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bubonickitten · 4 years

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Summary: Jon goes back to before the world ended and tries to forge a different path.

Chapter 3 is up!

Chapter 1 (tumblr // AO3) | Chapter 2 (tumblr // AO3)

Full text + content warnings under the cut.

CW: brief claustrophobia; some grief and loss stuff; a few more instances of casual misgendering (not malicious; just some wrong pronouns here and there due to the speaking-in-statements thing, but thought I'd mention it just in case); a single LORGE spider. Also, Jon gets to do one (1) swear, as a treat. SPOILERS through MAG 169.

Chapter 3: Rift

Jon doesn’t remember the hill being this steep.

Or maybe he’s just winded from the long trek through the wasteland. He’d had to pass through a long stretch of territory fought over by the Buried and the Vast. The ground there was practically a minefield, pockmarked with sinkholes. They would start out as quicksand traps and suffocating tunnel entrances, only to be hollowed out into yawning chasms and cenotes, then ultimately collapsed all over again by a retaliation-minded Choke. It was an endless cycle of petty rivalry and animosity, and passing so near their battlegrounds left Jon breathless with a discordant mix of claustrophobia and agoraphobia.

Worse was when the Dark managed to sneak its way into the mix. Whether it was Too Close I Cannot Breathe or the Vast’s abyss, the Dark could always find a way to exploit subterranean spaces – and it could never resist reaching out to needle at an Avatar of the Eye, no matter how inadvisable it was to cross the Archive these days.

As Jon drew closer to Hill Top Road, he left the warzone behind for a mostly featureless landscape punctuated with the occasional foxholes of the Slaughter and pockets of the Forsaken’s fog. Eventually those too gave way to a seemingly endless dust bowl of soot and ash – a sprawling domain claimed by the Lightless Flame.

The house at Hill Top Road is the only thing still standing in the midst of kilometres of Desolation-scorched earth. The charred terrain stops abruptly at the foot of the hill, a stark line demarcating the boundary between the Blackened Earth and the territory that Annabelle Cane has staked out as her own. Jon had half-expected an invisible barrier to stop him there as well – the last time he was here, Annabelle had forbidden him from returning – but there had been no resistance when he stepped over the border.

As he hikes up the incline now, he finds himself worrying over what that might mean. Is Annabelle expecting him, inviting him in? Is she simply tolerating his presence, curious to see what he’s up to? Could he be powerful enough now that even she cannot stop him? Or is he once again wrapped up in the Web’s machinations, doing exactly what the Mother of Puppets wants?

He shakes his head. No. He and Martin talked about this. There’s no point in obsessing over the Web’s motivations, letting the memory of Annabelle’s statement paralyze him with indecision. Better to just… keep moving forward.

And it’s not like he has anything left to lose.

Jon continues up the hill, increasingly winded, his bad leg throbbing angrily, and he thinks to himself again: he really, really doesn’t remember it being this steep.

Before long, he’s standing at the threshold of the house at Hill Top Road. The dread permeating the place is just as palpable as he remembered.

He waits for the Distortion’s inevitable appearance, determined not to let her startle him this time. As if on cue, a door creaks open on the ceiling above him.

“Interesting.” Without preamble, Helen lands noiselessly on her feet beside Jon and peers around curiously. “I wondered whether Annabelle would let me in.”

So did Jon. Maybe he should be concerned about – no. He shuts down that train of thought before it can pull out of the station.

“You still haven’t explained what exactly you plan on doing here.”

Honestly, that’s mostly because Jon hasn’t figured it out yet, either. He only Knows that this is where he needs to be.

The Eye wants things to change – as much as it can be said to want anything. Setting the question of its sentience or lack thereof aside, at the Panopticon he had been able to Know things that the Beholding had previously withheld from him. He might be stronger than the other Avatars and monsters lurking about the world, but he’s not arrogant enough to believe he could overpower any of the Fears themselves. If the Ceaseless Watcher gives him access to knowledge, it’s because his Knowing will facilitate – or at least not inhibit – its plans, which means that he must have the Eye’s… blessing, to be here? He shakes his head; he’s getting caught up on semantics again.

Point is: he Asked a question and – as usual – he was given a scrap of an answer and left to puzzle the rest out for himself. All he Knows for certain is what he wants to happen, and that this is where he needs to be in order to make it happen.

“Jonathan.” Helen says his name with a playful lilt and leans further into his personal space. “Are you going to share with the class?”

Without a word, he sidesteps around her and walks further into the house. In her statement, Anya Villette had mentioned a door under the stairs leading to the basement, but the last time Jon was here, it was nowhere to be seen. He hopes it’s there this time.

“What are you looking for?”

Jon drags one hand down his face and sighs. Having Helen tag along is like taking a road trip through hell with an easily bored and… well, deeply annoying child. Huh.

“I won’t be ignored, Jon –”

Jon bristles, redirects his gaze, and stares daggers at her with a few more eyes than strictly necessary. “Some magically appearing door.”

“You aren’t being very kind to me right now, you know.” She tries to sound wounded, but really she just sounds pleased to have gotten a reaction from him.

Jon gives an irritated huff and continues forward through the entrance hall. He treads softly, all too aware of every subtle creak of a floorboard. He doesn’t know why he’s bothering muffling his footsteps. It doesn’t matter how quiet he is; Annabelle will know – probably already knows – that he’s here regardless. Still, there’s just something about the house that demands a certain amount of fearful reverence. Disturbing the silence just feels like a bad idea.

Helen doesn’t appear to have the same concerns. In fact, it almost seems like she’s going out of her way to announce their presence. Of course.

Jon catches a glimpse of the staircase as he rounds the corner and – yes, there’s a door under the stairs. A plain, painted white door with a brass handle, otherwise unremarkable and entirely unassuming.

And yet…

As he tries to approach it, he finds himself rooted to the spot, overcome with a sense of trepidation. He feels his breath coming faster, shallower; feels the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. Every one of the Archive’s eyes locks onto the doorknob and for a moment he swears he feels tiny, feather-light legs scurrying down his spine. He pulls his pack tight against him, using the physical weight of it to dampen the tactile hallucination.

“I hate it,” Helen says darkly. Jon jumps just slightly at the break in the silence, and a few of the Archive’s eyes suspend their rapt scrutiny of the door handle to glance in her direction. Her posture is tense where she stands, staring warily at the door as if it might lunge at them. Jon has never seen the Distortion look so… unsettled.

She’s right, though. The door is wrong. More than that, it’s the exact same flavor of wrongness that he felt the first time he saw A Guest for Mr. Spider, and again when he reached out to knock on the monster’s door.

Back then, he hadn’t known that the concept of wrongness could be broken down into so many distinct subtypes: the uncanny disquietude of the Stranger feels fundamentally different from the compulsion of the coffin, the sensation of worms tunneling through flesh, the Distortion’s nonsensical corridors, the Lonely’s suffocating fog.

The pull of the Web is in a class of its own, and the sight of the door in front of him drops him right back into the memory of the day he opened the book – the day he took the first step on the winding path that led him, inevitably, to this exact moment. It’s such a fitting parallel, he wouldn’t be surprised if it was orchestrated down to the finest detail. He knows the Web plays a long game, but precisely how much of what has happened was in perfect accordance with the Web’s plans? What even is the Web’s –

No. Stop fixating on the Spider, he reprimands himself for the umpteenth time this… day? Whatever; it’s not important. He forces his legs to move.

“You’re sticking your hand in a bear trap, I hope you know.”

“I knew opening the door was a stupid thing to do,” Jon says, nonchalant. “So I opened the door.”

Helen breathes a surprised laugh. “Was that a joke?”

“The idea that this is all some grand cosmic joke,” Jon rattles off drily, “thousands of us running around spread horror and sabotaging each other pointlessly while these impossible unknowing things just lurk out there, feeding off the misery we caused –”

“Terrible.” Helen groans and puts her head in her hands. “Here I was, ready to compliment you on finally finding a sense of humor, and you have to ruin the moment with – with existentialist brooding.”

Jon chuckles quietly to himself and takes another step forward.

“Wait.” Helen reaches one long-fingered hand in Jon’s direction, then falters and pulls back. For a moment, she seems to wrestle with whether or not to continue. “What’s behind the door?”

“A scar in reality –”

“Yes, I know about the rift. What do you expect to find in it? An answer? An escape? A means of suicide?”

“A metaphysical quirk of this new reality’s divorce from the traditional concept of time.”

Jon pauses, chewing on his bottom lip as he looks inward and browses through his catalog.

“It bends and twists and returns to what it was,” he settles on eventually.

“I told you not to use my words.” Helen gives him a warning look, but it’s fleeting, because a moment later his meaning sinks in and she huffs out a short laugh of disbelief. “Wait – wait, wait, wait. You think you can… what, turn back time?”

Jon grimaces and makes a noncommittal seesawing motion with one hand.

“…could emerge back into the world that she remembered.”

Helen starts laughing in earnest now. “You think you can time travel?”

Jon just shrugs, unashamed. He knows he should feel embarrassed – back when he first took the position as Head Archivist, he would have scoffed at anyone making such a suggestion – but at this point, is it any more or less unrealistic than anything else that’s happened?

“Alright,” Helen says, stifling another giggle, “I’ll grant you that there’s a rift in space and time. People have traveled through it before.”

Jon gives an enthusiastic nod. After her encounter with the crack in the house's foundation, Anya Villette had found herself temporally displaced. What would stop Jon from also –

“However,” Helen continues, “what makes you think you’ll just rewind your position on this timeline? It could just take you to a parallel world, leaving this one behind to suffer and decay. Would you abandon what remains of humanity like that?”

Seeing as Anya Villette appeared to have also been spatially displaced, Jon has already considered this possibility. Helen probably knows that, too – she’s well-acquainted with his tendency to overthink things. She’s just trying to tap into his chronic self-loathing, demoralize him, make him doubt his own perceptions. It’s a familiar pattern, one Jon used to submit to far too easily.

“…better than staying here with this strange woman.”

“Ouch.” Helen brings a hand to her chest in mock offense. “You’re being awfully cruel today.”

Jon flashes an entirely unapologetic smile.

“I was being serious, you know.” A knowing mischief creeps into Helen’s eyes. “You’ve always been selfish, but would you really run away from your mistakes, save yourself and damn the rest?”

Unfortunately for Helen, she’s arrived too late to this particular debate. Jon already spent the entire trip here berating himself and second-guessing his conclusions, and he’s just about gotten it out of his system for the time being. Self-recrimination as an inoculation against the Distortion’s manipulations – now there’s a concept, he thinks wryly.

“Do you honestly believe you deserve to escape an apocalypse that you brought about?”

God, she’s persistent.

“Now there’s only one thing I have left that I value,” he says simply. “That I love. And I cannot lose him.”

It’s the truth: the final deciding factor for him was, as it so often is, Martin.

“You would potentially forsake this entire world just to reverse your own loss?”

“There was nothing left to save.”

It never gets easier to admit it out loud, but that doesn’t change the truth of it. This world is already forsaken. Humanity is dying out, slowly but surely, and Jon harbors a guilty feeling of relief that their torment will not be eternal after all. As far as he can See, there’s no way for him to save the ones who remain. There never was.

His power was never meant to help anyone. For a long time, the only action within his grasp was to hurt – and so, he went after those who deserved to be hurt, because the only other option was doing nothing at all. But seeking revenge never saved anyone, never even made himself feel any better. If anything, it only made him feel emptier, more and more alienated from whatever human part of him still lingered – and that was a very dangerous place to be.

And when he and Martin decided together that he needed to slow down, to maintain some distance between himself and the Eye? Well… nothing substantial changed in the slightest. He didn’t get any worse, but he also didn’t get better. The world continued to suffer just as much as if he were to sit down and take no action at all. Nothing he did or did not do made any impact whatsoever.

He Knows intimately that he cannot banish the Entities from this world as long as one person remains to feel fear. Once that last person dies, there will be no one left to save. Hell, depending on how human he still is by that time, he may very well be that last person, and the Dread Powers will just have to ration him. And why shouldn’t they? They’ve all had a taste of him more than once. He’s an unfinished meal. They could just resume hacking away at him, demanding their respective pounds of flesh one after the other until nothing remains – until finally, mercifully, the Fears themselves would wither and die as well. He just doesn’t want to consider how long that could take – no. Best not to dwell on it.

The point is, there is no future for this world. There is nothing left for him to do here. His only hope is to prevent all of this from coming to pass in the first place, and this… this is the only lead he has. And besides, Martin –

“You do realize that you have a vanishingly small chance of seeing him again, don’t you?”

“I decided to take a risk and try it anyway.”

Helen looks put out at his easy dismissal, but she really ought to know better by now, Jon thinks. He might be chronically plagued by self-hate and a visceral fear of being controlled, but Martin is his anchor in more ways than one. Their relationship is proof of Jon’s own capacity for free will, and his decision to go after Martin in the Lonely remains one of the only things he’s done where he’s never once wondered whether he made the right choice. He doesn’t think he’s ever been more confident about anything than he is about their love for each other, even if he doesn’t always feel like he deserves it. Helen really couldn’t pick a worse seed with which to sow self-doubt.

When she sees that Jon isn’t taking the bait, she changes tack.

“And assuming this scheme somehow works as you hope it does, and doesn’t just get you shunted to some hellish pocket dimension – which it almost certainly will – you do realize that your little scene with Jonah Magnus will mean nothing, don’t you? This future will be erased, he will not suffer for eternity – he won’t even remember that it was ever a possibility.”

“For all her anger, there was no thirst for revenge in the Archivist, only an eagerness to expunge an infection that had gone unnoticed for too long.”

“Then why bother confronting him? I know it wasn’t for closure – if you were at all capable of letting go or moving on, you would never have been a candidate for the Beholding in the first place, and we wouldn’t be here now.” Jon just barely manages to not flinch at that. Luckily, Helen doesn’t seem to notice that she struck a nerve, instead staring up at the ceiling in contemplation, as if trying to decipher Jon’s motivations on her own. “So, why? All those messy emotions it dredged up and for what – the drama of it all?”

“I live for the monologue,” he deadpans.

“Jonathan!” Helen gapes at him in exaggerated shock. “Was that another joke?”

She could stand to tone down the condescension, Jon thinks. It isn’t his fault if people overlook his sense of humor just because they never think to listen for it.

“Are you certain about this, Archivist? You have a history of reaching these points of no return and choosing the worst imaginable path.”

Even at the very end, the Distortion just can’t resist one last chance at undermining his confidence. Despite the cockiness underlying her taunt, Helen has a hungry, almost pleading look in her eye – desperate, like everything else in this place that feeds on fear, for scraps in the midst of a famine that will never be remedied.

Jon reaches out and grips the doorknob with one hand.

“Even the end of the world can’t stop you throwing yourself on a grenade. Can’t say I’m surprised. I’m not following you in there, though.”

“Thank heaven for small mercies, I suppose.”

“I am trying to have a heartfelt goodbye, Jonathan,” Helen says, not sounding sincere in the slightest. “I doubt this will go as you hope it will, but I’m fairly certain that no matter what happens, I won’t be seeing you again. I won’t wish you luck, but… well, it will be interesting to see whether one of your half-assed plans might pan out for once – not that they ever have gone according to plan.” When Jon’s resolve remains strong, Helen sighs – and this time, her disappointment does sound genuine. “Well, if you’re sure…” She trails off, giving him one last hopeful look – once last chance to fall apart under her skillful denigrations – before her shoulders slump in resignation.

Not content to leave it at that, though, she does offer one last parting shot: “Do say hello to the Spider for me, won’t you?”

An involuntary shudder courses down Jon’s spine as he remembers Anya Villette’s statement – the massive spider legs reaching up to pull her into the crack in the foundation – and compares it with his own memory of the book, the door, and the monster lurking within. Helen breathes a contented sigh at his ripple of unease – basically a snack for her, at Jon’s expense. Fine. She can have that last little morsel of fear from him, as a parting gift.

“Sometimes you just have to leave,” Jon says firmly, turning the handle. “Even if what’s on the other side scares you.”

And, oh, it does.

Miraculously, Helen allows him to have the last word. As he pushes open the door to the basement, he hears Helen’s door creak open in unison. By the time he’s staring down the stairs into the dark, her door has snapped shut and popped out of existence.

The staircase pitches down, down, down, stretching far deeper than it should. It’s too dark to see much of anything, and it takes a full minute of descent until he notices that there’s a slight curve to it. With every step, the air grows warmer and more stifling. The revolting sensation of walking through cobwebs becomes a constant, but any time he reaches up to brush away the web clinging to him, he feels nothing but his own bare skin.

A few minutes in, his bad leg starts twinging again, and he holds on to the wall to steady himself. Before long, his mind begins to wander to the horrifying possibility that the staircase is interminable, and he’s overcome by an image of a funnel web spider waiting patiently for unsuspecting prey. He tries to push the thought away. Just keep moving.

Between the lack of visibility and being lost in his own head, he doesn’t notice the sharp turn in the staircase until he plows right into the wall, a sharp pain erupting in his left shoulder from the collision. He throws one hand back to steady himself and only barely manages to stay on his feet, his bad leg protesting as he throws his weight into it. After briefly taking inventory of himself and experimentally putting weight on his leg again – painful, but not unbearable – he gropes blindly for the wall again and uses it to guide himself forward, more slowly this time. It isn’t long before the stone of the wall gives way to cool, damp earth, and he shivers with the memory of the Buried.

