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The invocation tears out of his throat and he fights the urge to give into inevitability. He knows how this goes, even if he doesn’t know, even if panic is flooding his mind and drowning everything else out. He has to stop himself speaking and quickly and there isn’t enough time and--he shoves his fingers down his throat to try and cut the words off but he instinctively bites his fingers hard and pulls them back out, hissing in pain, Elias’s dread ritual still pouring out of him.
There’s not enough time to kill himself before he finishes, as much as he feels like he should, has to, for the good of the world, for--for Martin. He forces himself to his feet, every muscle and tendon and synapse working hard against him, and it hurts to fight his body this hard, shrieking, boundless pain echoing through every nerve. He manages to throw himself hard into the edge of the table, hard enough to wind himself and stop speaking for a moment, struggling for air, and the hold the ritual had on him lifts, long enough for him to stagger back, bloody stinging hand pressed to his ribs.
He can’t stay balanced, it’s like his inner ears are wrong, or like he has the bends, depressurizing after being forced on a cosmic ride, and he keeps taking steps backwards to try and steady himself.
His back hits a wall. It was a wall, he’s almost sure of it, but it somehow opens, and he falls through, and can’t stop falling, and the dizziness follows him, leaving him disoriented and sick, eyes scanning for something to hold onto, but it’s all just blinding color, and directions and time and space lose meaning, there is nothing but overwhelming, psychedelic, existentially painful something and he can’t stand it anymore. If he had a name, a meaning, a place in the world, it vanishes, drowns in the noise, the pulsing living prismatic music of it all.
He ceases to exist, and then he blinks and he exists again, breathing shallowly, head buzzing, spinning, brain melting in his skull.
He comes back to himself. Jonathan Sims. The Archivist. Jon. He knows who he is, and after a brief moment, where he is, though it doesn’t make much sense.
His desk, in the Archives, the smell of stale air and old paper. A tape recorder clicks on in front of him and starts whirring, and he sputters softly at it. His hands are both intact and undamaged, and he has to squint at them a moment to reconcile that.
This isn’t right. Nothing about this is right. But it’s not the end of the world, it’s not--it’s not the Watcher’s Crown, unless--but why would the Eye take him back here, if--
He can’t follow his thoughts, his mind is still overwhelmed with dizzy, singing static, and he stares blankly into his desk, trying to steady himself.
There’s a knock at the door of his office, and the sound startles a ragged gasp out of him. He grips the edge of his desk. “C--come in,” he says, a cold terror ripping his heart apart.
“Uh, um--hi!” Martin says, leaning into the office, and Jon shudders with relief, gasping.
“Martin, thank God, I--I’m so glad you’re alright,” he says, trying to stand up, to go hold Martin, but the second he rises he’s back in his chair again, too off-balance to stay standing. He can’t keep Martin’s face in focus, it keeps spinning away, but he seems concerned.
“Uh...that’s…” Martin starts. “Why--why wouldn’t I be? Is--what’s going...are you okay? D’you need to go to the doctor? Or home? Or--you don’t seem very well, I…”
“No, I’m--I’m fine, I just need a moment,” Jon says, swallowing hard. “But you’re alright? Nothing went--went wrong ?”
“Went...wrong?” Martin asks, laughing nervously. “What d’you mean? I was just--I mean, I was just doing a follow-up interview on--”
A horrible dread creeps over Jon, and he shuts his eyes against the dizziness, pressing a hand over them. “Martin, what--what year is it?’
“Uh--are you sure you’re okay?” Martin asks.
“Just tell me ,” Jon snaps, without meaning to, and Martin makes one of his strangled noises and sputters even harder.
“Uh, um, it’s--it’s 2016?” Martin says, and Jon can’t stop the winded laugh that escapes him at that.
So he’s been placed in some kind of sick hell, or something. This can’t be real. But if it’s some kind of trick, he’s not going to escape it by kicking against it. The only way out is through, or whatever the fucking expression is. “Thank you, Martin,” Jon says, unable to keep the existential exhaustion out of his voice. “What were you coming in for?”
“Was just...uh, was just going to ask if you wanted coffee?” Martin asks, voice small, and Jon drops his hand and opens his eyes to see Martin hugging himself with one arm, shoulders hunched, visibly terrified.
Jon hates himself deeply for ever having that effect on Martin. It takes him a moment to process what Martin actually said. “Wait, sorry, coffee?” Jon asks.
“Um. Yes?”
“You don’t--you don’t drink coffee,” Jon says, squinting in confusion. “It keeps you up.”
“That’s...what?” Martin asks, looking so thoroughly uncomfortable that Jon deeply wants to put him out of his misery by ending this interaction.
“N--nothing,” Jon says, shaking his head. “No, thank you. I appreciate the offer.”
“O..okay,” Martin says. “You’re sure you’re alright? You seem…”
“What, insane? Bad ?” Jon asks, tiredly, pinching the bridge of his nose. “I’m fine, Martin, thank you for the concern. Didn’t sleep well.”
“Okay,” Martin repeats. “Well. If you’re...if you’re sure.”
“I am.”
Martin gives Jon a weak, half-hearted thumbs up, and all but books it back into the Archive, away from Jon, and Jon lets out a long breath, gripping his desk again, head pounding and spinning. 2016. Early enough to fix--to fix everything , but--but this can’t be real, obviously, this is some sick fucking game.
Elias--Jonah--whoever...he must know what’s going on, whatever it is. And besides, if Jon--if Jon kills him--maybe it’s early enough that all their ties to the Eye are too weak for it to destroy them as well. It might be a risk he’s willing to take, to possibly free them all, to save the world , though that’s laughable considering he’s the one that destroys it.
