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Jon doesn’t sleep much anymore.
The paranoia keeps him awake, tossing and turning in his bed at night. Even after double and triple checking all of his locks, he can’t shake the feeling that he’s being watched. Someone is just waiting to slip inside a breach in his defenses, shoot him in the chest like they did to Gertrude.
He buys blackout curtains. It doesn’t help. He adds deadbolts to all his doors. It doesn’t help. He puts a chair under his front door knob. It doesn’t help.
He doesn’t know why she was murdered. That makes it worse. If he knew, he’d know how to protect himself. He’d at least have some idea of what to do. His ignorance causes him at least as much stress as his paranoia.
What little sleep he gets is interrupted by nightmares. In dreams the worms burrow into his flesh again, writhing through organ meat and blood vessels, wriggle into his heart and lungs. The feeling doesn’t quite go away when he wakes up. He lays there, stock still, and waits for the sensation to fade, for the worm song to fade from his ears. The worst part isn’t the pain or the wiggling, it’s the warmth . It had felt like an embrace, at first. Soothing, almost comforting. But as they’d burrowed deeper the sensation had grown more intense, spreading like an infection, burning him up from the inside like a fever. His body was sick and bloated, oozing pus and rotting away. More than once, he finds himself taking cold showers in the middle of the night.
The healing process is mind-numbingly slow, and sometimes he thinks he can feel it if he stays still enough. Bit by bit, his flesh knitting itself back together. The scars are raw, dark-tinted and tender. They’re a constant reminder of what happens when he’s unprepared. When he isn’t vigilant enough. A constant reminder that he’s in way over his head.
But the only way out is forward. So when Jon reaches his breaking point – when he just can’t stand all the paranoia and pain – he gives up on rest and goes back to work early.
***
“Okay. What do you want?”
Jude Perry leers at him from across the table. Her grin is just a touch too wide, like her lips are being stretched past their natural limit. Jon watches her eyes light up (pardon the pun) as she considers.
“Oh, nothing much,” she says. “Just shake my hand.”
“What?”
“You hurt my feelings earlier. I want you to shake my hand.”
He can feel the heat radiating off of her from here. The air around her wavers slightly, heat waves distorting his view of the street behind.
“Come on,” she says. “It won’t hurt.”
It’s a lie, an obvious one. But he needs what she’s willing to give him for it. He needs Michael’s address. He needs to figure out what the hell is going on with these things, gods and worshippers, horrors beyond comprehension. He needs to Know. If he doesn’t, if he’s caught unaware again, he’ll probably die. And she’s his only lead.
What’s a little pain compared to all that?
“Fine.” He doesn’t hesitate when he places his hand into hers.
She grins at him, her lips now definitely stretching in a way human lips shouldn’t be able to. She looks down at him like he is food, like he is something to consume, like he is something to burn the life out of.
“I lied,” she says, and Jon starts screaming.
Her hand melts around his, enveloping it completely. He can feel his flesh deforming, the keratin proteins in his skin denaturing, fat melting. The fever of infection from the worms is nothing compared to the heat of the Desolation. He thinks it must be hot enough to destroy the nerve cells, but the pain continues anyways. He can almost feel the life itself retreating from his hand, burning up like charcoal in a fire. He screams long and loud, and Jude does not let go until she has drunk her fill of it.
Georgie helps him patch up the hand later. Her face is tight, disapproval and worry fighting for control over her features. He had called it an occupational hazard, trying for a grin, but she no longer smiles at the self-deprecating humor like she used to. She knows that he sought this out, probably thinks that he’s just recklessly putting himself in harm’s way. There is no comfort in the way she handles him. Just sterile, clean care.
***
Jon should have lost consciousness by now. He remembers a saying he must have read in a book a long time ago: three weeks without food, three days without water, three minutes without oxygen. It’s been well over three minutes, but whatever force Michael is using to hold him in a perpetual freefall seems to be keeping him alive as well. His chest spasms, trying to force him to inhale, but the phantom weight of air pressure keeps him from taking another breath. Jon doesn’t want to die, but the promise of unconsciousness, the promise that this will end – it has to be better than this perpetual state of pain. He is being kept awake to feel the fear, feel the breathlessness and desperation, to feel the lightheadedness and watch the spots appear at the edge of his vision. The back of his throat tastes like blood.