After several more sharp, nearly 90-degree twists and turns, a faint glow starts to permeate the darkness. A few minutes later, the staircase opens up into a large, dimly-lit space, garlanded with spider silk. The ceiling, walls, and floor are composed of tightly-packed dirt, and Jon has to fight back a rush of claustrophobic panic at the thought of being surrounded on all sides by the crushing earth. It’s short-lived, as it’s crowded out by a much deeper, more primal fear when he sees the fissure in the ground ahead.

It’s a repulsive, crooked thing, oozing with a pervasive, tangible feeling of wrongness. It should not be there. It cannot be there. And yet there it is, boldly existing where it has no right or reason to be, a gnawing, open, inflamed wound in the fabric of reality, pulling him toward it like a black hole. It’s a compulsion stronger than the coffin, an abomination more uncanny than the Stranger, a malice deeper than any Dark, an inevitability on par with Terminus itself.

Jon hates it. At his first glimpse of it, every one of the Archive’s eyes fly open, greedily drinking in the oppressive presence of something so unfamiliar and anomalous, leeching off of Jon’s terror as he beholds it. The scrutiny is fleeting, though, as the sight of it turns corrosive and blistering; all at once, the eyes shrink away and retreat, like a school of fish spotting a bird of prey swooping down for a meal. It takes some of the edge off, having fewer eyes with which to see the thing, but it still weighs him down with dread and revulsion.

Jon doesn’t know how long he’s stood there, staring unblinkingly at the fault line, before he senses a presence – something colossal and hungry and wrong, malevolence and foreboding given physical form – climbing inexorably toward him. He hears a faint rustling, the whisper of tiny avalanches of dirt scraped loose and sent sliding down the walls of the crevice. He knows exactly what to expect, and still he isn’t prepared when the first of the spider’s legs peeks up over the lip of the fissure.

How is it that after a lifetime to process a childhood trauma, it still throttles his heart and squeezes the air from his lungs at the mere thought of it? How is it that, despite being the most formidable thing in this world outside of Fear itself, he feels as small and helpless now as he did on the day he met his first of many monsters? Why is he just standing here, letting those hairy, spindly limbs hover and curl around him like an enormous clawed hand, waiting for a fate that is as unknowable as it is inevitable?

Focus, Jon thinks to himself. Listen to the quiet.

He slowly reaches into his jacket and breathes a sigh of relief as his fingers close around the notebook safeguarded there. It’s Martin’s, full of poems and sketches and stream-of-consciousness journal entries. Jon has had it with him for a long time now, but he’s never been able to bring himself to look inside it. Martin would occasionally share its contents with him – mostly completed poems, and only occasionally works in progress, as he was always self-conscious about his creative process – but Jon doesn’t want to accidentally see something that Martin would have preferred to keep to himself. Martin might not be beside him right now, but he still deserves to have his privacy respected.

Still, for Jon, just having it with him is a physical reminder of his anchor, and running his thumb over the cover grounds him in the present. He closes his eyes and looks inward.

The Archive gropes blindly for something solid amidst the noise, some elemental truth to serve as a starting point in the chaotic tangle choking this place. The edges of his mind brush against thread after thread and none of them are what he’s looking for. They stick to him, filling his head with cotton, making him sluggish and confused, obfuscating his sight. The Spider watches as he flails, becoming more and more snarled in the web.

“I closed my eyes and remembered in as much detail and with as much love as I could muster in my despair,” he whispers to himself, anchoring himself in the truth of the statement. He swallows a terrified whimper as something coarse and fuzzy brushes against his face, and he weaves a command into his next words: “Eventually, I opened my eyes again –”

The Archive obeys, hundreds of eyes materializing on his skin and blinking open in the space around him, grotesque satellites of varying sizes all seizing on single question, and suddenly he can See –

There.

A single thread, out of place among the rest, pulled taut and leading down into the deep gloom of the chasm. He spares a brief thought as to its origin point – Is its anchor here, now, or do its roots begin on the other side? – before silencing it. It’s not a question that needs answering right now. The Beholding objects; Jon reflexively shuts it down and takes an aggravated swipe at the nearest cluster of eyes he can reach, like swatting at a swarm of mosquitoes. He doesn’t think it actually does anything concrete, but when they disperse it brings him a small measure of satisfaction all the same.

He gives an experimental tug on the thread and – it feels right. That’s good, right? Well, he supposes it could be the Web trying to trick him into –

God, he’s like a dog with a bone. He could be trapped in a burning building and find part of his mind wandering off to idly ponder the melting point of steel –

…around 1370 °C for carbon steel; between 1400 and 1530°C for stainless steel, depending on the specific alloy and grade…

– which, yes, he has done. It’s a good way to dissociate from a crisis. Unfortunately, it’s also a good way to get killed, and the giant spider is still there, Jonathan, focus.

He holds fast to the thread – make a path for yourself, tune it to the frequency you need –

“Everything about being with him felt so natural that when he told me he loved me,” he tells himself, louder this time, “it only came as a surprise to realize that we hadn’t said it already.”

– and he follows it, stepping carefully around and between the spider’s legs. He has no idea why it isn’t attacking him – what if this is exactly what Annabelle – no. He shakes his head as if it will jostle the thought loose. Just be thankful for it and keep moving before the damn thing changes its mind.

Moments or hours or perhaps days later, he��s standing at the precipice of the fissure and looking down. Several eyes are riveted on the massive hairy form poised above him, but most are staring into the unknowable darkness with a gnawing, longing fascination. He stands frozen in place, torn between an overwhelming urge to flee and an overpowering need to Know what’s down there: something new, something fresh, something different – any reprieve at all from the excruciating monotony of this nightmare world.

The spider shifts above him. It’s now or never. He has nothing to lose, and if there’s any chance at all of changing this doomed future – of seeing Martin again…

“Sometimes you just have to leave,” he reminds himself, shutting his human eyes tight, one hand clutching the notebook and the other clenching into a fist until the fingernails cut into the palm. “Even if what’s on the other side scares you.”

He takes one last deep breath, thinks of Martin – safe hands, warm eyes, gentle touch – and he takes a leap of faith.

Jon can’t see anything. He can’t See, either. There is an incessant, high-pitched whine screaming in his ears and drowning out his thoughts. When he moves to put his hands over his ears, he realizes all at once that he can’t feel his body. He has no sense of up or down, no fingers to flex, no breath to hold, and – and he can’t See.

It’s… terrifying. It’s liberating. It hurts, but in the same way that his first gulp of fresh air hurt after three days asphyxiating in the Buried.

He doesn’t know how long he floats there in that near-senseless limbo, but between one moment and the next a blanket of fog drops over him and the shrill static is muffled. Through the haze, he can just barely make out a voice, coming from so far away – like he’s drowning, and someone is speaking to him from above the water’s surface. He drifts and listens in a daze as the voice cuts in and out.

“– just – thought I’d – by. Check in – how you’re –”

It’s a nice voice.

“– really need you –”

A safe voice.

“– Jon.”

Wait.

“– bad. I – how much longer we can –”

Wait, it’s – that’s Martin’s voice.

“We – I need you.”

It’s Martin. Martin!

Martin is here, he’s here – Jon doesn’t know where here is, but it doesn’t matter, because Martin is here, and – and Jon is so overwhelmed with euphoria that he isn’t actually processing what’s being said. Calm down, focus – focus on the words –

“And I – I know that you’re not –”

Oh.

“I know there’s no way to –”

Oh, no.

“But we need you, Jon.”

All at once, Jon knows where – when he is.

“Jon, please, just – please.”

No. No, no, no, no –

“If – if there’s anything left in you that can still see us, or –”

Martin, I’m here!

“– or some power that you’ve still got, or –”

I’m here, I’m here, I’m here –

“– or, or something, anything, please! Please.”

Martin’s voice breaks, and Jon’s heart fractures with it.

“I – I can’t –”

Jon can just barely make out the buzz of a phone and – oh.

“I’m – I’m actually with him now.”

Martin!

“You were right.” A pause, and a heavy sigh. “I – will they be safe?”

Peter Lukas. It’s Peter Lukas. Peter Lukas is still alive, Peter Lukas is hunting Martin, Peter Lukas wants to feed him to the Lonely, Peter Lukas is –

“Okay. Okay, I’ll do it.”

Martin, don’t –

“Yeah. Sure thing.”

Martin!

“I’m sorry.”

Jon tries to scream, to reach out, to do anything at all, but he doesn’t have a body and he doesn’t have a voice and he can’t See –

“Goodbye, Jon.”

Martin, look at me! Hear me, please - see me!

He tries to thread a command through the words, but the compulsion doesn't come through, and -

Jon hears the rustle of clothing as Martin stands to leave, followed by the soft click of the door as it closes behind him.

Fuck.

End Notes:

me: i could go into some long-winded exposition about the space-time continuum also me: OR, alternatively, i can handwave it and say It's The Power Of Love, Don't Even Worry About It

anyway, my gay little heart knows what it's about.

- Jon’s dialogue is taken from the statements in the following episodes: MAG 146; 054; 151; 139; 168; 101; 134; 010; 037; 008; 019; 167; 108; 103; 146; 048; 013; 146.

- Jon gets some original verbal dialogue starting next chapter. Thought I'd mention it just in case anyone is getting tired of the Archive-speak (though there will still be some of that). :P

- Psst, if you want to read a detour about Jon and Martin's talk about Annabelle and free will and Not Obsessing Over The Web, I wrote that here. (I'm linking it here because it actually originally started as part of this fic but I decided to make it its own thing because my ADHD brain ran with it and it was waaaaay too much of a tangent sdsdhshgh)

#tma #the magnus archives #tma fic #jonmartin #long post #spoilers through MAG 169 #tma spoilers

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bluejayblueskies · 3 years

Text

acherontia atropos

Part 26 of Whumptober 2020

Fandom: The Magnus Archives Characters: Jonathan Sims, Martin Blackwood, Basira Hussain, Melanie King, Georgie Barker, the Admiral Tags: Whump, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Eye Trauma, Blood/Gore, Hurt/Comfort, Gratuitous Cuddling of the Admiral

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“Okay, am I going to have to be the one to say that this is a terrible idea?”

Melanie’s standing in the doorway to the half-crumbled house they’re currently squatting in, her arms crossed across her chest and her face schooled into an impressive expression of disbelief and distaste. “Well?” she says, when nobody responds.

Jon’s the first to break the silence. “Melanie, it’s—”

“Nope, not you,” Melanie says curtly. “Even your good ideas are still terrible ideas.”

“Well, that’s hardly fair.”

“Guys, stop,” Basira says tightly. “Are we doing this or not?”

“There’s no we.” Jon stares down, at the knife he holds in hands that are trying desperately not to shake. “It’s my choice.”

“Yeah,” Melanie says, “but your choice could get us all killed!”

“Or,” Jon says, his tone rising to match hers in intensity, “it could fix everything! It’s not like we have many more options.”

“Guys, please—”

“Martin,” Melanie says, “please tell me you’re not okay with this.”

Martin’s sat at Jon’s side, and his eyes are fixed firmly on the ground. He doesn’t look at the knife. He doesn’t respond.

“Christ.” Melanie pushes off the doorframe with a sour expression. “Fine. Do what you have to, I guess. But I won’t be any part of it.”

“Melanie—” Georgie says from next to Basira, but Melanie’s already gone, her cane clacking against the broken tile floors. “I, um. I’m going to go make sure she’s all right. You… are you going to be okay?” She looks at Jon, and her eyes are full of perhaps the first real pity he’s seen in them since he arrived at her doorstep so long ago, frightened and alone and running from a monster that had made its home within him before he even knew what it was. He looks back, and thinks that this will be the last time he’ll see her face.

“Yes,” he lies. “I… I’ll be okay.”

She pauses, just for a moment, then nods. Then, she leaves, and Jon wishes belatedly that his last memory of her face would have been one of joy.

“Are you going to be okay with this?” Basira asks after a few moments of tense silence. “No, better question: are you going to be okay with what comes after this?”

Martin stiffens by Jon’s side, but remains silent.

Jon stares again at the knife and imagines the moment it will puncture sclera and hit nerves like hot coals. It makes him want to drop the knife, to be sick, to give in to that same cowardice he’d succumbed to back when the option had first presented itself to him. Martin had stopped him then. Martin would stop him again now, if he let him.

Jon looks at Martin, at the tension in his shoulders and the eyes that stare resolutely forward, and knows that he can’t let this be Martin’s decision. Not this time.

“Yes,” Jon says, and tries to pretend like he means it. “I will be.”

Basira pauses, just for a moment, before nodding. “Okay. I’ll go get the bandages.”

“There are three scenarios,” Jon said, in a voice much calmer than the fear threatening to consume him. “The first is that by doing this, I reverse the effects of the ritual, and the world goes back to how it was.”

“And how likely is that scenario?” Basira asked, her arms crossed and her face skeptical.

“I don’t know,” Jon said honestly. “I can’t know the future, or any hypotheticals. I can tell you that it’s possible; how possible… I won’t know until I do it.”

“You mean until you blind yourself,” Martin said in a voice controlled to the point of pain.

Jon’s stomach twisted, and his voice broke in spite of himself when he said, “Martin…”

“What are the other two?” Basira’s voice was tight, in the way of someone who has long since learned that emotions are a dangerous thing.

Jon spared one last glance at Martin, at the clear lines of hurt etched into his face, before sighing and turning back to face Basira. “The second is that nothing happens, good or bad. I’ll be blind, and nothing will have changed.” He paused, just a moment, before continuing, “And the third is that… is that this reality collapses.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

Basira’s face was a mask of shocked disbelief; Martin’s looked almost hopeful.

“If I’m gone,” Jon said hesitantly, “it is possible that this world could… vanish as well. I- I don’t know how likely it is, of course, but it is possible.”

“No,” Martin said, watching Jon with wide eyes. “You can’t—”

“So there’s a one out of three chance that we lose everything?” Basira cut in, and the hope that had begun to crystalize in Martin’s eyes—that now there was a reason not to try, that he could convince Jon not to try—shattered upon impact. It shattered Jon’s heart in kind. “It’s… it’s not great odds, but it could be worse.”

“It could be better!” Martin fixed Jon with one last wildly desperate look. “Because there’s a fourth scenario, and that’s that you die, Jon!”

Softly, in a voice undercut by the weary pain of one burdening the sins of the world, Jon said, “I can’t think about that, Martin. Not when there are so many suffering. If this is my way to help them—”

“By sacrificing yourself? No, no no no, no. There has to be another way—”

“There. There isn’t.” Jon placed a hand on Martin’s cheek, tried for a smile. It didn’t quite stick. “We’ve tried them all. This is… this is all that’s left.”

Martin looked at Jon for another long moment. Then, his expression hardened, and he looked away. “Fine,” he said tightly. “It… it’s your choice.”

Jon’s hand lingered on Martin’s cheek a moment longer, trying to provide a comfort that he wasn’t sure he could anymore. Then, with an exhalation, he let it fall.

“So,” Basira said, “what do we need to do?”

The pain is white-hot and excruciating, beyond that of the sizzle of flesh on a hand immersed in molten wax or a pair of ribs slipped free from unbroken skin or a hundred worms wriggling eagerly through soft flesh.

The knife clatters to the floor, and Jon falls into darkness.

There’s so much blood.

It’s soaking through the bandages.

Outside the window, the eyes stare impassively in at ones that cry and ones that search for more cloths to wrap ones that bleed and bleed and bleed.

Reality shivers for a moment as another Watcher becomes Watched before settling again. An Archivist becomes undone, and a body that remembers death longs to return to it. A world where death does not come to those who deserve it maintains stasis, and a heart continues to beat. And wounds continue to bleed.

“It didn’t work,” a voice says, staring out the window at a landscape still laced with trembling, woven threads of fear.

Somewhere far beyond, a Spider sits in its web, feels the threads around it twitch and throb, and smiles.

“Here.”

Soft, warm hands press a softer, warmer shape into Jon’s arms whose purrs vibrate against Jon’s chest. Jon lets his hand rest on the Admiral’s fur, still soft and clean despite existing within a world that is not so, and feels a bit of tension bleed out of him.

“Thank you,” he says, as the Admiral begins to knead his stomach. “I… are you all right?”

Martin scoffs; the bed Jon’s lying on dips slightly as a weight settles upon it, just shy of Jon’s hip, and a hand covers Jon’s where it rests on the bed. “Yeah, I’m all right. But I’m not the injured one. Does it… do you need anything else?”

Jon thinks of the eyes that have settled on him once again, their weight pressing against the surface of his skin and sticking there, eagerly waiting for him to be afraid. For them to have something to Watch. “Can…” he begins, hesitantly. “Can you tell me what it looks like? Out- out there?”

Martin’s sigh is slight, barely there, but with nothing to occupy his eyes, his ears pick up the slightest audio cues, in a way that makes the hidden difficult. “Jon, I don’t think—”

“Just. Please.”

Martin sighs, a bit louder this time and in resignation, and says, “Okay.” The weight on the bed lifts, and footsteps creak their way across hardwood floors that bend just a bit too much under his weight. There’s a pause, and then: “It’s- it’s like before. The sky is still all eyes, and they’re- they’re, um. They’re still watching you. There’s still that old museum with the- the, uh, faces in the windows, off to the left a bit, and the right is still just- just totally dark. Like, an actual wall of black.” Martin makes a small, discontented noise. “It’s all the same, Jon. Nothing’s worse, but nothing’s better, either.”