He needs a weapon. Figures knowing an avatar of the Eye to death won’t work the way it did on Peter, but anyone can get knifed--a lesson from Melanie, certainly. The question is where to get one on short notice, but--but there’s time. He doesn’t need to rush in. If he’s learned anything from this neverending nightmare, it should certainly be that.
He should think before he acts, and he should speak to the others, and...and in case he does die in the process of taking Elias out, he should probably tell Martin he loves him.
He pushes himself to his feet and supports himself on the table for a minute, letting his head clear as much as it’s going to before attempting to leave his office, which leads to him staggering hard into the doorframe. He clings to it and breathes heavily, mouth flooding with saliva, but he swallows it back and tries to compose himself.
He slowly, steadily, forces himself into the Archive, and a lively, if hushed conversation between voices he never dreamed he’d hear in person again immediately stops. Tim gives him a confused, but ultimately very Tim, smile.
“You good, boss?” he asks. “You look rough.”
“I’m not feeling too well, actually,” Jon says, but he can’t tear his eyes off Sasha, who’s looking at him like he is absolutely, completely mad. But it’s her , actually her, actually alive, and he has to fight hard to keep a disbelieving laugh down. He feels himself smiling and tries to stop it, but he can’t. Even if this isn’t real, it’s still--it feels real, and it’s fucking good to see her again, to be temporarily relieved of the guilt he carries on his shoulders like Atlas holding the world.
“Are you high?” Sasha asks, squinting at him, and he can’t suppress the laugh anymore, it tears out of him wild and maniacal.
“Honestly, I might as well be,” Jon says, trying to compose himself even a little.
“What does that... mean ,” she says, eyebrow inching up. “Do you--should we take you to A&E?”
“Field trip!” Tim says, fistpumping, though there’s some hint of concern in his eyes.
“No, no, I’m--” Jon laughs breathlessly. “I’m fine.”
“You owe me a quid,” Martin says, elbowing Tim and hugging himself, looking deeply distressed.
“Yeah, fair enough,” Tim says. “This definitely counts as weirder than normal.”
“Jon...what’s wrong,” Sasha says, her eyes locked with his, unwavering, and Jon swallows hard.
“It’s just...it’s good to see you,” Jon says. “You too, Tim.”
“What, not Martin?” Tim asks, beaming.
“It’s never good to see me, don’t you know,” Martin mutters, looking away from Jon.
“It’s always good to see you, actually, Martin,” Jon says, and Martin immediately flushes bright red, eyes widening. “I’m lucky to have you all.”
“Okay, yeah, I’m calling it, he’s tripping on something ,” Tim says, standing up decisively and wrapping an arm around Jon’s shoulders. “Alright, mate, we’re gonna get you somewhere that isn’t a spooky archive and ride this out, yeah?”
“No, Tim, I’m--”
“And I still would like to be paid for the day because I am, technically, assisting you.” Tim pats Jon’s shoulder with the arm wrapped around him. “Good?”
“I’m not--”
“Check his pupils,” Sasha says. Tim obliges, pushing Jon’s face in his direction and tilting his chin up, squinting down into his eyes. It’s frighteningly, aggressively intimate, but, well, that’s Tim.
Jon doesn’t understand the expression that creeps across Tim’s face, some combination of horror and fascination and confusion.
“Uh…” Tim says. “Well, that’s…”
“What?” Jon asks, and Tim blinks rapidly, dropping his hand and shaking his head.
“Nothing,” he says. “Not sure what...uh...his eyes are normal, Sash.”
“Well, something’s wrong with him,” she says, throwing her hands up. “Not that we didn’t already know that, but, you know.”
“I’m fine ,” Jon says, ducking out from under Tim’s arm. “Really. Just exhausted and feeling a little ill.”
“Whatever you say, boss,” Tim says, smiling again.
“I’ll see you all tomorrow,” Jon says, looking at each of them for too long, holding onto their faces, Sasha’s especially, trying to burn into his mind how it feels to be there with them again. His eyes linger on Martin, who looks so young . The next four years age him significantly, and it tears at Jon’s heart.
Martin just looks back with his eyes full of confusion and worry and what Jon now understands as infatuation. Jane Prentiss hasn’t trapped him in his flat yet, his mum’s still alive, Jon hasn’t dragged him through hell--Jon can spare him so much pain .
His resolve strengthens, as if it weren’t ironclad before. If this all is real, he’s going to fix it for the three of them. They deserve the lives he tore from them with all his stupid fucking mistakes and reactionary decisions and paranoid delusions and he’s going to make sure they get them.
He has to.
The Eye is on him as he slowly makes his way out of the Institute, pointedly ignoring all of the looks he’s getting from the other departments’ staff. He’s focusing so much effort on staying standing against the dizziness that he can’t stop himself knowing what they’re thinking, and the ambient noise starts to overwhelm him to the point where he barely stifles a scream.
He shoves out onto the street and it just gets worse , all the knowledge of all the people around him flooding his mind so violently he can’t hold himself up anymore and crashes to his knees, arms braced on the pavement. He knows the people who pass by’s maiden names and birthdays and deepest desires and first kisses and he can’t shut it off, can’t slam the door in his mind shut and he struggles for air, for some way to keep moving, but this is an attack, a calculated move, Elias baiting him into action.
Fuck Elias. Jon does this on his terms.
He somehow, somehow , fights back to his feet, blood pouring from his right nostril, and staggers into the wall of the Institute, ignoring the looks people are giving him and shrugging off the few strangers kind enough to stop and ask if he needs help.
One puts a hand on his shoulder and says you need to go to a hospital, mate and Jon spits back helping me won’t fix the way you let her die, nothing will , and they recoil hard, winded, and Jon manages to make his escape.
Some of the pressure eases. The Eye blinks shut. A strong enough show of will to keep it off him, if only for a bit.
That’s fine. He won’t need long.