When Michael lets him go there is no sense of relief, no joy as oxygen floods into his bloodstream again. It’s just more pain as he gasps and spasms, struggling to bring enough air into his lungs before it's expelled by his heaving chest. His body refuses to abandon its struggle for breath, but at some point a part of his brain just shuts down. This is his life now. He exists to throw himself at the mercy of these things – these gods, as Jude described – and allow them to feast upon him and his terror. And when they are done, spitting him out, drained and mangled, every bit of him screaming in terror, he will clean up his wounds and be grateful they didn’t decide to kill him. The resignation hits him slow and heavy as he struggles to raise his head. This is his life now.
When Daisy grabs him by the throat a few hours later and begins to drag her knife across it, he almost feels relief. Something warm and wet trickles down his neck. At least it’ll be over now, he thinks. At least it doesn’t have to hurt anymore.
***
“I…I think you need the dressing changed.”
Martin tucks one foot behind the other nervously. When Jon doesn't say anything, he rambles on.
"I saw it when we were in there." He gestures towards Elias's office. "It doesn't look good."
Jon is still for a second, then he sighs. For the first time since stepping foot into Michael’s apartment, a little bit of tension begins to bleed from his body.
"Yes, well…" Jon's hand hovers over the makeshift bandage covering his neck. "There wasn't much time in between that and this."
"Oh." Martin shifts uncomfortably. "Well, I know you probably have somewhere to go, but you should come down to the archives. We have a pretty extensive first aid kit."
Jon blinks. "We do?"
"Yeah, we put it together after the Prentiss attack. Figured it might come in handy, considering…"
"We did?"
"Yeah. Me and Tim and Sa-" Martin cuts himself off. "We all chipped in money and I picked up the supplies."
"You never asked me to chip in."
"Yeah, well," he bites back a grimace. You weren't very approachable at the time."
"Oh." Jon looks up at Martin and tries to push back the guilt that pushes at his throat.
"Yeah. Anyway. You should let me take a look at it." Martin seems to be surprising himself with his boldness. "I might be able to help."
For a moment, Jon digs around in his brain for an excuse of some kind. But none are forthcoming (none that Martin would buy, anyway) so with a deep breath that he hopes does not sound too much like a sigh, he follows Martin down into the archives to receive a kindness that he does not deserve.
A few minutes later, Jon finds himself studying the ceiling tiles as he tries very hard not to move. You’d think he’d be used to it by now, considering what his life has morphed into. You’d think he’d at least have built up a bit of a tolerance to it. But it seems he isn’t so lucky. When Martin dabs at his neck with an alcohol-soaked cotton swab, it stings so badly he flinches backwards.
Martin stops, hand still raised partway to his neck.
“Sorry,” Jon mumbles. He averts his eyes from Martin’s and presents his neck again, trying to ignore the way his cheeks are heating up.
Martin tries again, and even though Jon can see him coming, even though he can anticipate the pain, his body rejects it violently, flinching even harder this time. He actually slides back a few inches on the chair, fingers gripping the edge tightly. His cheeks are burning in earnest now, and he avoids the concerned look Martin is giving him.
“Sorry,” he says, again. “Sorry, I’m not trying to-”
Martin gently places his hand over Jon’s, causing all capability for language to immediately evacuate his brain. He stares dumbly as Martin looks up at him, gently prying his hands from the side of the chair. His hands are soft, and warm, and they’re not here to hurt him, they’re not going to hurt him . “It’s alright,” Martin says, and he runs his thumb across Jon’s palm until his hand relaxes just a little bit.
***
The act of shaking or trembling, which is controlled by the limbic system of the brain, is a response to fear. It often sends a signal to the rest of the body that the danger has passed, that the fight-or-flight response is no longer needed. Jon isn’t sure how he knows this; he must have read it in a book somewhere. In any case, it is perfectly reasonable that after a month of captivity in a mannequin’s basement, the first thing he does when he gets a moment alone is collapse onto the floor and begin uncontrollably shaking.
He thought he might cry, when he first got free, but it seems he’s no longer capable of tears. But maybe that’s better – it’ll be easier to hide whenever this finally stops. He remembers the sensation of Nikola’s plasticky hands against his skin and has to cover his mouth to prevent a sound of terror from escaping.