Something bitter rises in the back of Jon’s throat, but he shoves it back down. He can feel the annoyance of that which watches him emblazoned on his skin as he does so. Quietly, he says, “Thank you, Martin.”

The footsteps reapproach the bed, and then there’s a gentle hand resting against Jon’s cheek, just shy of the bandages that wrap around what used to be his eyes. “Of course.”

Martin must have jostled the Admiral, because he gives an indignant mewl as he shifts on Jon’s lap, his tail flicking once across Jon’s chin as he readjusts and settles back down. With a bit of humor that is, at its core, undercut by a heavier sadness and by what might be guilt, Martin says, “Well, I suppose I should let the two of you rest, then. I’ll be over- um, just- just call if you need me.”

“Will do.” Neither of them can rest, technically, but it’s the thought that counts, Jon supposes.

Martin’s footsteps recede, pause for a moment, and then continue past the door and onto carpet that muffles them. It’s quiet but for the purring of the Admiral and Jon’s own slightly labored breaths.

The eyes are so very, very heavy on him when he’s alone. He supposes it could be curiosity, at what a man who used to be an Archivist may do in a world no longer made for him. It could be anticipation, waiting for fear to finally sprout within him that it can cultivate and grow and feast upon, trapping him within a domain of his own naïve creation. It could be simply pity, if something without form or emotion or existence in the way humanity knows of it can pity.

Jon can’t Know for sure. Not anymore. But he knows, with growing certainty, that it doesn’t matter. Whatever he had been to this world, it hadn’t mattered in the end; the linchpin had been removed, but the structure had learned to stand on its own, and it laughed at the tool that had given up its very existence because it thought itself essential.

Perhaps the eyes are full of humor, as they look down at what had once been theirs. But as their gaze settles upon Jon like a swarm of buzzing flies, it doesn’t feel humored, or pitying, or curious, or anticipatory.

It just feels hungry.

#whumptober2020 #no.26 #blindness #the magnus archives #fic #eye trauma tw #blood tw #knives tw #self-mutilation tw

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soveryanon · 4 years

Text

Reviewing time for MAG178~!

- Notable thing this episode was the intensity of the sounds (understandable given where they were), almost covering Jon’s words at some point, and the fact that once again… we got statements-specific ones. It used to be a bit unclear whether the sounds we were hearing belonged to the scenery around Jon or if they were emanating from the statement itself: for example, the sounds of the war (MAG163) were surrounding Jon&Martin before the statement while they were immersed in the domain, same with the carousel (MAG165) or the burning building (MAG169); and likewise, the wailing of the worms (MAG166) was audible outside of the statement (surrounding Martin at the end of the episode, when he wasn’t even in earshot of Jon)… but the squelching we could hear during Jon’s statement was a manifestation of what was happening in Jon’s narration. The hooks attacking Francis (MAG172) were a bit more ambiguous: were they audible outside of the statements, and Jon was commenting on them as they were happening? (Jon himself, after all, was described as present in the audience in the statement itself.) In The Extinction domain (MAG175), were the scuttling and hisses of the creature audible anyway around Jon? Or were these sounds created by Jon’s statement?

It’s been a bit clearer with these last three episodes that Jon’s statements seem to be creating/emanating these sounds, or allowing them to be heard: we could hear the sounds of running footsteps and pants while Jon was unmoving (MAG176); we heard the clock of the room, the chair creaking or scraping, the pills getting swallowed, the altercation, the distant wailing, the peeling of Doctor David’s face… and these sounds disappeared (including the clock!) when Jon got out of his statement, while the tinny muzak reappeared (MAG177). This time, Jon was stated to be in a closet: yet, we heard the factory gates opening, the grunts of the “things”, the tools they used, the sizzling of flesh, the cutting… and same thing, they faded once Jon was done with the statement.

(MAG176) ARCHIVIST: “Feet pound, silent whisper, silent blood on lips, blood on teeth, blood-scent of hated prey flows through veins and into feet pound silent in pursuit. [IN THE BACKGROUND, CONSTANT SOUND OF A CHASE IN THE FOREST: FEET RUNNING, PANTING, SHUFFLING OF LEAVES AND BRANCHES] Teeth smile. Ready to kill. [SHUFFLING OF BRANCHES]”

(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: [SIGHING] If you say so…! [INHALE] [STATIC RISES] [DOOR OPENS AND CLOSES] [FOOTSTEPS, A TELEPHONE RINGS IN THE BACKGROUND] [CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] [STATIC FADES] ARCHIVIST: “Hi. How are we doing? You can call me Doctor David. […] Like I say: we have all the time in the world! [STATIC RISES] And good old Doctor David isn’t – going – anywhere.” [STATIC FADES] [SOUNDS FROM THE STATEMENT FADES] [THE TINNY MUZAK RESUMES]

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “The only smell… is the smell of cleaning products. The door finally opens, [RUSTY DOOR OPENS] and another thing stands there. […] Finally, he is led over to a grate on the floor. [SWIFT METALLIC NOISE] He barely even has time to register the red-hot wire cutter [SLASHING SOUND] before it is in and out of his left arm with practiced, professional ease, neatly removing a small wedge of muscle. […] [SHUFFLING, CRACKING AND ELECTRIC SAWING SOUNDS] The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut. [ANGRY FOOTSTEPS] “Useless,” one of the butchers says. And Tyler is gone.” [STATIC RISES] [SOUNDS FROM THE STATEMENT FADES] [STATIC FADES]

Is Jon “creating” them through dream-logic? Could Martin&Basira hear them, if they stayed around as Jon’s audience, or are these sounds only present on the tape we’re hearing? I’m keeping in mind that the tape recorder is not acting like an out-of-the-box machine: through Jon, it seems to be able to “interact” with the content of the domain/the stories Jon is describing, as affected as the characters…?

- Jon explaining how this domain worked was super interesting (and terrifying):

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Uh… [EXHALE] Technically, a lot of them… actually aren’t people? BASIRA: … Come again? ARCHIVIST: A–a lot of them are created by this place as, uh… “set dressing”, I suppose? Th–this domain, the fear of it requires these… queues, these… this, uh, intricate hateful bureaucracy o–of hundreds of thousands of doomed souls, it needs far more than the number of people who actually ended up here. MARTIN: Wait–wait–wait, so… so it just… makes the rest of them up? ARCHIVIST: Er, maybe one in a hundred or so are actually real? The rest are there to make those people’s fears more acute. MARTIN: … That’s… Ugh, that’s somehow more disturbing.

… because it felt almost like some level of consciousness was at work? Or, well. Once again, a symbiosis between the Fear and its victims, the fact that the domains are literally their fears given enough autonomy to construct that reality and hurt them even more. (I’m thinking back to Jon’s “You want to talk about psychological projection, try viewing the metaphysical world through the lens of a being that is, by its very nature, a reflection of your own obsessions and fears.” from MAG175: he was, in context, talking about his own relationship to The Eye, but that… actually applies to every victim in the domains.)

Things getting me in the statement: the implicit rules/functioning of the domain being so unpredictable and odd that Tyler couldn’t expect them (“He looks around, unable to find a pen, a pencil, anything. The thing sat behind the desk does not respond to his questions. Finally, Tyler takes his fingernail, now long and ragged from his time in the queue, and painstakingly scores the words into the paper.”), the hurt and the pain never being factored by the creatures around him, the fact that his reactions were never timed exactly right (didn’t try to flee when he could have; would like to flee later but knew it was too late in the line), the fact that trying to find a meaning in his own sacrifice was utterly denied (“Is it not better, at least, to be useful? […] The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut. ‘Useless,’ one of the butchers says.”). There were such a range of different fears in the whole statement: the anguish coming from limited options, the idea of suffering for nothing, of being evaluated and imprisoned into categories outside of one’s control, the crushing feeling of inadequacy, of accepting sacrifices and yet being labelled as a disappointment. Jon described it as an “intricate hateful bureaucracy of hundreds of thousands of doomed souls”, and there was indeed a big aspect of it evoking modern workplace environments (… unfortunately).

Even with the description and the beginning of the statement, I was surprised that this one was a Flesh domain! I do get the “Meat is Me” aspect (the idea of being reduced to meat and value, of being stuck in an abattoir), but I reaaaally felt a Vast vibe in it (being one amongst thousands, of time and space spreading, of being meaningless) with dots of Web (being absolutely dispossessed of agency, having the “choice” to rebel and being conscious enough of the decision not to) and maybe of Lonely (disconnected from the others, lost-in-the-crowd yet unable to reach anyone). One gigantic blob of terror, I know, but it’s a nice feeling when Jon labels a domain and I got a slightly different vibe, while seeing and understanding Jon’s logic!

(- Re: time, it was also very striking in this one that Jon is not exactly describing things as they are happening, but condensing them, since this one would spread through “years”:

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “Time has no meaning in this place – but that does nothing to lessen the certainty that Tyler has been in this line for years.”

Or. Well. That time experienced in the domain is an absolutely subjective experience, to the point that it might be possible that, actually, Jon is still telling the story as it happens although there would be no way for his words to match the rhythm of the events he describes? It’s still dream-logic, so whatever can happen.)

- ;; Once again, domains affecting victims’ abilities to remember or be conscious of anything that happened to them before the Change (or creating memories to hurt them more efficiently):

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: “Next to him, Charlie saw Ryan, who he’d known since childhood – though the other details were hazy. Ryan gave him a thumbs-up and an encouraging smile – before his face exploded inwards to a sniper’s bullet, peppering the boat with shards of bone and gore.”

(MAG164) ARCHIVIST: “There was never a time before the disease, no matter what the old bastards tell you. It has always been in the village, always festered in the dark corners where nobody could stomach to check, where good neighbours wouldn’t dream to speculate.”

(MAG165) ARCHIVIST: “Its pace remaining as it ever was, it does not care for coming pains as you are torn. Doesn’t it know who you are? No… And soon… neither will you. […] You will be someone again, someday. […] “I’m still Hannah!” you try to scream, but are you? No. Perhaps there’s some Veronica as fragments there, or Julian, or Anya, but… no. You feel the last of names and “who” you might have been be torn away and borne towards new bodies. New pages, blank; determined to be people.”

(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: “When had the crushing pressure in his chest become literal? When had the empty promise of the horizon finally vanished completely, replaced by the pitch darkness of this “forever wall of earth”? Sam did not know. Time had no meaning here. […] His existence was static, and eternal. Immutable. “Sleep” was only a memory, because even the prospect of unconsciousness might have made his present state slightly more bearable. Food as well, he knew, must be a thing, for he could feel the hunger, but his imagination failed to picture it. The only smell he knew was the damp, and the dirt.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “How long as she lived here? How long have these cramped, dingy rooms in the back of this sprawling rundown tenement been the place her heart calls home? She cannot recall, but long enough for her to grow into love for it, to cherish every rusted appliance, every crumbling piece of plasterboard, every – flickering – lightbulb. […] Sabina cannot… picture their faces, but knows that should they wake to see the state of the place… their anger would be blistering. […] What floor was her flat on again? Surely, it can’t be this high. […] Limping and desperate, she turns to see her furniture in flames, the bookshelves full of memories, that she can’t quite place [STATIC RISES] but knows are precious to her, curl and float away as ash. The photos on the wall of her family whose faces seem indistinct but she knows that she loves, begin to blacken, as the glass pops out of the frame.”

(MAG170) MARTIN: … It’s sort of weird, isn’t it? [CREAKING] A smell can trigger memory so… powerfully. Like this one; it, it–it makes me think of… [INHALE] Hm. [INHALE] Hm. I, I don’t know. Is it a person? A place? No, no; people, people don’t smell like that. Besides, I’m all alone. … I’m, I’m all alone. [CREAKING] Why, why am I alone? I, I shouldn’t be alone! There should be people! It’s such a, such a big house, my house, there mu–, there must be other people! People who care. Unless…

(MAG174) ARCHIVIST: “When it had first covered her home, bathing the street beyond her window in unexpected shade, she had thought it an eclipse. There wasn’t supposed to be one then, she is… sure of that – although if pressed, she could not have told you what day it is today. Before the shadow fell, she is sure that the sun was shining brightly – although, if pressed, she could not have pictured it. And the humid heat of a lingering summer had left the world sleepy, and unprepared – although, if pressed, she remembers the heat, but not the season. […] Mehreen cannot quite make out their faces as she bundles them into the car, old and shuddering as it coughs into life. Does she remember having a child? A spouse? Does she remember her mother having such a cruel sneer? It doesn’t matter. They are here now, and she has to save them.”

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “It’s faded now. He remembers aches and worries and, sometimes, something that might have been joy…! But it’s far away now, like something seen projected on a distant wall.

I still wonder if that situation will evolve, by MAG200… Jon said that the Fears would stay as long as there are people to fear them, and the current status quo is that victims are imprisoned in a loop – their fears made manifest, torturing them in turn, leading to more fear, their perceptions and memories biased to prevent them from feeling something else. We’ve seen how anchors could work as a point of focus to get out of their grasp; it’s not possible with how the world is shaped now, but if the victims could remember something else than their fears, maybe…?

- Oh! I hadn’t noticed/wondered if there was an echo of Beholding in the domain itself in a while, but:

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “Even if he had the will to, Tyler could not have struggled: the movements of the things scrutinising him are as gently unstoppable as a piston.”

… that’s a big Eye mood.

- Same as in the Slaughter domain, it seems to be a loop of fear:

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: “There is a rumbling in the earth around him, as a tank speeds along its unstoppable path, and Charlie is immediately pulled under its tread. He has a moment of shocked horror, before being reduced to a smear in the mud. […] Next to his bleeding corpse, Charlie wakes from what passes for sleep in this place. A sergeant is yelling at him, screaming for him to take his gun and get into the waiting transport.”

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: “The tragedy of Francis. A comic puppet show, in all acts. Act 48067”. […] And so it will be until the curtain descends at last, and THE SPIDER resets the scene, its belly already beginning to swell once again with replacements for the creatures it so gorily birthed. AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LAUGHS] Pause, for laughter. AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LOUD CLAPS] And so the curtains descends.” AUDIENCE (BACKGROUND): [LOUD CLAPS AND CHEERING] [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: “The tragedy of Francis. A comic puppet show in all acts. Act 48068.”

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: “The last thing he sees before returning to the processing line… is everything going into the garbage. There wasn’t a single, suitable cut.”

(And I’m still dubious of Oliver’s claim that The End’s domain was better than the others and would deliver it for real! Though Jon mentioned dream-logic as the rule at work, to explain why Daisy wouldn’t be coming back if killed… so maybe enough belief in The End as an absolute ending makes it real in that world. Mm…)

- Back to Martin worrying over victims’ feelings, and being vocal about it!

(MAG163) MARTIN: … They’re not… real? [VOICES SHOUTING IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: [MIRTHLESS CHUCKLING] No…! They’re real; they were… normal people before the– … Before me. But now they’re here, meat for the grinder. I just mean there’s no point… talking to them. MARTIN: Don’t be a prick, Jon. Hey! I’m, I’m sorry about him. He’s–he’s going through a lot – well… we all are, I suppose, but well… “Hi”, I guess. [SILENCE] Hello? ARCHIVIST: They won’t hear you, Martin, they’re all… too busy waiting to die. MARTIN: Jon…

(MAG178) MARTIN: [HUSHED] Oh, would you both just keep it down, please? ARCHIVIST: They’re not aware of us, Martin, I keep telling you. MARTIN: Yeah, I know, but it’s not okay to talk as though they’re not there. They’re still people. […] [MARTIN JOSTLES A BODY] MARTIN: Excuse me. ARCHIVIST: [EXASPERATED] Martin, they can’t hear you. MARTIN: [SHARP] I know, Jon, that’s not the point. ARCHIVIST: … All right…!

He hadn’t been vocal about it in a long time! (And he had felt a bit disconnected about it, to me, with the worms and the carousels.)

In comparison, I do understand Jon’s pragmatism in the uselessness of trying to Know who is real and not:

(MAG178) MARTIN: Wait–wait–wait, so… so it just… makes the rest of them up? ARCHIVIST: Er, maybe one in a hundred or so are actually real? The rest are there to make those people’s fears more acute. MARTIN: … That’s… Ugh, that’s somehow more disturbing. BASIRA: … How do you tell which is which? ARCHIVIST: I mean, you could ask me, I suppose. B–but I don’t… really see the point. Would it help you to know whose suffering is real and… whose is just a… grim reflection? [SILENCE] BASIRA: No. ARCHIVIST: Well, there you go then.

… but still, a bit aouch about that logic – it’s true that people in the domains are not aware of them, so taking them into account doesn’t change anything, but it still means ignoring real people. (I wonder if they will end up in a domain where victims are aware and conscious and a potential threat to them, if it’s the point of the domain?)

- I’m glad, however, that Jon was trying to make them avoid the avatar of the place, because it was contrasting a lot with Jude:

(MAG169) MARTIN: That turn…! You, you took a hard turn after the roots back there. I knew that was a thing! Why are we here? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s just… [INHALE] When you said… [SIGH] MARTIN: Jon, why have you taken us here? ARCHIVIST: Jude Perry. … This is where Jude Perry rules.

(MAG178) BASIRA: So who’s in charge, here? ARCHIVIST: Not anyone you’re familiar with. We won’t be meeting them. MARTIN: You’re not going to… y’know? [MARTIN VOCALISES AN EXPLOSION] ARCHIVIST: No. Even if I wanted to, he’s in the, uh… Main Processing Room, and believe me when I say that’s… not somewhere you want to be. MARTIN: … Yeah. I guess.

