they came.

He hears her words and trembles under her unwanted touch and heaves when she pours all her wretched knowledge of skinning a being alive into his eyes until he’s so full of dread he thinks he might die from it. Jon can see his own terror, trace where she had traced, an invisible scar no one would ever understand mapping the road of arteries and veins she threatened to nick.

Messy business, she’d said, being flayed.

But she'd had so much practice.

His office is abruptly too small, the walls closing in on him, sliding closer and closer until he’s certain he’ll be crushed. He stood, violently enough that his chair went skidding into a corner, crushing statements in its wake, and nearly collapsed when dizziness washed over him. Out. Out. He had to get out. The door stretched farther away with every step Jon took, reaching, scrabbling for the knob, nearly panicked enough he failed to open it on the first try. He couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t. All the air was gone, squeezed from his chest with a hacking cough that wouldn’t stop. Black threatened to swallow him up, steal him away.

The cement of the archive floor pressed painfully into every joint, exacerbating their ache, and a warbling noise very gradually transformed itself into his name repeated anxiously.

"Jon?" Martin coalesced above him, out of focus but unmistakable. Strong hands pressed along either side of his face, holding him still. One slid carefully to his brow. "Warm," muttered to himself as though confirming a hypothesis. "Jon?"

"Hafta…" like marbles in his mouth, Jon's words slid over each other, crashed together, more syllable and sound than anything intelligible.

“Shh, take a minute.” Martin’s voice reverberated in his ears, fading in and out like it was coming from underwater, while Jon tried to pull together all his disparate pieces. “Are you with me?”

“Wi...M’with…” He couldn’t bring himself to speak above the whisper catching on a desert-dry tongue flooded with salt. He could barely bring himself to breathe for fear of cracking completely in half and exposing his sawdust insides.

“Okay. Just relax.” Martin stroked his cheek, let him stay there, pillowed in his lap, and cocooned in safety.

He woke later, muzzy and distant, blinking up at a familiar ceiling and hemmed in by file cabinets. The sound of a page turning drew his attention and he let his head loll to the side. Martin looked up from the little book of poetry he was flipping through, smiling with what might have been relief.

“Hey there.”

“‘Ullo.” Jon croaked, letting his eyes drift closed again.

Jon was at a loss, caught between all the wrong choices, and while he wouldn’t admit to outright hiding from Tim, he certainly wasn’t going out of his way to find him. Instead, he tried to keep away from everyone and their judgment, too fragile to sustain the enormous weight of it on his brittle heart. Ever since coming to with Martin and his poetry beside him, Jon had felt wrong, somehow. Like he was lingering a half-step behind his own body and watching himself perform a poor imitation of one Jonathan Sims.

Inhuman.

Disconnected.

Nothing felt genuine or substantial, as though, if he attempted it, he’d be able to pass through walls, straying aimlessly through dark hallways and winding up places with no memory of how he’d come to be there. Mugs, files, pens, tape recorders all seemed the same. Only objects, unfamiliar in his hands until he’d come back from wherever he’d gone away to and startled, badly enough once that he dropped the tea, long cold, convinced it was spiders. He didn’t remember slicing open his burned hand on broken ceramic until Martin tugged him into a chair to bandage it. There wasn’t much feeling in it anymore and while his skin was so sensitive the brush of his oversized clothes was like claws raking across his body, the pressure exerted by Martin’s skillful fingers as he dabbed away old clotted blood and wrapped it neat and tidy with a bright white bandage, was grounding.

“Jon?”

“Mm?” He got the sense that Martin had been trying to get his attention for several minutes. He had to look away from the worry in his face, lest he break down entirely.

“I was saying, you don’t look well.”

“It’s fine, Martin.” Jon pressed the heel of his good hand against a closed eye. The throbbing behind it made it hard to think. “Tired, is all. Please.” He had to take a moment to get himself under control, the ache of being witnessed cloying in his throat. “Don’t.”

“How can you justify whatever you do in here all day while we’re being hunted?”

“Tim.” Jon couldn’t keep the pleading note out of his voice. He didn’t want to do this. He didn’t want to argue.

“What, Jon? What?”

“I’m trying to help!”

"You're bloody well taking your time!”

“I, I don’t know what you want from me!” He didn’t mean it, didn’t mean to yell. He didn’t want to fight, least of all with Tim, but everything was so mixed up, pieces missing, and his coworker spinning riddles like yarn. “Just tell me! Tell me and I’ll do it.” Tell me how to fix it. Tim’s unkind laughter cut through him like an icy winter wind.

“But you're not trying, are you?" Tim got close, so close that Jon’s ears shook with his roar. “You just let things happen to you!” Red washed over everything, blotted out Jon’s vision.

“Oh yes, Tim!” Hurling his name like an expletive, Jon stared up at him, narrow chest heaving, uneven and fast. “I just let the Circus have me. I just let them t’t. T, touch me!” Breath catching in his chest, Jon felt the tears begin to fall, hot and embarrassing. “You know nothing about how hard I'm trying!” The whole of him was shaking now, shuddering as he sucked down noisy gulps of air. “Always sulking! Maybe if you’d been paying better attention you’d have noticed Sasha was gone!”

“Don’t.” Tim’s voice was low and dangerous, the rattling warning of a snake fixing to strike. But Jon couldn’t stop, filled to bursting with recklessness, intoxicated by danger and dizziness.

“You claim to know me so well, Tim, but clearly, you never knew her!” Lunging with a hoarse cry, Tim snatched him up by his collar to yank him close enough he was on his toes.

"Should've been you." And it was Daisy, of all people, that shoved herself between them and stopped it going any further.

“He’s not worth it, Tim.” She jeered as she pulled him bodily away, his fingers separating from Jon’s collar with a reluctance Jon could feel in his bones.

He wasn’t. He wanted to be.

He shouldn’t have said that. Not to Tim.

He had to start doing the right things. Acting the right way. Then Tim would stop looking at him like that. Like he’d been replaced.

Like Sasha.

With legs made of jelly, Jon limped along the hallway in the opposite direction and took refuge in the restroom, begging his innards to calm while he splashed his face with cool water from the tap. He stared grimly into the mirror, setting his shoulders, and examined the gaunt lines of an unfamiliar mask, watched the liquid trace paths he didn’t recognize. The dissonance was overwhelming. This was someone else. This was a stranger. This was unequivocally, irrevocably him. Without looking away, Jon reached for a handful of paper towel and scrubbed his face clean. When the reflection gawking back at him seemed no less alien, he scoured his skin until it was raw and red, until his eyes watered with unshed tears.

Maybe he’d been replaced after all. Maybe Nikola took his skin and left him with this. Or maybe he was still there and this was just his hell.

So, he forced himself to look. To look, and look, and look until moisture stung his cheeks, dripping from a trembling jaw. Until he lost the battle with his stomach and was sick with the sight of himself, his not self, turning just in time to dry heave into a toilet bowl, violent spasms arching his back, drawing straining muscles tight enough Jon could feel his shoulder blades trying to escape his skin as he clutched the porcelain for dear life and was finally, finally allowed to close his lips around a silent sob.

He collapsed, then, against the tile, his chest heaving, hitching, fists curled, convulsing.

No noise. Mustn’t make noise. Noise means violence. Threats. Fear. Touching.

No. No noise. His voice was worth less than nothing anyway.