There comes a knock on his door, and all of the blood in Jon’s veins turns to ice.
“Jon?” Martin’s voice is muffled through the wooden door. “I brought some tea. Thought you might want something relaxing, after…”
Jon squeezes his eyes shut and prays that whichever entity is listening will send a plague of worms or wind or fire, anything to drive Martin away from his door.
“Jon?” Martin asks again. After a few seconds Jon hears the doorknob turning, and realizes with horror that he forgot to lock it.
The door creaks as it opens, and this time the “Jon?” that escapes Martin’s mouth is genuinely concerned. Jon’s breath hitches involuntarily at the sound and cold panic floods through him instantly. There’s no way he didn’t hear that, now his footsteps are coming over towards the desk, Martin’s going to see -
A pair of shoes stand before him. Jon doesn’t dare look up. Hoping against hope that their owner will get the hint. Go away, go away, go away.
The shoes do not go away.
The shoes stand before him, silent and steady, for ten very long seconds before they move again, out of the field of his vision. There comes the sound of something ceramic being set down on a desk, and then the sound of shifting fabric. Jon watches from the corner of his eye as Martin settles in next to him. He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t make any sound. He just sits. And after a long moment of hesitation, he raises his hand and slowly puts it atop Jon’s.
It’s warm and soft, heavy and solid. And it isn’t plastic, it isn’t wax, it isn’t worms or claws or heat – it’s skin . Just skin.
Jon clutches Martin’s hand close to his chest until he stops shaking.
***
Jonathan Sims is almost dead.
Almost, but not quite. He can still hear, even if the sounds are muffled and distorted, like he’s underwater. He can still taste, blood and guilt pressing against his tongue. He can still feel, even if the sensations are far away, almost as if they are happening to someone else.
He can still see. He can still see everything.
Sometimes someone sits by his bedside, talking softly, words falling on mostly-deaf ears. He can See their worry, their stress, their turbulent, delicious fear. He wants to reach out and feed upon it – he wants to wake up and take away their worry – but he can't quite do either. Something is weighing him down, taking that final step between dreams and wakefulness completely out of his reach.
A few times, it feels like someone is holding his hand. The despair then is quiet and soft, like the last exhale of a dying animal. The fingers are warm and heavy. It makes some twisted part of him want to die slowly, crumple away into nothingness.
It isn’t until Oliver visits his bedside that he realizes quite why that is: in order to live again he must give up that thing weighing him down – give up something of himself. And after everything, it feels like it’s not only himself he’s betraying by shedding the dead skin.
By the time he actually does wake up, Martin is long gone.
Maybe it’s for the best. No one would want to touch the Archivist anyway.
***
There is a hollowness in Jon’s chest.
Jared Hopworth was not gentle when tearing away his ribs. Jon could feel his hand go into him, gouging its way through flesh and organ and bone until it found what it wanted. He could feel soft, fleshy fingers grasp around the rib. It hadn’t quite hurt; instead it had just felt terribly, viscerally wrong . There was something inside of him and it shouldn’t be there.
And then Jared had pulled, yanking his rib until it splintered and broke away. That did hurt, hurt even as Jared’s touch smoothed down the broken ends, hurt as he pulled it out of Jon’s chest. The flesh had closed around itself with a sickening squelch as Jared held out the rib. Jon had taken it in his hands, turning it over as he caught his breath.
There was- there had been an eye on it.
Jared had reached back to take another rib, and Jon hadn’t tried to stop him.
He stares at it now, for the dozenth time this morning. There isn’t much else to do at the moment. He can’t go into the coffin until Basira gets back; that’s what Melanie and he had agreed on. He’s been reading statements, as many as he could handle. Anything he could find about coffins, about stone and mud and dirt. To prepare himself. That was the idea. It isn’t actually very helpful at all. If anything, it just makes him more scared for that inevitable moment when he undoes the lock and climbs down into the Buried. But he can’t stop. And he can’t stop looking at his rib.
The eye does not blink. It can’t; there isn’t an eyelid. It just sits, half embedded inside the bone, glassy and dead. At least it doesn’t seem to be alive. At least it isn’t looking at anything.