(And even with Oliver: Jon had made the decision that he wouldn’t pursue Oliver, but it had been shown as a rare act of mercy in the face of Oliver’s actions. Here, it really sounded like he wanted to spare Martin and Basira more suffering, didn’t want to put them in an upsetting situation.)

… a bit worried that Martin still hasn’t let it sink in that Jon didn’t want to go Kill Bill anymore because he felt that it was detrimental to himself, but to be fair, Martin sounded like he had asked just to clear it up and wasn’t pressuring, just checking.

- OHOHOHOH about Martin’s frustration feeling extremely… meta (it’s something an audience would say):

(MAG178) MARTIN: [INHALE, EXPLOSIVE EXHALE] God, I hate all of these… loose ends…! ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry. MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go!

Both the thread imagery and the storytelling aspect are screaming a bit “Web?” (THIS IS HOW WEB!MARTIN CAN STILL W–)

- I’m still a puddle on the floor about the fact that:

(MAG178) MARTIN: … Yeah. I guess. [INHALE, EXPLOSIVE EXHALE] God, I hate all of these… loose ends…! ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry. MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go! ARCHIVIST: Hm? MARTIN: [SIGH] Around Elias’s neck. ARCHIVIST: … Ah.

MartinElias. The MartinElias in season 5 is so delightful *snif*. Strangulation? That’s such an intimate way of killing… It’s what Will described as what his preferred method for killing Hannibal would be… My MartinElias rights…

I love how. Martin. Just brings up Elias so much this season.

(MAG161) MARTIN: Elias won, and there were some tapes he’d kept for himself, and he wanted to gloat. So, he sent them! ARCHIVIST: He’s not… MARTIN: I–I don’t see– ARCHIVIST: … “Elias”. MARTIN: Jonah, then. I don’t know, I find it hard to think of him as… I don’t really like to think of him!

(MAG162) MARTIN: Do you think it’ll do anything? Confronting Elias?

(MAG164) MARTIN: What about Elias?

(MAG170) MARTIN: I mean, the interview was weird, I… I don’t really remember the man who talked to me. Just his eyes. They stared at me; th–through me, and… and, I–I knew that he knew what I’d done. God, I…! I was so scared, but… but then he smiled and shook my hand…! What was his name? [CREAKING] He said I “had the job”…! [CHUCKLE] That he “looked forward to working with me”! … I was still so scared I could barely move my arm…! I was so terrified I’d let him down…!

(MAG174) MARTIN: … Hang on, you’re still down to kill Elias, right? Uh, oh, Jonah, whatever.

(MAG177) BASIRA: … So what’s your plan? MARTIN: Long-term? Elias. He’s up in that that… “Panopticon” tower thing.

(MAG178) MARTIN: God, I hate all of these… loose ends…! ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry. MARTIN: It’s, it’s fine. [INHALE] We’ll just have to tie them all up in one go! ARCHIVIST: Hm? MARTIN: [SIGH] Around Elias’s neck.

* “I don’t really like to think of him!” said Martin Blackwood, before proceeding to mention Elias at every turn. (And still “Elias”! Jon and Martin seem to have completely given up on calling him “Jonah”. He’s still “Elias” for them, even though they know who he truly is.)

* Oh, Martin… He really seems to have decided that “killing Elias/getting revenge on Elias” was their goal, and that it would do anything good. Jon has already proven that killing avatars in domains didn’t free victims, didn’t improve their situations; that the domains just… kept going, even “unsupervised”. Even if Jonah is still around in some shape or form (in his old decaying body, in “Elias Bouchard”’s body, merged with the Panopticon, anything), and even if he is the ruler of the Panopticon (not a given, since Jon said that they were heading towards his own domain: unclear if it was the Archives, the Institute, the Panopticon, or all of them)… killing him would not fix the world. Is Martin absolutely in denial about this? Or does he need a small goal to keep going and process his feelings?

(;; And there is just a huge chance that… Martin is mostly feeling guilty about what happened, about the fact that he had the chance and opportunity to kill Elias but refused to do so, and that it led to Jon getting his last mark with The Lonely (with potential additions of not having checked the package they had received, and having chosen to leave Jon unsupervised while he would read a statement). The episode was about Basira knowing all along what was happening but trying to pretend she didn’t, and how this prevented her from reaching her goal (Daisy); I wonder if Martin will soon have to undergo the same process, to allow him and Jon to reach the Panopticon…)

- About Jon’s need for a stop:

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Left. [INHALE] Just up ahead. [STATIC FADES] Although, uh… Hum… Actually, you might want to head through that door and… wait. BASIRA: Again? Already? ARCHIVIST: There’s a lot of fear in this place. […] MARTIN: New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff.

Once again, it’s definitely presented as Jon having to unload an excess, and I’m really interested in Martin’s lexicon. In MAG177, he called it a “statement”, and this time, presented it as “tell[ing] [his] story to all the hooks and stuff”: “story” had been how Fanshawe had described Albrecht von Closen pouring out his horrors, and Martin’s formulation took into consideration the need for an audience. Jon did introduce the tape recorder as a necessary audience in MAG163 while he was giving the domain’s statement (and he had mentioned how “pouring out” into them had helped him to understand what the cabin was doing, in MAG162), but really, I’m struck with how similar Jon sounds to how Fanshawe had described Albrecht?

(And what is happening with the tape recorder, what is Jon creating through them…)

- Uh! So it seems like Basira got Enough already, by listening to Jon last time. Not keen to reiterate the experience, uh. (Well: it’s mostly Jon who, first and foremost, took it as a given that Basira wouldn’t be listening either.)

- I’m fond of the fact that:

(MAG178) [DOOR OPENS AND METALLIC JANGLING IS HEARD] MARTIN: [EMPHATICALLY] Nope! BASIRA: … What the hell sort of tools are those? ARCHIVIST: “Flesh” factory, remember?

The tools weren’t described. Some things better left to imagination, nondescript but evoked through characters’ reactions, uh?

- ;w; Is Jon still worried about Martin potentially losing himself in a domain? He really almost lost Martin in the Lonely house, and Martin had wandered away too deep in the Web one:

(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: Oh, Martin! Thank god, I, I was… I–I thought you were behind me. [FABRIC RUSTLES] MARTIN: I thought you’d left me behind…! Gone on without me.

(MAG172) MARTIN: No, I… Not for most of it. I just thought I heard… something. Whatever. I went exploring, all right? I don’t know why; I shouldn’t have. ARCHIVIST: No, you–you shouldn’t have!

(MAG178) MARTIN: New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff. ARCHIVIST: … Fine. Just don’t wander off.

… I really wonder if, at some point, Jon will try to come back to Martin&Basira, and they’ll be just… gone, because of Helen, Annabelle, or the domain’s work. (… It might be how Daisy could appear? While Jon is focusing on a statement and unaware that she reached them first?)

- Martin has his Limits and will be vocal about it:

(MAG178) MARTIN: [EMPHATICALLY] Nope! […] New plan. We wait in the corridor; you go in the spike cupboard and tell your story to all the… hooks and stuff.

… but mostly, I’m snickering so hard, because. It was.

It was.

It was Martin refusing to go into the closet. I’ve been snickering about it for a week, alright.

- … I really wonder what Martin was talking about with Basira:

(MAG178) MARTIN: –I know, I know you find it hard whe– … Done already? ARCHIVIST: Yes. [INHALE] Talking about me? BASIRA: … I assume that’s a rhetorical question. ARCHIVIST: I am trying to keep my powers to myself. BASIRA: Sure! MARTIN: I was just… giving Basira some advice. ARCHIVIST: [GOOD-NATURED] Avatars are from Mars and humans are from Venus, that sort of thing? MARTIN: [TINY CHUCKLE] I mean… yeah? Sort of? ARCHIVIST: [BRIEF CHUCKLE] MARTIN: Well, w–we were pretty much done anyway.

… Jon’s shitty sense of humour… (Was that an allusion to the feared vs. the fearful, as Helen made the distinction? To the Jon/Martin relationship as avatar/human? x’))

Was Martin’s “advice” about how to not take what Jon was saying too badly, how to try to talk with him constructively since she and Jon had grown sour towards each other in season 4? … Or does Martin have a plan in the making, that requires Jon to not know about it? Because this episode and the previous one made a point to remind us…

(MAG177) BASIRA: … What’s it like? Being with someone who can see the inside of your head? MARTIN: Hm? Oh! Oh no, he doesn’t. I told him not to, and so he tries to… look away? BASIRA: And you trust him to do that. MARTIN: [DECISIVE] Yes. I do.

… that Jon doesn’t know what is happening in Martin’s head since Martin asked him not to “know” about him…

(I’m glaaad that Martin and Basira are talking outside of Jon!!)

- I like the contrast between Jon absolutely knowing what he was doing, where he was leading Basira and Martin… and the fact that Basira didn’t know about it.

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Next one’s through here. BASIRA: Next one? ARCHIVIST: Her latest victim. [DOOR IS WRENCHED OPEN WITH A METALLIC CREAK] MARTIN: [REELS] Oh… [SOUNDS OF FLIES BUZZING]

Not exceptionally great from Jon, but typical from season 5 – it just highlights how much Jon knows how the world operate, what is around them, is indeed almost completely omniscient… and forgets how others aren’t.

- I really, really love how Daisy’s victims have been introduced for these past two episodes:

(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: We’re here. [DOOR CREAKS] MARTIN: … Oh! Jesus… [BAG JOSTLING] ARCHIVIST: Yes. Horrible way to go…! BASIRA: You’re sure this is Daisy’s handiwork? ARCHIVIST: Positive. […] I could tell you. BASIRA: [EXHALE] Don’t bother. I know who he is. MARTIN: What? BASIRA: [SIGH] Noah Thomson. That… nasty piece of work. Crossed him a few times when we weren’t doing sectioned work. Last I heard, he’d dodged a GBH charge Daisy brought him in on. Blinded a guy during a robbery. I guess she didn’t forget. MARTIN: Wait. Wait, so… so, she’s hunting down criminals? People who she… thinks got away with stuff? BASIRA: … Sure. ARCHIVIST: Really? As simple as that? BASIRA: What’s your point? ARCHIVIST: What, you think he ended up in Wonderland House at random? We’re just going to ignore it, and write him off as a “nasty piece of work”? BASIRA: We don’t have time for this. ARCHIVIST: Then we should make time. You want to hear how he ended up blinding that man? Because it wasn’t a robbery. He was running away from Daisy, lashing out in a panic. The court believed it. But you believed her…

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: Recognise her… BASIRA: … No… I don’t think I do. ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t a question. It was an instruction, we can’t… move on until you do. MARTIN: Jon, what are you getting at? ARCHIVIST: This isn’t just a journey through spaces. BASIRA: … Fine, I recognise her. I don’t know her name, though. [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: Isabelle Moran. Shoplifter, drug addict. [STATIC FADES] Daisy was certain she was dealing as well, derailed her recovery twice.

Jon asking Basira to “recognise” the victims is such a significant move? It’s about giving them some dignity back: we’re given their names and last names (which… is more than what we’re getting in the domains’ statements; it feels more real); we’re being introduced to who they were through their identity, their history, what was done to them, the wrongs done to them… both as humans actions (the hurt Daisy caused as a police officer, although influenced by The Hunt) and as monstrous actions (Daisy butchered them as a beast). It feels very striking that most of the violence inflicted upon them is… not especially the fact that they’ve been murdered in these domains (Jon implied they should respawn?), but really, about what was done to them before, and how fundamentally Daisy’s behaviour had hurt them.

I really like how Jon is pushing Basira to acknowledge all of this, to process Daisy’s responsibility (and indirectly, hers, as someone who let it happen)? There is something very empathetic, very powerful in the fact that what needs to be done is about seeing the harm, understanding how it happened, before being able to proceed to the next step and take actions?

(- Basira, serial Sayer Of Fuck And Swears:

(MAG143) BASIRA: [SIGH] So, what, this was another waste of time? What, no Church, no Dark Sun? … I’m gonna kill that son of a bitch…!

(MAG148) BASIRA: You sent us to the North fucking Pole for no goddamn reason. ELIAS: A, a–hem… miscalculation.

(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: [DEEP EXHALATION] … Satisfied? BASIRA: Ff… Fuck.

(MAG178) BASIRA: Don’t give me that patronising, ominous-oracle bullshit, Jon. I’m not an idiot…! […] Of course I fucking care!

Now she’s on equal ground with Jon!)

- Basira broke my heart into tiny pieces this episode, because all her prickly behaviours were bad, as she was put in that uncomfortable situation and trying to flee (while Jon relentlessly pushed her to see)… and it felt so human in its own way?

(MAG155) BASIRA: I’m trying to convince her to go after them. To, er… “Hunt” them. ARCHIVIST: Why? BASIRA: Because I’m not going to lose her. ARCHIVIST: She goes Hunting again, you might anyway. BASIRA: And if she doesn’t, she might die. ARCHIVIST: Something you’re fine with in certain other cases. And something she’s made peace with. BASIRA: Because of the guilt she feels over the stuff The Hunt made her do…! It’s not her fault. ARCHIVIST: Earlier, when she was still out of it, I, uh… I “saw” some of the things she was talking about, some of the things she did, while she was police. I’m not convinced I disagree with her assessment. [PAUSE] Do you want me to tell you? BASIRA: No. No, I don’t. ARCHIVIST: … You knew, didn’t you? You knew the sort of things she did, and you let her. BASIRA: No, not exactly. I thought… [PAUSE] It’s not that simple. ARCHIVIST: It never is. But that doesn’t make it okay.[SILENCE] BASIRA: None of us are who we were, Jon.[SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: No. I suppose not. In many ways, it’s simpler now, isn’t it? At least now, our demons have names. BASIRA: Mm.

(MAG178) BASIRA: Fine. Noted. Can we just move on please? ARCHIVIST: I’m afraid not. BASIRA: Why not? ARCHIVIST: We aren’t finished here. BASIRA: Is that a threat? MARTIN: Guys, come on, don’t do this, not here. ARCHIVIST: I told you before, we can’t hunt a monster you refuse to see. BASIRA: Don’t give me that patronising, ominous-oracle bullshit, Jon. I’m not an idiot…! ARCHIVIST: I never said you were. MARTIN: Guys… BASIRA: [ANGRY] Look, I need you to lead the way. I don’t need your advice, and certainly don’t need you stood there judging me! MARTIN: [LOUDLY] Enough, enough! Someone has died! Show some respect. Or don’t you care? BASIRA: [INCENSED] Of course I fucking care! … [QUIETER] That’s the problem. MARTIN: I… I don’t understand. BASIRA: … I just… I don’t need him laying everything out for me like I’m some kind of idiot. I know, all right? Daisy is the only person I could ever rely on and… [GETTING QUIET AND SHAKY] And she… she did things, terrible things, and I… [SIGH] I refused to see it or… said it was my duty, or whatever. I don’t know. MARTIN: Basira…

Basira’s discomfort had to do with her feeling judged, criticised, leading her to get so defensive, all of which we’d already seen a lot in season 4! It’s a defence mechanism! And we finally could see what she was hiding, the feelings she didn’t want others to see! It was long due, and it was such an amazing pay-off!!!

I feel like it’s the equivalent of Melanie in MAG131, and Daisy in MAG132, when they explained themselves to Jon, gave him the keys to understand what was happening in their heads and why they behaved like they did, and, once again, it was such a precious, sensitive moment?

(MAG178) BASIRA: I care, I just… I don’t need to wallow in it. I need to end it. All of it. MARTIN: … We’re here for you. BASIRA: No. She was there for me. ARCHIVIST: … “Cops versus robbers and monsters”… BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good. ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I know how that feels. BASIRA: … I wanted to help people, you know? When I first joined. Protect people. But then I saw what some of those same people were capable of, and… something changed. I wanted to hurt them, the ones that deserved it, and it… it felt good, it felt… righteous. I thought I could feel the line, though, I really did. Eventually, though, it was… too much. [PAUSE] I was going to quit. I couldn’t… take what I saw myself becoming, but… then I got sectioned, and suddenly… suddenly it turned out there were real monsters out there, and… Well, that just made the power feel better. So things kept slipping. But… Daisy was always there for me. MARTIN: All those innocent people… BASIRA: Were they? Innocent? ARCHIVIST: Some. And if not? [INHALE] What crime warrants what was done to them? Theft? Violence? Disrespect?

* Honestly, the raw vulnerability, melancholia and sadness? It was my favourite performance from Frank ever.

* I really love how it tied in with what Basira had already said about her relationship to police, that she had never really felt extremely attached to the profession (MAG117: “I don’t want to be here. But by the end, I didn’t want to be police either, so… guess I don’t really know what I do want, which… maybe that’s just as well. My options… they’ve gotten a lot narrower over the last year.”). It’s just such a sad story because, in her case, she hadn’t gone there for the power (unlike Daisy); as she explained, she had good intentions… and the structure in place tends to sour and corrupt, encourages its agents to abuse their power, won’t make them become better persons (will only make them worse), and turns out to be a threat for the vulnerable instead of protecting them. It’s even sadder that Basira thought about quitting shortly before she got sectioned because, with the timeline in mind:

(MAG043) BASIRA: Okay, well, the first time I got hit with a Section 31 was five years ago, August 2011. I’d got my badge the year before that, and was still getting used to some of the more stressful bits of the job.