Not anymore , he thinks. The Archivist imagines what the rest of his insides must look like. Eyes embedded in every bone, on the surface of every organ. Dozens of irises darting around. Alight and alive and searching.
There is a hollowness in the Archivist’s chest. The ringing, empty hurt of something missing.
He’d run into Martin a few days ago. He hadn’t meant to, but he hadn’t exactly not meant to either. He wasn’t consciously Looking for him. Well, he didn’t think he was. It’s hard to tell, sometimes.
Martin had looked like shit. His usual warm cheeriness was gone, the red in his face replaced with something so pale it was almost grey. He’d looked gaunt, hollow. Jon had reached out despite himself, and Martin had flinched away the instant Jon’s fingers touched his arm. His skin was freezing cold.
There is a hollowness in the Archivist’s chest, and it’s just because his ribs were torn out of him. That’s all.
Jon feels the thrum of the Eye inside him, humming with electric energy. It’s grown less subtle lately, perhaps because it sensed Jon won’t turn away from its presence anymore. It hums quietly in the back of his mind, a wordless offer. It could fill the void in his chest. Jon imagines the empty space filling with a cluster of eyes, growing and budding off of each other like cells dividing. Stretching across the twin spaces inside him until he isn’t empty anymore.
It doesn’t fit in right. But it’s all he has.
This is how it gets you, Jon thinks.
He returns to his office and prepares to step into the coffin.
***
Forever deep below creation, Jon can almost reach Daisy’s hand.
They’re both stuck: have been stuck, will be stuck. Till the end of time. He Knows that now. He can See it. The weight of the knowledge is overwhelming – crushing, really. It’s taking everything he has in him to focus on their conversation instead of the suffocating despair. It could be worse. It could be a lot worse.
Daisy is here. And he can almost reach her.
“I was gonna kill you. You know that, right?”
Jon lets the words settle inside him for a moment before responding. “I mean, I definitely got that impression when you dragged me into the woods for an execution.”
“No. After the mission. I was planning to kill you.”
Oh. “I…I did not know that.”
He wishes the revelation would surprise him. Or at least, provoke any emotion at all. But it’s just one more thing to fade into the background, one more fear to add to the suffocating pile of them in the back of his mind. It’s all the same. She was going to kill him. She was going to take him back to that spot in the woods and shoot him in the head. She was going to bury him in a shallow grave. Well, he did that last part for her. And there’s no way out. The fear is all there is. The fear is all there will ever be.
***
Jon wakes up to the sound of Martin cooking breakfast.
When he stumbles into the kitchen, still trying to blink the sleep from his eyes, Martin is there with a warm smile and a mug of coffee for him. Jon doesn’t understand how he could possibly be so cheery this early in the morning.
“Sleep well?” Martin asks.
Jon answers with a noncommittal grunt. He doesn’t want to think about sleep. He doesn’t want to think about his dreams. Instead he concentrates on the sunlight streaming in through the kitchen window, draping Martin in soft light. He’s changed, since the Lonely. His skin is a shade or two paler than it was before, the freckles dotting his cheeks and arms faded. His eyes are grey, now. They still look slightly cloudy in some light. And his hair is pure white, the undertones almost blue.
“Jon?”
“Hmm?”
“You’re staring.”
Jon tears his eyes away from Martin, face burning. “Sorry,” he mumbles.
Martin’s laugh is a truly magical sound. He hadn’t realized how beautiful it was before. It almost lets him forget his embarrassment.
“It’s alright,” Martin says.
Jon finally looks up a few seconds later, and Martin gives him a smile so warm and soft he feels like his chest is being torn open right there. They eat breakfast while standing in the kitchen, leaning against the countertops. There is an unspoken desire to stay next to one another, to constantly be in the other’s orbit. Even sitting at the table would put far, far too much distance between them. They talk about nothing. They talk about the archives. They talk about the people they used to be. There are months of unsaid words hanging between them, kept there by the inertia of their isolation. But there is a hole in the dam, and slowly, but surely, the water level is draining. How precious this is, Jon thinks. How fragile this is.
Oh, how much he’s missed him.
When the sun has risen past the window and the last bits of coffee have long been drained from their mugs, they wash the dishes together. It’s near the end when it happens. Martin is handing Jon one of their mugs to set on the drying rack, and for just one brief moment during the transfer their fingers brush up against one another. Jon flinches away, almost dropping the mug.
To his credit, Martin is very good at masking the brief flash of hurt on his face.
“Sorry,” Jon mumbles, looking down at the mug in his hands.
“You have nothing to apologize for.” He says it gently, like Jon is a deer he’s afraid of startling.
“I do.” Jon sets the mug on the drying rack and runs a hand through his hair. “I do. It’s not- it’s just- um.” He leans back against the counter and takes a deep breath. “I think it’s just instinct? I…I’m not really used to…um.” He stops. So much for a mountain of unsaid words. He can barely get a few of them out without them clogging up his throat.
“To physical contact?” Martin asks.
“Yeah. Something like that.”
Jon runs his hand over his neck. He watches Martin’s eyes dart from his face to the scar on his neck, to his burned hand, to the worm marks dotting his arm, and back up again. He sees the realization dawn on his face, confused look melting into sorrow.
“Oh,” Martin says. “Oh Jon, that’s-”
“Don’t. Please?” Jon pulls his arms in tighter to himself. “I’m, um. I’m not very good at handling sympathy.”
This is it, he thinks. This is the nail in the coffin. The tipping point. Martin is finally going to realize that all this isn’t worth the effort, and he’s going to leave.
“Okay,” Martin says softly. “Is there anything that I can do? That you’d like me to do? To make you more comfortable?”
Jon stares up at him, stunned. Martin must see the look of utter confusion on his face, because he smiles sheepishly and holds up his own hand. It still looks translucent from the right angles. “We can meet each other where we’re at,” he says.
And Jon finds he can’t do anything but nod.
***
Jon has always been a lightweight. He has enough embarrassing memories from Oxford to know that he is better off staying away from alcohol. His low tolerance is good for one thing, though: getting thoroughly drunk very quickly. By the time Martin returns from whatever corner of the house he’d been exploring, Jon is thoroughly shitfaced.
“They have real food here!” Martin smiles as he enters their room. “Biscuits! I mean, they’re a bit stale, but-” He cuts himself off, finally seeing the crumpled pile of Jon on the floor and the nearly-empty bottle of Mikael’s liquor beside him. “What are you doing?”
“What does it look like?” Jon says sourly as Martin helps him to his feet. He sits down heavily on the edge of their bed. It’s covered in fresh sheets and slightly rumpled blankets, and it’s the softest goddamn thing he’s ever felt. He wants to lean back into the sheets and pile them over his face until he suffocates. Instead he leans down towards the bottle and grabs it, attempting to down the rest of the contents in one go.
Martin stops him before he finishes, gripping Jon’s hand tightly and pulling back. He is gentle but firm, and Jon doesn’t have the strength to fight him. He leans his head in his hands heavily as Martin sets the bottle down on their bedside table and gives him a completely baffled look.
“What’s gotten into you?” Martin asks, and there’s more than a hint of reproach in his voice.
“It hurts,” Jon mumbles.
“What? Speak up, love.”
“Don’t call me that.” Jon drags a hand through his hair and tilts his head to look at Martin. “I said it hurts.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Without the Eye.”
“What, like creepy superpower withdrawal or something?”
“Not that,” Jon says softly. “I’m talking about the-” He gestures tiredly towards the window in their room, towards everything outside of it. “You know. The weight of it all.”
“Ah.” Martin’s voice is tight. “So you’re referring to something more emotionally painful, then.”
“In so many words.”
“So you decided to get drunk.”
“Yep.” Jon draws out the word, making his lips pop at the end of it.
“I see.” The words come out short. He’s definitely irritated now.
Jon feels a sinking in his stomach. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing. Nothing’s wrong.”
“You’re angry at me,” Jon says. He watches Martin take that in, carefully school his expression into something more neutral.
“I’m not angry at you,” Martin says.
“You are.” Jon’s throat suddenly feels very tight. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you. I…you probably don’t want to have to put up with this right now.”
Martin closes his eyes and lets out a long sigh.
“It’s not that,” he says eventually.
“What is it, then? Is it something I said?”