It happened barely a year after she joined the police. And she was already aware that she was becoming someone she didn’t like, that she was doing terrible things, and was considering quitting because of it…

* The “I wanted to hurt them, the ones that deserved it” reminded me a bit of Melanie explaining her anger in MAG131, and I’m sad in retrospect about how… Basira and Melanie could have understood each other much better in season 4 if the circumstances had been different…

* I also like how the existence of the supernatural goes hand in hand with Daisy’s side of things: the monsters and the avatars were a pretext for Hunters to unleash their violence. It was never about protecting the population from dangerous people; it was about having easily digestible targets, which allowed them to feel good about being violent (since, after all, they were only eradicating threats, right?). As both Basira and Jon pointed out:

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: … “Cops versus robbers and monsters”… BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good.

It wasn’t a clear-cut situation – there were monsters out there. But we’ve also seen how so many of these monsters had initially been preyed upon by the entities, had initially been trying to survive, and how the line about their “badness”… wasn’t as easy to establish as characters would have liked. (And, in Daisy’s case: indeed, it wasn’t worth it anyway to… push struggling people deeper into misery, just because she had power over them, and Daisy, in season 4, was the first to remind people of it.)

* T__T I really love the… complexity of Basira’s situation? How would you react if the person there for you, representing a fixed point (your anchor?), turned out to be doing wrong things? In theory, it feels easy to answer that the good behaviour would be to turn your back on them, or to try to make them improve; and in practice, in Basira’s case, it meant allowing her whole system to collapse, and having to rebuild from there. I’m really fond of how she explained that she wasn’t stupid, that she was still aware of what was happening: that she still chose the pack mentality over a rejection of that system, but that she was already disillusioned with it. Basira had often felt a bit… emptier than the other characters; we only knew of a life-lesson given by her father, and the rest of her life seems to have been tied to the police force for the past few years, before she joined the Institute. It has really felt like Daisy was what brought her stability and peace. And yet: Daisy did awful things, Basira enabled her by trying to think it was for the greater good (MAG091: “But I… I always thought you just killed monsters.”), and Basira wasn’t even able to make the most of her return in season 4, when Daisy wanted to improve, since Basira was stuck on the idea that they needed a strong defence against threats… (And I wonder how much of Basira’s initial rejection of Daisy in season 4 had to do with the fact that… allowing herself to understand and hear the “new Daisy” would mean having to acknowledge that the old one had been bad and wrong; that Basira had allowed her to be monstrous, and that they both shared responsibility in those crimes.)

- Really loved Martin’s attempt, too:

(MAG178) MARTIN: … We’re here for you. BASIRA: No. She was there for me.

Because it said so much, that Martin used a present tense while Basira answered in the past (as if, after Daisy, there couldn’t be anyone else). It also put back in my mind how Basira had tried to be a bit softer on Martin at first, after his mother died (MAG127: “But I didn’t want to push it. He was in a… bad place, what with the attack and his mum and everything, so I didn’t press it.”) but didn’t provide comfort either; and how, even earlier, Basira and Martin had tried to be there for Melanie when they learned what Elias had done to her (MAG110). There’s still a lot of ice, but I’m glad that Martin offered, and that Basira didn’t attack him on it either – she’s mourning (that past tense in “she WAS there for me”…), but not… absolutely rejecting him either.

- In the moments of small understandings, Jon’s was also noteworthy:

(MAG178) BASIRA: I thought we were doing good. I really did…! I knew there was some bad shit, I knew Daisy was into a lot of it, but… I thought it balanced out. [WEAKLY] … I thought we were good. ARCHIVIST: [SOFTLY] I know how that feels.

Since he also had to face the reality that the Archives team hadn’t really been doing “good” either, although he had tried to cling to the idea:

(MAG150) MELANIE: Because this place is evil, Jon! And so… doing this job… ARCHIVE: [LOUD EXHALE] MELANIE: Helping it out… even in small ways, i–is in some way… evil too! Every time we try to use it to do good, it just seems to make everything worse, and… and I will not be a part of that anymore. ARCHIVIST: What about The Unknowing? We, we saved the world! MELANIE: Did we? I… I mean, I–I think it was the right thing to do, but how many people were killed to do it? We, we weren’t even a neutral party; we did it as agents of The Eye, because Elias told us to. ARCHIVIST: An–and then you put him in jail! MELANIE: Martin put him there. And, and–and he’s still doing harm.

(With the additional fact that Jon had indeed saved Melanie and Daisy, but had attacked five people during the season; that The Unknowing would have failed anyway; and that ultimately, a lot of Jon’s “good” actions had also marked him as a preparation to Jonah’s ritual.)

Re: Jon’s situation, it’s the same thing with Basira’s declaration about caring:

(MAG178) MARTIN: [LOUDLY] Enough, enough! Someone has died! Show some respect. Or don’t you care? BASIRA: [INCENSED] Of course I fucking care! … [QUIETER] That’s the problem. MARTIN: I… I don’t understand.

(MAG152) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … When does it stop? HELEN: What? ARCHIVIST: The guilt… The misery… All the others I’ve met, they’ve been… cold. Cruel. They’ve enjoyed what they do. When does The Eye… make me monstrous?

It had been Jon’s “problem”, too: how he was conscious and aware of the suffering he caused, and how he had to live with it, wasn’t okay with it. I really like how it feels like, finally, after season 4, Basira is able to participate in a conversation where they’re opening up, talking in good faith, trying to understand each other and… not hurt each other anymore? How they can relate, or just listen?

- I’m back to sobbing about Jon and Daisy’s relationship in season 4 because:

(MAG178) BASIRA: [SHAKY] … You knew her. She was trying to be better…! ARCHIVIST: She was. But she never asked me to forgive her. BASIRA: Forgive her? ARCHIVIST: … I’ve been scared, terrified for my life so many times these last few years, but I’ve never, not once, felt so horribly, abjectly powerless as when she… took me into that forest to kill me. I’ll never forget it. MARTIN: … You never said. ARCHIVIST: It’s not easy to talk about. MARTIN: Oh, Jon… BASIRA: … And would you have? Forgiven her? ARCHIVIST: No… But she never asked me. She knew she had no right. [SILENCE]

… It’s still “aouch”, but not surprising: Daisy had been terrifying in MAG091, absolutely hammering in that Jon’s life was in her hands, that she had decided who and what he was and what he deserved. It had been a very hard scene, cruel and violent, a demonstration of what Daisy could do (and had done)… and I really don’t feel like it negates the moments she and Jon shared in season 4, it mostly just casts another dimension on it? How Jon was a bit tense and awkward around her, and slowly mellowed down:

(MAG133) DAISY: You sure? ARCHIVIST: No, uh, it’s, hum. It’s fine. DAISY: It’s just… Basira’s busy. ARCHIVIST: I–I understand. Ho–honestly, er, I’d actually appreciate your insights, er, for this one, just… You know, keep quiet during the statement and that. DAISY: Sure. I, I can do quiet. ARCHIVIST: Right. Er, oh, do you want a chair? DAISY: No. ARCHIVIST: Oh. Okay.

(MAG136) MELANIE: W–well, I’ve kind of got to… uhm. I’ve got somewhere to be. Do you mind if, if… she hangs around, with… ARCHIVIST: Er… I suppose… Not at all. She’s very welcome. […] Are you alright? DAISY: Asked me that already. ARCHIVIST: Right. Sorry. DAISY: I didn’t ask her. To do that. ARCHIVIST: I–it–it’s fine. […] DAISY: Get over yourself! You’re always talking about choices – we all made ours. Now I’m making the choice… to get some drinks in. Coming? ARCHIVIST: I d–… I… [SIGH] … yeah? Okay. DAISY: Melanie’s out, but I’ll go get Basira. ARCHIVIST: Is she… W–will she want to join us? DAISY: If she doesn’t, I’ll rip her throat out. ARCHIVIST: Uh… DAISY: It’s a joke, Jon. ARCHIVIST: … oh. Hahah…! Yes… Uh, I–I’ll get my coat.

(MAG139) ARCHIVIST: The others are doing… better, I think. Basira’s busy doing research for something secretive, unsurprisingly. But she seems to be adjusting to, uh… the new Daisy. I actually like Daisy now, which is a… really weird feeling.

(MAG153) ARCHIVIST: Are you alright? DAISY: [BREATHLESS] Don’t touch me. ARCHIVIST: Christ, he was right, I, I didn’t… When did you get so thin? DAISY: I’m not, it’s fine. ARCHIVIST: … It’s The Hunt, isn’t it? Without it– DAISY: I’m fine. Just haven’t been hungry. I’m strong enough. ARCHIVIST: Clearly. […] Even so, if it’s having this much of an effect on you– DAISY: I’m not going back. I can’t let it in again. ARCHIVIST: But it– … What if it kills you? DAISY: [CHORTLE] Always said I was dedicated to justice…! ARCHIVIST: Daisy! It’s not… You can’t think like that. DAISY: Jon. Do you have any idea how much damage you can do if you’re a police officer who wants to hurt people? How much the system will protect you? ARCHIVIST: [SHARP INHALE] DAISY: I managed to keep most of it from Basira, but… ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t you, that was The Hunt! DAISY: … [SIGH] We were the same. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: … You’d never known anything different. [SILENCE] DAISY: Because I never wanted to. All that time trapped was good for one thing: thinking. And I did a lot of it. I’ve made my choice.

I feel like… there is a form of deep respect from Jon, when he explained how Daisy didn’t ask for forgiveness – because it proved, in a way, that Daisy was very aware that the harm she had done was too huge to be forgiven, and that she couldn’t ask that from him (and that it might be a reason why Jon accepted to get closer with her in the first place: because she wasn’t lying when she said that she now understood how terrible she had been). We’ve seen, however, how Daisy was quick to apologise:

(MAG132) DAISY: [CRIES OF PAIN] I’m, I’m sorry… I’m sorry Jon… I’m sorry…

(MAG142) MARTIN: I know. [PAUSE] Not nice being interrogated, is it? DAISY: I… [EXHALE] Oh. MARTIN: Yeah. [SILENCE] DAISY: [INHALE] I’m sorry, Martin. 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.

But indeed: never asked to be forgiven. And it might strike a very personal chord for Jon, since… he knows, first-hand, how it is to not be forgiven:

(MAG119) TIM: Jon, I don’t know if you can hear me, but if you can… ARCHIVIST: [FAINTLY AND FAR] Tim…? TIM: I don’t forgive you. But thank you for this.

(If I remember correctly, the only time Jon had asked to be forgiven had been to the assistants through the tape recorder, when threatened by the Not!Them and panicking. But, same as Daisy: afterwards, he said “sorry”, and didn’t ask for it.)

- There is another thing, not mentioned but hard to forget if we’re talking about Daisy’s victims, including Jon: what about Jon’s? What about the statement-givers who were plagued by the nightmares, and specifically the ones he attacked knowing the harm that he would do to them? We’re exploring the harm Daisy caused to her victims, I wonder if we’re heading towards what Jon did to these people, too… (Are they waiting at the Panopstitute or the Archives, since it’s “Jon’s domain”? He used to terrorise them through the nightmare zoo, and had claimed them for Beholding: but in this new world, he doesn’t sleep anymore. It would feel logical that… they’re still trapped and victimised by The Eye as of now.)

- Early season, Jon had really felt like Virgil leading Dante (Martin) through the circles of Hell, and there is a bit of that with Basira too! Except that it’s not a didactic exploration of divine retribution/punishment, but… precisely, it is about how the “punishments” were the problems, how nobody was inherently unsalvable (or even, how everyone was plain pushed towards misery because of a biased repressive system)? There is still that idea of guiding Basira, both physically and mentally, through a terrible and hard journey, to make her able to see the reality of the world and reach her goal… (and that makes Daisy “Beatrice”. Who is… already dead TT__TT)

- From MAG163 to MAG177 (excluding MAG167, which was Jon&Martin taking a break and Jon giving the statements about the Archives during Gertrude’s tenure), we crossed through all the Fears present in Jonah’s invocation, minus Beholding itself and plus Extinction. MAG178’s was explicitly labelled as The Flesh; although it was another aspect from Jared’s garden, it’s still a “repeat”. I would infer that, either Jon&Martin’s journey has been set aside and put on hold right now (since they’re focusing on finding Daisy), and they now will be able to reach the Panopticon as soon as they’re done with this current quest… either no, going through one domain of each Fear wasn’t the point of Jon&Martin’s journey to reach the Panopticon, and it is something else. Since they left the cabin, Jon had mentioned multiple times that their journey wasn’t a purely physical one, that there was a meaning underneath it:

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: Geography doesn’t work anymore. Space… doesn’t work. MARTIN: … All right. So what does that mean? ARCHIVIST: It means the journey will be the journey, regardless of how we choose to make it. […] You see that tower, way off in the distance? MARTIN: Yeah. [PAUSE] [SIGH] It’s watching us, isn’t it? [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: The Panopticon and the Institute. Merged into something entirely new. MARTIN: Wha–, what? No, th–there’s, there’s no way we could see it from here. We, we must still be a hundred miles from the border, never mind London! ARCHIVIST: You could see that tower from anywhere on Earth. And it can see you. And if you walk towards it, eventually you’ll get there. But you have to go through everything in-between.

(MAG164) MARTIN: How much further do we still need to go? [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: A long way. Through many dark and awful places… […] MARTIN: Are we safe, traveling like this? ARCHIVIST: Yes… Yes, sort of, we’re… I don’t know how to phrase it, we’re… something between a pilgrim and a moth. We can walk through these little worlds of terror, watching them; separate, and untouched.

(MAG177) ARCHIVIST: She was here, but the corridors of this place are… Rushing isn’t going to close the distance faster, it’s more about how we choose to move through these domains rather than our speed. BASIRA: What does that mean? MARTIN: I’ve been with him the whole way and I still don’t know. ARCHIVIST: It means we’ll reach her quicker if you stop tearing off, and let me concentrate on finding a proper path through this place. […] BASIRA: [ANGRY] I told you not to look in my head! ARCHIVIST: I didn’t. And I won’t. But you can’t hunt a monster that you refuse to see.

(MAG178) ARCHIVIST: That wasn’t a question. It was an instruction, we can’t… move on until you do. MARTIN: Jon, what are you getting at? ARCHIVIST: This isn’t just a journey through spaces. […] We aren’t finished here. […] I told you before, we can’t hunt a monster you refuse to see.

What is Jon’s and/or Martin’s journey? Basira has to learn to see/acknowledge the monster in order to hunt it; what is the mental process that Jon and/or Martin have to go through in order to be able to reach the Panopticon again? Is it about guilt, about their active responsibility (vs. what wasn’t their fault)? Is it about the line between victims and culprits not being that simple to establish, and them being unequipped to judge? Is it about their own fears?

- It felt like Basira made a lot of progress in this episode. She finally opened up and admitted how turning a blind eye had made her complicit. She implied that she had indeed tried to flee the responsibility of having to kill Daisy:

(MAG178) BASIRA: [QUIET] … I really am going to have to kill her, aren’t I? ARCHIVIST: There’s no way to bring her back. Not any more. At this point, if I tried to take away her fear… it would destroy her anyway. BASIRA: Am I even going to be able to? ARCHIVIST: Yes. BASIRA: And she stays dead? ARCHIVIST: In this case… yes. MARTIN: What about the powers? ARCHIVIST: Dream logic remember? She won’t come back. Trust me. BASIRA: … Does she want me to kill her? ARCHIVIST: She asked you to, didn’t she? BASIRA: No, I mean, right now. Is she suffering? ARCHIVIST: … No. Right now, she’s… She’s happy. MARTIN: [DEJECTED SIGH]

* Before this episode, Basira would probably have been unable to do it. Jon’s certainty contrasts with what he used to say about it:

(MAG164) MARTIN: What’s Basira going to do? [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: She… thinks she’s going to kill Daisy. Like she promised. [STATIC DECREASES] But she’s conflicted. MARTIN: And will she? ARCHIVIST: I–I don’t know, th–the future, th–that’s… that’s not something I can see.

So it feels like he, too, thinks that she’s now ready.

* I was wondering about whether or not Jon would be able to do anything to save Daisy with his powers: I was mostly waiting for him to explain whether he could or couldn’t help, I’m fine with this explanation (which makes sense in context). It also strikes me that… he had probably been mourning her for a while during that journey:

(MAG164) MARTIN: And Daisy? [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: Bestial. Brutal. [STATIC DECREASES] [INHALE] Carving her way through the domains of other Powers, following the scent of blood. … Oh, Daisy, I’m sorry…

(MAG175) ARCHIVIST: Basira and Daisy. We’re close. MARTIN: Wait, what? Wait, really? B– Th–that’s brilliant! What are we waiting for, let’s go! ARCHIVIST: Uh, y–yeah, i–it’s… It’s not… it’s not going to be easy, things aren’t… good.

The fact that, despite Daisy’s murder attempt and the fact that it deeply traumatised Jon, they were able to form that friendship, feels so fragile and precious at the same time? Jon didn’t want to lose her. He’s not allowing her or letting her die because it feels like a fair punishment or the only way to deal with Daisy; it really feels like… it’s to honour Daisy’s last wish, as a person who wanted to be better and who got caught up by The Hunt.

* I’m a bit more curious about Jon explaining that Daisy would stay dead because of “dream-logic”: is it because of Jon’s own feelings influencing the world (if he feels like she’s dead for real, then she is)? Is it because, as long as Basira goes through that inner journey, killing someone in these circumstances can grant a “permanent” death unlike the domains? Is it because of their connection to The Eye…?