“You didn’t do anything wrong,” he says carefully. “People react to things differently. That’s okay. It’s just…” he looks Jon up and down. “I can’t help but be a little irritated? You’re like this after what, two days? I don’t have the Eye. I don’t have whatever evil emotional shield you’ve got going on out there.” There isn’t any malice in his voice. No anger. He just sounds very, very tired. “How do you think I feel all the time?”
Jon finally gives in to gravity and lets himself fall back onto the blankets. “I’m sorry.” He doesn’t have the energy to pull them over his head. “I’m sorry.” The ceiling above him is white, ornate trim decorating the walls. A beautiful old chandelier hangs down to his left. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.” He blinks, and the details of the room have all been smudged away. Something warm and wet trickles down his cheek.
“Jon…” Martin’s voice is exasperated, and Jon blinks hard while trying not to sniff.
“I’m sorry I ruined the world. I’m sorry I-” this time he does sniff, and the act makes his throat tighten even more. “I’m sorry I was stupid enough to think I could save you. I’m sorry I was stupid enough to think I could bring you – that I could ever bring anyone – anything but pain and destruction.”
“Hey.” Martin’s voice is softer now, and it makes Jon want to crawl out of his skin. “Hey now, don’t-” he lays a hand over Jon’s arm, and Jon recoils as if he’s been burned, rolling onto his side at the foot of the bed. He clutches a handful of blanket, chest heaving as he sobs.
“I’m sorry-” Jon has to stop, force himself to catch enough breath to get the words out. “I’m so, so sorry I tricked you into thinking I was something worth loving.”
He doesn’t know how long it lasts, but eventually he is able to wrestle his breathing into some semblance of control. His chest still hitches as he tries to inhale, but the rushing in his ears has calmed down somewhat. He can feel Martin’s eyes on his back. Jon screws his eyes shut and waits for him to speak.
“Is that…” Martin’s voice strains, then breaks, throat clogged by tears of his own. “Is that really how you feel?”
A little bit of reality returns to him, and Jon sits up so quickly it makes him dizzy. “No, no, it isn’t,” he pleads. “I was just being dramatic. I’m sorry.” But the words just make Martin cry harder. Panic rises in Jon’s chest. He lays a hand on Martin’s arm, “No, please don’t, please… ” He thinks better of it and releases his hands from Martin and leans back on his knees, too scared to say or do anything else. He should have known better. He considers never letting himself speak again.
Martin takes a deep, shaky breath, wiping at his eyes. They’re rimmed in red as he looks at Jon. “Jon.”
Fear rises in his throat. “Yes?”
“I need you to be honest with me.”
“I…”
“You’re a terrible liar. And it will make me feel worse.” He’s a little shaky on the inhale, but his voice is calm and steady.
Jon looks down at his lap, defeated. “Okay.”
“Good. Okay.” Jon chances a glance up and sees that Martin’s eyes are closed. He takes three long breaths before opening them again and looking at Jon. “Is that really how you feel?”
A moment passes. Jon opens his mouth, then closes it. He can’t get the words out. His throat is too tight. He takes a shaky breath.
“I ended the world, Martin.”
It’s all he can bring himself to say.
Another long silence.
“You didn’t, though. You didn’t. Jonah did.”
Jon just looks at him.
Martin seems to realize that there will be no point in continuing that particular argument, because he frowns slightly and runs a hand through his hair. “Do you really think that I’m so easily duped?” he asks. “Do you really think that I’m capable of being tricked into loving you? Why do you think I can’t love you of my own free will?”
Jon frowns. “There must be something , though. No one could see all this – see everything I’ve done – and think that I even deserve to-” He cuts himself off, squeezing his eyes shut. He digs his fingernails into his palms as he waits for the urge to sob to subside. “-And think that I’m anything other than a monster.” White hot shame burns in the back of his throat, tinged with panic. He’s said too much. He’s really said too much now.
“What if you’re wrong, though?”
Jon turns to Martin. He’s looking back at Jon, expression unreadable.
“What if I can? What if I do?”
“I…”
“Can you accept that I love you? Can you accept that you are worth loving, to me?”
Jon stares at him blankly. He tries to say something, but no words come out. He doesn’t even know what he would say.
“I’m not asking you to understand how or why,” Martin says. “I’m asking you to believe it. I’m asking you to know it.”
Jon shuts his mouth. He stares down at his hands, tracing his eyes over the rough, scarred skin. He feels hollow, like the smallest touch could send him crumpling into nothingness.
“Okay,” he says finally. It’s barely above a whisper.
Martin’s smile is at once comforting and heartbreaking, warm and sad and relieved. “Okay,” he says. He reaches his hand forward. A request.
Jon takes it and lets himself be buried in Martin’s arms.
***
“So you really don’t remember anything?”
“No.” Jon looks down at his feet as they trudge on through a bone-infested beach.
“Huh.”
Jon can’t quite parse the expression on Martin's face. “Did something bad happen?” Worry flashes through him. “Did I do something?”
Martin is quiet for a moment. “Well,” he says eventually, “you got a bit drunk.”
Jon wrinkles his nose. “I did?”
Martin nods. It’s a few more seconds before he realizes that Jon is studying his face. “What is it?”
Jon frowns. “You’re a good liar. I genuinely can’t tell if you’re hiding something.”
“You could always strip my memories,” Martin says sarcastically.
“I couldn’t. It won’t let me.” Martin shoots him a sharp look, and he adds on quickly. “I didn’t- I didn’t try. I just Knew it wouldn’t work the instant you mentioned it. The Eye can’t see anything about that place. Past, present, or future.”
Martin’s face settles into something softer. He nods, and the two of them walk on in silence.
“It was that bad, huh?” Jon asks quietly. “I’m sorry. For whatever I did.”
Martin furrows his brow. “Do you really want to know?”
“Of course I do.” This soon after the Upton house, the parts of Jon that are human and the parts that are the Eye haven’t quite completely settled back together yet. He isn’t sure he really does want to know, if it was this bad. In this moment, it feels like something alien is twisting itself around Jon’s tongue.
Martin thinks for a moment. “If…if you were to somehow get into my head-”
“Which I won’t do.”
“-Which you won’t do. But. If you were to do it. You would See exactly how much you are loved. Despite everything. You are loved in your entirety.”
He says it so plainly. Like it’s not a difficult thing at all.
Jon feels something clog up the back of his throat. He tries to push it down; he’s never cried in front of Martin before, and he has to wait a long moment before he can trust himself to speak.
“That’s…” he trails off again, wrestling to get his voice under control. “That is a very nice thing to think about.”
Beside him, Martin slips his hand through Jon’s. “I’m glad.”
Hand in hand, they walk through the wasteland together.
***
As Martin presses their lips together in the panopticon, Jon wonders if it was always doomed to end this way. Perhaps there was a world where this didn’t happen. Perhaps there was a world where he didn’t take Jonah’s place. Perhaps there was a world where he and Martin came down from the tower together, walking side by side.
Or perhaps he was too broken from the start to be good for anything but this.
The knife is ice as it sinks into him. It is at once cold and bright, numbing and agonizing. It seems to split him in half, bursts of white-hot pain arcing throughout his body. He can feel himself being torn apart. He is held taught, pieces of himself being pulled past their limit, then finally, blissfully, tearing away. Something is leaving him. He can’t See where it’s going. And then he can’t See at all.
There is something left, after the worst of it is done. Even if it feels like something has torn half of his being away. Something is left of him. He hadn’t thought that’d been possible. He hadn’t thought there could be anything left without the Eye. But it’s there all the same.
He thinks it’s dying.
Is he dying? He doesn’t know. He doesn’t Know. Blood as black as ink is spilling across Martin’s hands. Martin’s hands. Martin . It’s getting hard to see. It’s getting hard to think.
Consciousness is beginning to fade. It’s almost like falling asleep. He doesn’t have the strength to fight it anymore. He imagines his brain going dark, little lights flickering off one by one. Neurons collapsing in on themselves, tiny bursts of electricity fizzling and dying in miniature showers of sparks. He feels the knife deep inside of him, cold and sharp. He feels something wet drip onto his cheeks from above. He feels Martin’s hands, cupping his face, holding him tight.
As the last bit of himself slips away into the unknown, Jon realizes that it doesn’t hurt anymore. There isn’t any pain left. None at all.