* é_è Basira’s last questions about what Daisy currently wanted broke my heart… and Jon’s answers did, too. It really feels like “Daisy” truly died in MAG158, uh? That what matters is what Daisy wanted while she was still herself, even though the beast she turned into is “happy” in this state. (And it requires a bit of faith: who is the real Daisy, which wish should be respected? The beast happy to hunt or kill? Or the assistant who was sorry about the harm she caused, withering while trying to “listen to the quiet”?

* Martin’s dejected sigh said a lot… Until now, he was mostly optimistic about the possibility of finding their “friends” back, of helping them. I don’t think he had envisioned that… no, Jon couldn’t save Daisy, could only “help” her by helping Basira to respect her last wish. (Martin was mostly withdrawn from that last conversation, and… yeah, it might have been a lot to internalise for him, too. Jon seems to have borne that knowledge for a while; it might even have contributed to his perception that he couldn’t improve the general situation whatsoever? While Martin, who was lacking the keys, had kept hoping that they could… do something good. Killing avatars, saving the children, helping their friends, maybe getting Daisy back. I wonder if the current circumstances are making him more susceptible to reach for Annabelle or answer her call a next time, since she had offered her “help” and Martin has been realising, lately, how powerless they are…)

- This episode was a Lot of processing and of sadness, and that last note…

(MAG178) BASIRA: Killing her won’t undo any of it. But… that’s not the point. ARCHIVIST: No one gets what they deserve. Not in this place. They just get whatever hurts them the most! … Even me.

* Killing Daisy will be hard, and indeed. It won’t even change the harm she caused, won’t change the apocalypse. It won’t even be a matter of “retribution” or “justice”; but I’m glad that Basira is aware of that already, and that “the point” lies elsewhere. In this context, it’s really about respecting Daisy’s choice and what she wanted, to allow her to escape The Hunt one last time – even if it means killing her, and to prevent what she became to cause more harm. It’s about Daisy. (Which requires, to reach her, to go through what she had done: the person she had wronged and whose story had been hidden until now.)

* … I really loved Jon’s sad insight about this world. It is an unfair world, an unfair system, quite often echoing what the old world was: Daisy’s victims were, after all, already crushed and pressured by an unfair society, already pursued by their own fears (MAG177: “it’s the worry that everything is, is awful, and it’s actually… your fault. That, that you made it up […]. What, you think he ended up in Wonderland House at random? We’re just going to ignore it, and write him off as a ‘nasty piece of work’?”; and it’s meaningful, in the same way, that in this episode, Isabelle Moran was found in this factory, where people are pressured and pushed around and ultimately labelled as “useless”).

* I still really wonder what all this means about Jonah. He was initially afraid to die, or to be subjected to a different apocalypse, so is he also a victim of “whatever hurts him the most” in this new world…? (I still really wonder how Jon will behave in front of Elias. We’ve seen, again and again, how labelling someone/something as a “monster” doesn’t cover the whole reality of it: the “criminals” were mostly dragged down by society, the cruel “avatars” had often been preyed upon when they were vulnerable… I can still dig Jonah as TheWorstTM, the selfish asshole who doomed the world for his own benefit; but I also feel like it would be very in synch with this season to… mostly have Jon spitting to his face about how pitiful and afraid he had been, and how fear had motivated his actions way more than he thought?)

* What is “what hurts Basira the most”, then? Is it to have to kill Daisy? To see and acknowledge their past actions? I wonder what will happen to her next: will she be pulled back in into a domain? Will she be spared because of Jon’s presence, or because of her connection to The Eye because she’s still an assistant? (I’m thinking again about the possibility of Jon’s victims being in the Panopticon right now: the assistants were protected from the nightmares once they had signed the contract… but Martin, Basira, Melanie and Georgie had all given their statements to Jon. Would they happen to all be journeying towards his domains in a way, because they belong there because of the statements they gave…?)

* Big question being, of course… what is “what hurts Jon the most”. Is it the guilt of having launched the apocalypse and having to benefit from it despite his disgust (he’s not hungry anymore, he’s aware that it does feel good in a way that he hates)? Is it to have to be a passive voyeur in this new world? Is it to lose his friends, first with Daisy? Is it The Web dancing around Martin? Is it something he knows about their journey or about the Panopticon, and doesn’t want to tell Martin yet…?

- You could really see Basira’s progression through the episode, as she dealt with how Jon was leading the way:

(MAG178) BASIRA: … You’re sure she came through here? ARCHIVIST: Have I steered you wrong so far? BASIRA: I don’t know, do I? We haven’t actually found her yet. ARCHIVIST: We’re getting closer. BASIRA: Great. […] ARCHIVIST: Great. Well, in that case, shall we move on? BASIRA: After you. ARCHIVIST: … Right. […] BASIRA: … Can we move on, now? ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] Yes. I believe we can. This way.

From being distrustful of Jon to… being way more humble about it, and accepting that he knows what he’s doing and that it’s in her interest, too. From being suspicious and defensive, to cautious and strategic, to confiding and relying on him.

- Overall, I’m “!!” because this episode… managed to sell me on Daisy’s death, while I was really dubious about it?

I was pre-emptively a bit disappointed about the possibility of Daisy coming back as a Hunt beast just to get killed, because I felt that it was a bit pointless to make it drag for so long, while she… could have died on her terms in MAG158 instead. But here, where to reach Daisy, in order to fulfil her promise, Basira has to see, process and acknowledge the harm Daisy had caused and that she had herself enabled? It works for me! It finally unlocks Basira’s own development, that I was hoping for; it’s sad as hell; and it’s not portrayed as Daisy’s punishment or retribution. It’s about both acknowledging the harm and damage Daisy had caused (as the process to be able to catch up to her), and about respecting Daisy as an individual who was capable of growth, exercised it, was aware of the wrong she had done and firmly owned up to it, and didn’t want to return to that life – but was forced to by a power too big and crushing, and circumstances playing against her. It’s not done as an act of hate or revenge, or because Daisy’s crimes are too heavy for her to be allowed to live. It’s not a death sentence. It’s both about acknowledging Daisy’s crimes and how she had wrecked people’s lives, how she had been allowed and enabled to unleash her violence and unfairness, how Basira had willingly decided to ignore most of Daisy’s actions, and it’s because Daisy didn’t want to be a “sadistic predator” again, and asked Basira to stop her, respecting the fact that Daisy had improved as a person (to the point that she knew she couldn’t ask for “forgiveness”). So, I’m relieved about how things are heading: it’s sad as fuck, I’m going to be miserable, but so far, things sound incredibly satisfying, narratively?

(We know that The Eye might influence Jon to only see the worse or more painful side of things, so I’m not entirely ruling out that there could be a surprise, Martin doing something, or Annabelle, or Georgie&Melanie appearing with a solution? But I doubt it: I’m satisfied with the explanations given, how we’re prepared to say goodbye to Daisy, how respectful it is both of her victims and of her awareness of the harm she had caused, leading to her decision to be better… So, really, I’m fine. Crying in advance but FINE.)

MAG179’s title screams “Basira!” (but could technically apply to Annabelle or Helen, or Jon himself…). I’m not sure Daisy is getting killed this episode, but we might get a whiff of her? Or a cliff-hanger about her towards the end?

Domain-wise, mm… Could be a pause like MAG167, could be Hunt or Slaughter, Corruption? (It does feel like an anti-Lonely title, mostly!)

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soveryanon · 4 years

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Reviewing time for MAG169 (nice)~

- So, no cookie for guessing Desolation with this one, but big kudos to those who guessed that the episode would be reminiscent of the Grenfell Tower fire. Oh boy, what a domain it was ;; Desolation episodes have always felt extremely cruel and this one went veeerrry harsh on the torture and despair, even before the physical pain of it (as Jon said, “Some fears don’t need to be intensified; only manifested”). I really felt the nightmare-logic in this one, the feeling of being trapped and discovering/realising the rules and parameters as they became relevant; a little scenario that felt repeated, again and again, beginning badly (home as a prison, a toxic place that one cannot help but love because it’s familiar and theirs) and only getting worse, with Sabina losing everything (parents, possessions, physical safety), while at the same time… everything was rooted in something very concrete, very logical, very relatable, laced with poverty and the loss of agency.

- The edge in Jon’s voice for this one was terrifying (and so was the soundscaping, expressing what was being said), and it seemed… on point for The Desolation. Jude directly called him out about the fact that he himself was enjoying the fear but, even before that, the way Jon narrated Sabina’s nightmare really hammered in the cruelty and sadistic glee of the domain feeding on her ;; The mentions of the “landlord” were especially chilling, given a rhythmic, almost casually fatalistic c’est-la-vie tone to the whole ordeal (… while no, clearly, it wasn’t, and even if the fire had been accidental, there should have been ways and options to make it out… but no, due to an accumulation of negligence/neglect turning into something criminal):

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “But the door latch never really aligned properly, you see; the landlord always said he was going to get it fixed and… it refuses to open. […] The window frame never really opened properly, you see; the landlord always said he was going to get it fixed. […] But the fire escape was always really rusty, you see; the landlord always said he was going to replace it. […] Falling back into the inferno that is now her home, Sabina dashes over to the laughably small fire extinguisher the landlord begrudgingly provided; it is sputtering, and empty.”

(… Jon impersonating the parents’ screams sadly took me out of it on first listen, because the “We’re BURNING” immediately made me think of Jonny-playing-Galahad in HNOC’s “Hellfire” and the “We’re FALLING into the flames”, which was a bit of a mood-whiplash x”) It worked better on second listen, and again, WHAT is Jon currently feeding to the tape recorders…)

- Same as in other domains, memories were clearly rewritten or only made accessible to serve the dominant Fear at stake:

For Sabina, memories were only useful to represent what she would lose. (;; It’s one of the things that still makes me the most uneasy with this season: the fact that regular people are deprived of who they used to be, the memories of who they were… while Jon&Martin are beaming with their Uniqueness. People are trapped in these nightmares but, by comparison, it feels a bit like they’re already “dead” and interchangeable, only allowed to remember things and be reshaped to better fear and feed the Powers…)

- I was wondering what would be the point of avatars in this new world (if they would still feed their patrons, or be absolutely superfluous, etc.). The fact that Jude’s death apparently didn’t perturb the Desolation domain very much tends to prove that they aren’t necessary, so it really seems like the keyword was what Oliver said last episode:

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “Sometimes, for some small variety, I will allow Danika to brush against another root: the final fate of someone she loves. […] And with each one, she knows her steps forward bring closer not only her own end, but all of theirs. Time walks forward with her, but she has not the strength to stop it. Her fate draws ever-nearer, filling me with the joy of watchful fear, but also my own concerns.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: It’s a maze in there, deliberately so. People running, desperately struggling for fire escapes only to find them blocked. … We won’t get lost, though. I know the route. […] “Do you smell smoke? Do you smell… the creeping ruin of a life, a stalking creature of unmaintained electricals, of cheap insulation, of cut-corners and missing fire alarms and unenforced safety regulations? Do you see it creeping under the door to your bedroom as you sleep, the burning coals of its eyes, regarding you in the supposed safety on your home; not indifferent, but hungry, eager to take everything from you, to burn down your life in any sense it can reach? Can you hear the crackling promise of kindled despair, that it whispers into your uneasy, dreaming ear?”

“Variety”? Creativity? Diversifying people’s suffering for the Powers’ enjoyment, and above all The Eye’s? I… wonder what that would mean regarding Jon, as The Eye’s favourite, right now… ;;

- I got genuinely surprised that Jon mentioned Arthur Nolan as still alive, because I thought he had been done for since March 2014 and the events recalled by Jordan Kennedy:

(MAG145) GERTRUDE: So. Now, Diego has taken over… Where does that leave you? ARTHUR: [SNORT] Slumlording over a nest. GERTRUDE: Oh. A nest of… what? ARTHUR: Found a mass of the Crawling Rot growing, a while back. Managed to get a hold of the property before it became too big. Gotta wait ‘til it blossoms before we can properly burn it. So until then… just playing landlord.

(MAG055) JORDAN: Time seemed to move slowly as he reached for the ashtray on the arm of the chair and picked up a pack of matches. He struck one and without even looking at me, he gently pressed the small flame to the centre of the scar. His flesh caught fire, immediately, the flames spreading across his body like rippling water. The armchair caught, then the floor, and then I was running out of the building before the rolling inferno could come at me as well.

(MAG169) MARTIN: Right… I just assumed this would be… Who was that landlord guy? ARCHIVIST: Arthur Nolan. He’s here, he has a… part of it, but it’s… huge. Bigger than you could believe. There’s so much fear in there…

It had felt odd to die from self-immolation, for a Desolation avatar, but we hadn’t seen him since then, and he had lived his time – given how Eugene Vanderstock was aware that he wouldn’t last forever (MAG139: “So, me? I was born in ‘36 – I know, I don’t look seventy. But burning the candle at all ends does have a few advantages. Until you burn out entirely, at least. It’s hard to say how much I’ve got left in me; how much longer my sacrifices can buy me. But when I go… you better believe I’m going big – and it is going to hurt.”), I had assumed that Arthur setting himself on fire was because his time has reached its limit and/or that his life had been tied to The Hive’s nest somehow by Gertrude, and that Jane becoming The Hive meant his final demise or something? But apparently, no, he was still around. I wonder what he was doing during the following four years? (If it was a matter of Desolation avatars respawning in the domain, I’d have expected for Agnes to be mentioned, but she wasn’t, so…)

- Speaking of Arthur, it’s hilarious how much this statement hammered in the confluence of Corruption/Desolation when it comes to one’s life crumbling, getting devastated:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “Maybe the dirt and grime builds up to such a degree that the stench begins to infect your soul, or an infestation of moths or ants or bed bugs stretches itself throughout the very structure of your home, until it feels like your skin is squirming with them. […] How long as she lived here? How long have these cramped, dingy rooms in the back of this sprawling rundown tenement been the place her heart calls home? She cannot recall, but long enough for her to grow into love for it, to cherish every rusted appliance, every crumbling piece of plasterboard, every – flickering – lightbulb. Even as the widening cracks and spreading mould fill her heart with dread, they gently, slowly, inch by inch, approach the mildewed room where her parents lie sleeping.”

… Given Arthur’s utter disdain for the idea that The Lightless Flame could be assimilated to anything Corruption-adjacent:

(MAG145) ARTHUR: Not like I can vent to the others about what a prat Diego is! Got a lot of funny ideas. Still calls The Lightless Flame “Asag”, like he was when he was first researching it. I just want to tell him to get over it – I mean, [FASTER AND FASTER] Asag was traditionally a force of destruction, sure, but as a church, we very much settled on burning in terms of the… face we worship, and some… fish-boiling Sumerian demon doesn’t really match up, does it?! Plus, there’s a lot of disease imagery with Asag that I’ll reckon is… way too close to Filth for my taste, but, but no, he read it in some ~ancient tome~, so that’s that– GERTRUDE: Well, I can’t say I– ARTHUR: –reckons he always knows best, ‘cause he’s read a few books, well. Big. Deal! Way I see it, if a writer can’t even save themselves, they probably don’t have a lot worth knowing! Find me one so-called “expert” on all of this who didn’t end up regretting all of it!

I hope your ego and convictions are shattering and that this is your personal hell, Arthur. Diego was RIGHT.

- Regarding Jon and Martin’s own domains, Jon raised the possibility that they were metaphorically trapped in their own quest, and it follows the comments about how they were outside of the box:

(MAG164) MARTIN: Are we safe, traveling like this? ARCHIVIST: Yes… Yes, sort of, we’re… I don’t know how to phrase it, we’re… something between a pilgrim and a moth. We can walk through these little worlds of terror, watching them; separate, and untouched. MARTIN: [NERVOUS CHUCKLING] That’s not as comforting as you might think. ARCHIVIST: I like it better than the alternative…!

(MAG165) MARTIN: But. You said we needed to go through these places. … Is that even going to work here? ARCHIVIST: Uh… [EXHALE] We need to go through them… metaphorically. MARTIN: Mm… ! ARCHIVIST: Psychologically, we need to… “experience” them. […] MARTIN: Jon, what are you talking about? NOT!SASHA: [FURIOUS SNARLS] ARCHIVIST: She can’t touch us. We’re so far beyond her now. NOT!SASHA: [FURIOUS SNARLS] ARCHIVIST: She’s just like everything else here, rules by The Eye.

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: Like I said, I can’t see the future. It wouldn’t free them, if that’s what you’re asking. “Free” doesn’t really exist in this place. MARTIN: Apart from us. ARCHIVIST: I suppose. I–in a sense, though… [CHUCKLING] how much of that is because we are trapped in our own quest to– MARTIN: Okay, let’s, let’s not dive into another… ontological debate right now, not here.

… and 1°) they’re still technically under The Eye – the whole world is its domain right now; 2°) Obligatory “WHAT IS MARTIN’S DOMAIN” (a fixed place? Web, Lonely? The Institute-Panopticon too? Jon as “the Archive”, having ~trapped~ Martin?), 3°) … big Oouft because if they were to consider their quest as the “domain” trapping them… a quest is made around a goal. Jon presented it as a “doomed quest” which was already worrisome, Oliver highlighted that the current system would ultimately collapse on its own, The Buried’s domain taunted its victims with constant hope, so… if the goal kept being unreachable, but still “almost” out of reach, Jon and Martin could be trapped a bit more literally than just on an ontological plane.

- ;w; Martin is afraid of fire…

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: … You said you were onboard. MARTIN: I was! I am; I just… thought… ARCHIVIST: It wouldn’t hurt? MARTIN: … That we’d be safe. ARCHIVIST: I never said– MARTIN: I know! I know, okay, I just… [SOMETHING SHATTERS] Look, I j–, I just don’t want to get burned, alright? It’s, it’s like my least favourite pain ever. ARCHIVIST: Is that… a joke? MARTIN: No, no! Okay? I… I legitimately hate burns, alright, they’re–they’re awful, and they scar horribly, and they just, it– It–it just makes me sick, I–I hate it. Hate it!

* Is it related to the fact that he had to care for his mom from a very young age, and that accidents happened…? That makes his decision to burn statements in MAG117-MAG118 even braver – fire that he could control on his terms, but still, in close proximity to him.

* … Actually, Elias implanting in his mind the truth of how his mother saw him, while Martin had just burned a few statements and was threatening to keep doing it, and when the smell of the fire might have still be floating around at that moment miiiight have added fuel (ha) to Martin’s own fear. Associating bad things and pain to fire.

* Wooft that he hates burns and what they leave, when he’s probably been walking kilometres holding Jon’s all-burned-to-fuck hand.

* YEAH ALSO, that line about how pain can leave a scar even if there is no physical mark to show for it? Is valid on its own but, given Martin’s past, resonates even more when keeping in mind his relationship with his mother and the way Elias inflicted his powers on him and Melanie (MAG118: “Do you want to know what she sees when she looks at you?”). It’s really not empty words, he knows from experience.

* … Same thing as the contrast between MAG117 (“This way I finally get to do something. It’s gonna hurt, but… I’m ready. And I want to. Also, I get to burn some stuff, so that cool!”) and MAG118 (“Don’t. burn. any more. statements.”) around fire: reality not as great as when plans were made, when it comes to the “smiting”, uh.

* … Obligatory “This Is How Web!Martin Can Still Win” since The Desolation and The Web were extremely at odds, and Martin… really was uncomfortable and panicking in this zone, when he had been keeping it together in previous ones (he got very afraid in the Slaughter’s, but it was the first and Martin was discovering the rules):

(MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “The compromise we came to… was Hill Top Road. We knew it was a stronghold of The Web, full of other children Agnes’s age. We would supervise from a distance, but were confident she would be in no danger. The Mother of Puppets has always suffered at our hand – all the manipulation and subtle venom in the world means nothing against a pure and unrestrained force of destruction and ruin.”

(Though to be fair: Martin presented himself as a “luxury smörgåsbord” for Fears in MAG117 since he was “just afraid all the time”, was always the Assistant Of Many Fears throughout the series, so it doesn’t have to be significatively a Web indicator – it’s mostly that, well, alright, so Martin can still feel specific, personal fears.)

- … And meanwhile: we went from Jon really casually forgetting that he was using his powers and knew more than he mundanely should have (the beginning of MAG167) to taking a moment to remember that Martin is not omniscient nor a mind-reader, not processing that pain (even temporary and without long-lasting damage) is a genuine factor, and admitting blankly that he’s feeding from this world, which, oops:

(MAG167) [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: Help us with what? MARTIN: ‘xcuse me? ARCHIVIST: Annabelle, help us with “what”? Our–our, our journey, killing Elias, vanishing the Entities – what? [FOOTSTEPS STOP] MARTIN: Please don’t do that. ARCHIVIST: Do what…? Oh! Oh. Right, I, I see, yes. [STATIC FADES] Well, I– … [FOOTSTEPS RESUME] Sorry. MARTIN: It doesn’t… feel great, having someone looking inside your head…! […] I mean, I don’t want to keep secrets from you, but– ARCHIVIST: You should at least… be able to. MARTIN: Basically, yeah…! ARCHIVIST: I–I suppose that’s fair. MARTIN: It’s just… It’s weird, knowing that you can… know literally everything I think and feel– ARCHIVIST: Right… MARTIN: –especially since you’re not exactly the most open of people. Emotionally, I mean.

(MAG169) MARTIN: … Seriously? You don’t– … It’s on fire, Jon, it’s– ARCHIVIST: Yeah, uh… MARTIN: It’s a burning building! ARCHIVIST: Yes, it is. MARTIN: That’s on fire! ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: … Right. You are aware that traditionally, wading into a flaming inferno is actually considered bad for your health? ARCHIVIST: Yes, Martin. It will be fine. MARTIN: Alright. I just wanted to check. So. Okay. We’re planning to go through… all this, so I’m guessing the fire can’t… actually burn us! Right? Jon? ARCHIVIST: Hum… MARTIN: … Jon? ARCHIVIST: Hum… Mm… MARTIN: Jon. ARCHIVIST: I–it’s complicated. MARTIN: Well, if you want me to go in there with you, then I suggest you find a way to make it simple. “Yes” or “no”, can that fire hurt us? ARCHIVIST: Define “hurt”. MARTIN: Will the fire feel hot to me? ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: Will it cause me lots of pain, if I touch it? ARCHIVIST: Yes, though not as much as– MARTIN: [SHAKILY BUT STRONG] Will it burn me alive, and kill me dead? ARCHIVIST: … No. It can’t do us any permanent harm; once we’re out, we’ll be fine. MARTIN: You are aware that intense pain can do you loads of harm, even if there’s no any physical injury! […] ARCHIVIST: I should have told you before, so… I leave the decision to you. You know my feelings on the matter. MARTIN: I do? ARCHIVIST: I… Oh, right. I–I want revenge on Jude Perry. I want to… “smite” her. Make her feel what… [SIGH] what all her victims have felt. But I’m not willing to force you to suffer for it. […] JUDE: Yeah, but you like seeing their pain, don’t you? Their fear? ARCHIVIST: … Yes.

His relation to pain is understandable as someone who got “used” to the concept of hurting himself by repeatedly getting harmed, getting marked, and accepting more injuries to reach his goals and protect/save people who were close to him (and it’s very ironic that Martin used to be portrayed as the one “always setting himself on fire to keep others warm” while Jon… selectively did and does that too). The fact he’s feeding from this world is not a new thing: Jonah had announced that Jon would be tailored for this world, Jon himself pointed it out in the trailer, Helen toyed with him by being implicit about it – what is new is the… reverence? with which Jon seemed to marvel at the Desolation domain, the glee during the statement, the deadpanness when Jude called him out on it. It felt like at the beginning of the season, Jon was expressing more guilt, more uneasiness when it came to his enjoyment of this world… and in this episode, those were absent. So is it that he’s gradually accepting it? Or that he was trying to make a point to Martin about himself, about the fact that he is also (objectively) a monster and needs Martin to keep him in check if he doesn’t want to turn out like the others? No idea, but I feel like something is happening and building up about it;;

(… Was Jon feeding from Martin, in the Desolation domain? Martin who was miserable and afraid, coughing and in pain?)

- I LOVED the effect of Jon being in his small “bubble” of pouring out the statement, only for Martin to fight his way to get him out of it:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: “Limping and desperate, she turns to see her furniture in flames, the bookshelves full of memories, that she can’t quite place [STATIC RISES] but knows are precious to her, curl and float away as ash. The photos on the wall of her family–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: “–whose faces seem indistinct but she knows–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! ARCHIVIST: “–that she loves, begin to blacken, as the glass–” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon! [COUGHS] ARCHIVIST: “–pops out of the frame.” MARTIN: [MUFFLED, DISTANT] Jon, she’s here! ARCHIVIST: “Her home is being eaten alive by–” MARTIN: [CLOSER] Please come back! ARCHIVIST: “–this devouring Desolation–” MARTIN: JON! ARCHIVIST: “–and she–” [RESOUNDING SLAP] [STATIC FADES] MARTIN: She’s here! [COUGHS]

* … So, interestingly, Martin could actually get him out of it this time, while he had mentioned in MAG167 that he couldn’t stop Jon. Was it because the “statement” was different: given by the Desolation domain in this one vs. Jon giving a statement through his “knowing” in MAG167? Is it because Martin was outside of the statement mode, not listening to it (so able to break it, since he wasn’t enthralled by it)? Or is it because Martin has been becoming stronger by getting in contact with the domains? Or because he actually could have stopped Jon in MAG167… but didn’t, because he was curious, too, and preferred to think and say that he was entirely caught in the statement?

(* With MAG160, that’s the SECOND time Martin slapped Jon to “get him back” in some way. Gotta love how Jon shaking him off from The Lonely was by breaking out the violins and making an emotional confession and baring his soul to him vs. Martin, getting Jon back into focus by screaming and slapping him. Different kind of powers when there is an emergency.)

* … I’m very interested in the fact that the tape recorder was with Jon in that tiny statement bubble, while Martin was heard muffled from the outside. It wasn’t only Jon’s POV: it was, above all, the tape recorder’s, hearing the statement more distinctly than Martin. It illustrated the situation very well (Jon being unreachable and following the story, and the outside having trouble interacting with him), but I wonder what caused the bubble to exist in the first place: the Desolation domain contaminating Jon with his story? Beholding, focusing its attention on Jon because he was acting as a vessel while narrating Sabina’s story? Or the tape recorder, since Jon was feeding it?

- It’s noteworthy that so far, avatars have all been able to identify Jon as the one having provoked this apocalypse, and not “just” as an avatar beneficiating from it the most since The Eye is his patron:

(MAG164) HELEN: What would I have to gloat about? Much as I am delighted by this brave new world in which we find ourselves, I can take no credit for it. This was all… you!

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “This report is being sent to: [STATIC FADES] The Great Eye, that watches all who linger in terror, and gorges itself on the sufferings of those under its unrelenting, stuporous gaze! And its Archive, which draws knowledge of this suffering unto itself. […] Perhaps once it might have horrified me, or given me some sense of pursuing the ultimate release of the world that you have damned.”

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: Hello, Jude. JUDE: Fancy seeing you both here. To what, exactly, do I owe the pleasure, the honour, of being graced by the great and powerful Archivist, harbinger of this new world, and his, uh… valet…? […] Sure, I moan about The Eye, who doesn’t? But, we’ve won! Both of us. And… that’s great!

Seems like they got a special knowledge or are able to feel his status in the new world? It’s still cracking me up that nobody ever mentions Jonah and his participation, and that he’s absolutely irrelevant (while he was the one to scheme and pushe and engineer this apocalypse in the first place).

- Gigantic dread as soon as Jon mentioned Jude, because y i k e s: technically, we heard about avatars who felt extremely ruthless and cruel, such as John Amherst or Arthur Nolan, but those had belonged more to Gertrude’s era. Jude Perry was the one who felt the most gratuitous and deliberate in her cruelty, in Jon’s era? And despite that, was mostly staying in her lane – Jon had to look her up to find her in MAG089, she never went after him? So the idea that he was trying to confront her and bringing Martin with him (… without warning him at first), that he sought her out and was planning to kill her, felt dangerous and worrisome.

- Gotta love, about the “valet”-thing, how:

* It’s payback for Jon’s “I just… er, you were a friend of Agnes Montague, correct?” (MAG089). Opposite of mlm/wlw solidarity.

* ONCE AGAIN, after Elias, after Peter, after maybe Helen currently?, it’s an avatar underestimating Martin on sight.

- It felt to me like Jon was mostly seeking answers or a form of peace of mind than genuinely getting revenge, or helping Jude’s victims? He insisted on his questions all through their confrontation:

(MAG169) ARCHIVIST: I have a question for you. I’ve been wondering. MARTIN: [COUGHS] ARCHIVIST: Did you know what you were doing? JUDE: Excuse me? ARCHIVIST: When you burned me. Marked me with… Did you know it would lead to… all of this? [CRUMBLING] JUDE: You came all this way just to ask that? ARCHIVIST: Answer the question. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: If you want to know so badly, why don’t you just reach into my head and pull it out? ARCHIVIST: Because I want to hear you say it. Willingly. JUDE: What difference does it make if it’s– ARCHIVIST: Just answer the damn question…! JUDE: … No. I had no idea. ARCHIVIST: So why did you do it? JUDE: Why do you think? Because I wanted to hurt you. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: Because you were annoying, and I didn’t like you! So I hurt you. ARCHIVIST: And if you had? JUDE: But I didn’t. Look. I don’t care, okay? MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: I just… I don’t. Raking over the past like it matters, like it means anything… The past is dead, Archivist; ashes in the wind. We’re – here – now. And that’s it! ARCHIVIST: … I suppose you’re right…!

And this time, it wasn’t a tug-o’-war of question/answer resulting in one’s death (Peter), or an impulsive murder (Not!Sasha). It was planned and controlled, and deliberate. And it didn’t feel good at all: it was really a horrible scene, with Martin coughing and coughing in the background (… and Jon not paying it any attention), the execution dragging out and taking time, because Jon was processing slowly and not… giving the final blow. I really wondered if he was going to just stop, or if it wouldn’t work, or if Martin would ask him to stop – but no, quite the contrary, it’s Martin who yelled for it to be done:

(MAG169) MARTIN: [COUGHS] [STATIC RISING: LOW AND SPIRALLING, PRESSURING] JUDE: Uh! Listen… Listen… [BREATHLESS CHUCKLING] You’re enjoying this, right? ‘Course you are! You want to use those powers of yours to hurt people, you want to murder everybody who can’t fight back at you now? I can help you…! [DIGITAL GLITCHING SOUNDS] MARTIN: Just DIE already!! JUDE: You’re… not… better… than… me! [SCREAMS] [DIGITAL BURSTING, RIPPING SOUNDS] [STATIC DECREASES AND FADES] MARTIN: [COUGH] [PANTING] Is it…? ARCHIVIST: It’s over. … She’s gone.

;; There was something very… child-like, in Martin’s scream? You know, the kind of absolute rejection because he’s hurt and because in his mind there is no other way than for the other person to disappear for him to feel good ever again? I hadn’t paid much attention with Not!Sasha, but technically, the distorted, glitching sounds before and during the ripping of both the Not!Them and Jude sounded very close to Peter’s own static (and Martin’s, when he disappeared in front of Georgie): is it possible that he might have contributed in both cases, or amplified it? Or was it “only” Jon all through it?

- There is something very fitting in the fate of avatars, lately: the Not!Them was forced to “know” the suffering of its victims before getting ripped away from existence; Oliver was not rejecting death and knew it would come from him at some point, and Jon fittingly decided to spare him (although he was aware of the irony); Helen-the-Distortion is an ambivalent case (Jon can threaten her, but they can talk, it’s a bit of an unstable relationship the balance of which could shift at any time); Jude was inflected the suffering of her victims (and desolated herself in a way). It’s kinda fitting, for The Stranger, The End, The Spiral and The Desolation? I wonder how much the Domains are influencing Jon’s behaviour towards their agents, regardless of his personal feelings about them…

- Regarding Jon&Martin, it’s really heartbreaking that they are trying to navigate around and with each other’s feelings, trying to find the “right” decision regarding choices and boundaries… and that it backfired so badly due to the circumstances and the fact that, right now, they can’t really make an ideal, non-harming decision:

(MAG169) MARTIN: Jon, is there another way? ARCHIVIST: I mean… sort of? M–maybe? [SILENCE] MARTIN: That turn…! You, you took a hard turn after the roots back there. I knew that was a thing! Why are we here? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] It’s just… [INHALE] When you said… [SIGH] MARTIN: Jon, why have you taken us here? ARCHIVIST: Jude Perry. … This is where Jude Perry rules. […] You said you were onboard. MARTIN: I was! I am; I just… thought… ARCHIVIST: It wouldn’t hurt? MARTIN: … That we’d be safe. ARCHIVIST: I never said– MARTIN: I know! I know, okay, I just… […] ARCHIVIST: … Alright. If you really don’t want to do this, we, we can go another way. MARTIN: Really…? ARCHIVIST: Really. My revenge… [SIGH] Well, let’s just say you’re more important. […] So are we going in, or not? MARTIN: You’re– … I, you’re asking me? ARCHIVIST: I should have told you before, so… I leave the decision to you. You know my feelings on the matter. MARTIN: I do? ARCHIVIST: I… Oh, right. I–I want revenge on Jude Perry. I want to… “smite” her. Make her feel what… [SIGH] what all her victims have felt. But I’m not willing to force you to suffer for it. MARTIN: Okay, so it’s… I have to choose, do I? ARCHIVIST: Or we could sit here. [SILENCE] [DISTANT SOUND OF SOMETHING COLLAPSING] MARTIN: … No. No, I–I’m not going to choose, I d–I don’t think that’s a fair decision to put on me. It’s your revenge; your choice, not mine. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: … Fine. We go in. [DISTANT SOUND OF SOMETHING COLLAPSING] MARTIN: [SHAKY INHALE] Al–alright then…! ARCHIVIST: We’ll be fine. MARTIN: J– Lead the way. [BAG JOSTLING]

It was good of Jon to admit that he should ask Martin, and expressed reluctance at the idea of putting him in an uncomfortable position for his own revenge! It was good of Martin, to establish once again that he didn’t want to bear the burden of deciding for both of them (MAG154: “Don’t do this.” “Do what?” “Make it my decision.”), while it was explicitly about what Jon wanted! … But it also feels like Jon would have needed Martin to decide agree to go for him if the goal was for Jon to find some peace of mind with his revenge, and that Martin would have needed Jon to say that no, definitely not, his revenge wasn’t worth endangering and harming Martin.

(Though, I feel like Martin was the most hurt of them both, this time around ;; He sounded absolutely miserable at the end of the episode, and he had been the one to begrudgingly agree to follow Jon after making it clear that he wouldn’t like the experience… I’m really surprised that Jon stuck to the “revenge” concept while he knew what was at stake for Martin. Really hoping that they will talk about it soon ;;)

- ;; Technically, Jude made a lot of valid points regarding Jon-as-an-avatar:

(MAG169) JUDE: You’re not scared, though, are you, Archivist? ARCHIVIST: … I can feel the pain of every person you have trapped here. My own isn’t all that different. JUDE: Yeah, but you like seeing their pain, don’t you? Their fear? ARCHIVIST: … Yes. JUDE: You and that stupid Eye, god, you make me sick! Lording it over everybody like you own the place? You’re just leeches, voyeurs, parasites on the real monsters. […] Oooh, I see! I get it. You finally get a sniff of power, and the first thing you do is try to settle some old scores. MARTIN: [LOUDER COUGHS] JUDE: Play the big man, get off on good old-fashioned petty revenge~! […] I’m happy in this world. I belong here. And so do you. MARTIN: [COUGHS] [STATIC RISING: LOW AND SPIRALLING, PRESSURING] JUDE: Uh! Listen… Listen… [BREATHLESS CHUCKLING] You’re enjoying this, right? ‘Course you are! You want to use those powers of yours to hurt people, you want to murder everybody who can’t fight back at you now? I can help you…! [DIGITAL GLITCHING SOUNDS] MARTIN: Just DIE already!! JUDE: You’re… not… better… than… me! [SCREAMS]

He presented it to Martin as “revenge”. He went out of his way to find Jude, first hiding it from Martin and then deliberately making the decision of going after her after he learned that Martin would be terrorised by the domain (but ready to follow him if Jon really wanted to go). Jude’s execution also exists in contrast to Oliver, whom Jon had decided to spare because he had “helped” him (… to wake up as an avatar), while knowing full well that Oliver had killed people too (MAG121) and that he was currently torturing victims in his domains (in creative, cruel ways for “VARIETY”…). Jude’s smiting didn’t feel like an application of justice, or as something fair; it just felt like personal retribution, because Jon has the power to do it. There is something reassuring in the fact that the whole scene didn’t bring any catharsis, felt so extremely anti-climatic and miserable (Martin was in pain and on the verge of tears, wanted to leave the place; Jon wasn’t triumphant), because Jon behaved as the plaintiff, the legislature, the judge and the executioner – it is terrifying in itself that he has the power to establish who would have the “right” to die or to keep torturing people following whether or not they’ve served his interests.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: I just, I don’t think he’s… [SIGH] I don’t know, I don’t think he’s evil. MARTIN: Oh, yeah, sure, he’s probably a really kind, benevolent ruler of a hellish fear prison…! ARCHIVIST: It’s just… He helped me. Wh–when I was… He woke me up. […] But I’m not going to… seek him out. At the very least, he’s earned not having me hunt him down. MARTIN: Fine. I suppose that’s… reasonable. […] ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] No. If Oliver will not seek me out, then… I will leave him be. [TINY CHUCKLES] The avatar of Death… shall live. Martin’s going to be thrilled…! [SIGH]

(MAG169) MARTIN: [COUGH] [PANTING] Is it…? ARCHIVIST: It’s over. … She’s gone. MARTIN: [PAINED] The fires are still here. Doesn’t look like much has changed. ARCHIVIST: … No. I suppose not. [CRUMBLING SOUND] MARTIN: [SHAKILY] … Let’s just get out of here.

Jude was indeed that one avatar we wanted to see disappear (since the was gleeful about hurting, that she chose to get involved in the cult and didn’t join it to escape another horrible fate, that she admitted she didn’t regret this world nor the hurt she had to Jon himself); but her accusations had some truth in them precisely because Jon had just decided to spare Oliver given their own relationship – while Oliver, too, had admitted that he was torturing and enjoying people for the fun of it. Jon’s judgement… doesn’t work. And since nothing changed in the domain, it just proved that avatars themselves weren’t the real problem at the root – the Fear-system is still in place, still working, with or without them, still hurting and feeding from people.

(… And it also highlights that, indeed, right now, Jon is “made” for this world, as Jonah had hypothesised in MAG160. He’s been shown grieving the old world, being eaten by guilt, refusing to embrace the fact that the Fears around him feel “right” at the beginning of the season. But he’s currently feeding from this world and still enjoying victims’ pain on some level – what would happen, if Jon&Martin managed to successfully revert the world back in some way? Would Jon still be able to survive?)

- We’ll see if Jon and Martin talk about it soon, but it sure feels like a conversation regarding the “smiting” is needed. Martin seems to have experienced first-hand that it’s nnooooot as good in practice as in theory (he was miserable, in pain, coughing his lungs out, witnessed Jon choose to willingly bring him into a discomforting, potentially triggering place in the name of it), but I’m not sure it will be enough for him to reconsider the idea, or to point out that… he had been wrong about it, and that the logic of killing avatars as an easy, evident, helpful thing… is actually not that simple, since it didn’t change anything. (Probably because they have to aim higher.)

I’m really not sure about their future stances regarding other avatars, because, really, who could feel as “deserving” as Jude? Jon might want his rib back, but he technically gave it to Jared as part of an agreement (and Jared honoured his half of the deal!); Daisy would “at best” represent an attempt at mercy-killing if Jon were to try anything (and it certainly wouldn’t feel good); Julia&Trevor… indeed caused the chaos in MAG158, which also led to Daisy snapping, but would it be enough to want to “smite” them? (Meanwhile, if Jon meets Simon: same as Oliver, given his relationship to his patron, he would probably just embrace his own death.)

Plus, if Jude’s execution felt unsatisfying now, I really doubt that doing anything to Jonah would feel satisfying either? It… wouldn’t solve anything or fix the world back.

- I really wonder what’s happening in Jon’s head right now, if everything was a conscious decision that more or less backfired (ha), or if there are once again influences at stake… Did he really go after Jude because, like Martin suggested, Jon thought it could free or at least relieve the people imprisoned in that domain? Jon can’t see the future, but he could have “known” what had happened to the Not!Them’s carousel to get an indication of what happens in those cases; it… didn’t sound like a genuine reason. Same thing with the concept of revenge: Jon was scared of it just a few episodes ago (MAG166: “Because I’m ashamed, Martin. […] Yes! Ashamed of the fact that I… destroyed the world and have been rewarded for it; the fact that… I can walk safe through all this horror I’ve created like a fucking tourist, destroying whoever I please; the fact that I… enjoyed it, and… the fact that there are… so many others, that I still want to revenge myself on!”), and if it had been only about revenge, he wouldn’t have needed to ask Jude all these questions and to delay the moment when he would actually end her. Was it because he hoped that Jude would regret, would have behaved differently if she had known that it would lead to the apocalypse? Was it because he wanted to check with himself whether “smiting” her deliberately would feel good, fair and right? Was it because he thought that trusting Martin’s judgement and killing avatars would indeed be the best course of action? Was it because he wanted to prove a point to Martin – that he’s a monster too, and/or that killing doesn’t feel as great in practice as on the paper?

… His behaviour in this episode reminded me so much of MAG141, however, and how coldly rational he had sounded about what he was doing to Floyd, as if it was a logical and implacable course of action; so I can’t help but wonder if there is Eye-related influence at play. Pushing him to hurt other avatars for The Eye’s entertainment, to feed from the ones who are usually feared? For “variety”, too?

- … Regarding Jon’s powers, I had briefly wondered whether Jon was still able to compel, given what Oliver had mentioned, but mMMMmmm…

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “Please, Jon, do not interpret this report as a “plea for mercy” or a “call to action”. I would have offered it willingly, of course, but to do so is no longer an option. You cannot ask; you may only take.”

(MAG169) JUDE: You came all this way just to ask that? ARCHIVIST: Answer the question. MARTIN: [COUGHS] JUDE: If you want to know so badly, why don’t you just reach into my head and pull it out? ARCHIVIST: Because I want to hear you say it. Willingly. JUDE: What difference does it make if it’s– ARCHIVIST: Just answer the damn question…! JUDE: … No. I had no idea.

Since compelling Peter to death, Jon has never been shown forcing an answer out of someone again. He has been shown “knowing” things with alarming ability, being almost entirely omniscient at this point (MAG164: “Okay. So… how much can you see? What else do you know?” “Uh… Maybe everything…!”), whether it’s prompted by someone’s questions (as Martin demonstrated) or Jon just knowing things on his own accord. He has demonstrated a new way to deal with “statements”: getting filled with the Fears suffusing his surroundings, and having to “pour out” these statements into the tape recorder (MAG162: “This cabin. It’s not right. And, when I thought that, I–I felt… It, it all poured out of me down… into the tape.”). He has manifested his new Eye-related ability to turn the Feared into the Fearful, eradicating monsters and avatars (MAG166: “But The Eye still rules. All this fear is being performed for its benefit. And so, there are now exactly two roles available in this new world of ours: the watcher, and the watched. Subject, and object. Those who are feared, and those who are afraid. And Jon, well… he is part of The Eye; a very important part. And he’s able to, shall we say… shift its focus. Turn the one into the other.”). But compulsion as the act of asking a question and forcing an answer out of someone? Nothing since the beginning of the season. It might be nothing, but Oliver has always known so much about Jon and his situation, and Jude directly made a reference to that power when Jon didn’t use it, so… it could indeed be a thing.

(Or it’s also possible that, after Peter resisted compulsion to the point of dying, Jon fears that ability and what it could do, and purposefully stopped using it?)

MAG170’s title is… MmMMmm. If this an episode regarding a territory, I would say Spiral or Flesh (… and Jared in particular). It could also be about things outside of a domain, like what happened with “Curiosity” – and then, I’d see ways for it to be an outside POV (Jonah? Annabelle?) and/or other characters coming back (Georgie&Melanie? Basira? … stumbling upon/finding Daisy…?). And/or Martin talking about himself – we know so little about his pre-Archives life, I feel ;; (Same for Basira…) There could also be a way to connect with something mentioned about Agnes in MAG067…

(… It’s also making me think of Albrecht’s library / the Black Forest crypt and what Jonah did of the books…)

#mag169 #tma liveblog #tma season 4 #tma spoilers/#long post/#the magnus archives

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soveryanon · 4 years

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Reviewing time for MAG173!

- … It was absolutely terrible, horrible, upsetting, and I loved it – it was indeed answering that little question about the children, the answer was still absolutely horrifying even given the circumstances, and I needed to hear that level of discomfort&upset from Jon and Martin themselves about victims in general. (Though I’m a bit “it took CHILDREN for you to truly react with horror?!” x”))

I really like how this episode already felt like something that was… not a conclusion (really not; not yet), but something that couldn’t have happened right at the start of the season. It demonstrated explicitly why the “smiting” is not a viable option; it returned to the foreground what the actual problem is (the Fear-system, not the individual avatars having a small or large benefit in it); and it allowed for Jon and Martin to let their points come across a bit more explicitly in a way that didn’t feel like a full blown-up conflict either. They argue, they have conflicting views, but they’re also getting better at understanding the other’s mindset and limitations (the journey is not only through the domains; it’s also a journey of navigating with someone else who operates differently from you, and has other ways to cope, and learning how to push forwards carrying your differences).

- The “statements” of the children were heartbreaking ;_; Poem for The Stranger, formal report for The End, botanic manual for The Flesh, theatrical play for The Web… and now a children’s book for The Dark.

Stylistically, the use of repetitions and more simplistic words, constructions and reasoning, in Jack and Caitlin’s stories, really made me feel that it was about children, for children, in the mind of children? I love that their fears felt extremely logical: there is an absolute certainty in their fears, in what the monsters are, what they would do to them. The monsters and their tortures (what they want to do to the kids) are simple, but also very concrete and straightforward (and so is the name “Night Street” for the territory! It tells what it is). The kids’ beliefs are ruthlessly clinical. There’s no need to be fancy; it works as is. Even the adults’ rules sound concrete – but arbitrary and cruel, becoming neglect, leaving the kids at the mercy of monsters. And it’s interesting that we don’t see the monsters actually catching any of the kids: the apocalypse is mostly an extension of their fears removing anything that could appease or protect them (there is no light, no day after the night, nobody comes when they scream and the “adults” are unresponsive and useless; the kids are on their own).

On that note, pretty sure that the adults mentioned were not actually there (“Dad’s dead. Mum’s here but she lost it a while back. So now it’s just me.”, “Some grown-ups are not in bed, but they do not want to help Jack. They want to be alone. They don’t want any children around at all. They tell Jack it is after his bedtime, and put him in another dark room where he cannot run…! So no grown-ups told Jack to run into the dark.”, “Her mother is downstairs, but she is part of the sofa now. She won’t stop staring at the television and laughing. Laughing and laughing. She doesn’t like it, when Caitlin is awake. She doesn’t hear it, if she screams.”), mostly convictions in the kids’ mind to reinforce their hopelessness. But aouch: it seems like the domains, while showing some aspects of other fears (the kids are constantly hunted, what the monsters could do to them is close to Flesh-territory, etc.), are not really functioning as “collaborative” projects. If they were, pretty sure that some parents could be ensnared by Desolation or Beholding, for example, forced to watch their children getting tortured but unable to help and save them ;;

How the fear worked was also very on point for children’s psyche:

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: “Callum smiles and says he’s found a brand new monster! Jack doesn’t want to hear about it. He knows that when Callum tells him what it is, then it will start to chase him. He won’t see it, of course, because it’s just too dark! But he will know it’s there.”

Callum literally creates the fears of the monsters, which creates the monsters themselves. The conviction makes them true. And it really works that way when you’re a kid! Something that has been told to you, or that you saw/read somewhere (“Caitlin read a picture book once, full of horrible spiky fish with big eyes and crooked teeth. She would see them every time she went to bed for weeks. That was what the monsters looked like, she was sure of it. They would grip her, with their nasty cold fins, and bite her head clean off.”), is too powerful to be contained in pages and becomes a tangible threat that you’re sure is personally coming after you.

- … I live for the Dark vs. Eye animosity and:

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: Childish fears are… simplistic. MARTIN: [LONG EXHALE] ARCHIVIST: Direct. [SHAKINGLY] The Eye prefers the more complex neuroses and disquiets of a fully developed mind…! So the children are allowed to age… MARTIN: [DEEP INTAKES OF BREATH] ARCHIVIST: And they are placed in domains where their fears can… mature. Domains like this one. MARTIN: Christ, that’s… that’s messed up! ARCHIVIST: … Yes.

… The Eye throwing the kids at The Dark, because they’re not that satisfying on their own, so The Dark can have them. Beholding, please.

é_è Regarding the kids’ fears “maturing”, we get glimpses of that with Jack and Caitlin – there are very clear Hunt-vibes (being constantly pursued), but also some Lonely (nobody is coming for them), some Flesh and Slaughter (getting mutilated, consumed, being meat for the monsters), and I could very well see some Spiral sneaking in (not being confident in their sense of reality)…

The most upsetting part is how this domain and its function… felt thought through? That sort of grooming requires organisation to engineer a fear-machine. It’s not only instinct and impulse: it’s planned, organised towards a goal because current things are not good enough as is. It was stated time and time again (by Leitner, by Gertrude, by Gerry) that the Fears were mostly impulse, not really “thinking”, but this domain feels so… calculated, demonstrating a form of sentience behind it? I think that was the most upsetting reveal this episode – of course children wouldn’t have been safe, but to learn that they’re “allowed to age” only for their fears to develop and get more satisfying for The Eye? That’s truly horrifying.

(- I’m also a bit relieved to know what is happening to them, because there could have been “worse”: this episode could have talked about people who were pregnant when the Change happened, or about very very young infants. Though I can’t help but wonder about the babies and how they can grow up without adults to mirror, without forms of communication with their peers. Right now, the only hypothesis I have would be that they… could become “Inheritors” as described in MAG134, if left on their own and only raised with and around the Fears?)

- … I really wasn’t expecting Callum to come back, after the Church Of The Divine Host chapter seemed to have closed with Manuela. Well – I had trouble leaving behind the faint possibility that “Rayner” had somehow managed to hop into a new host, but I wasn’t expecting Callum to come back for himself.

(MAG073) ARCHIVIST: You said it started with a kidnapping case? BASIRA: Yeah. Callum Brodie. Twelve… twelve years old. Disappeared from his home in Dalston three weeks ago. Sitter was asleep when the mother came home, the front door was open, there was no sign of him. There was no forced entry so it started out as a missing persons case, but they got a witness claiming he’d seen three unknown figures entering the Brodies’ home that night, so it was kicked up to Serious Crime. There was some back and forth with Kidnap Squad since no ransom demand had been made, but not much progress in terms of finding the kid. […] The briefing was pretty short. We were told that Callum Brodie had been found and it was suspected he was being held by a man named Maxwell Rayner, with an unknown number of accomplices. There were suspicions that there might be cult involvement. That’s when I phoned you. […] Next to him was an old chair that looked like it could have come from a dinner table. The wood was stained, covered in dark mould, and tied to it with thin metal wire was Callum Brodie. The kid's eyes were blank, though not clouded like the old man’s, and his face was locked in a silent scream. Rayner was facing him, thin, bony hands raised to his face. Something was… something was flowing out of his mouth. It looked like ink, but it flowed more like a heavy fog than any sort of liquid. It drips down his forearms and onto the floor, where it… it rolled towards Callum, climbing up the chair and oozing across the boy’s body towards his face. It was moving slowly, and had just reached his chest. The roaring sound seemed to come as it convulsed out of the old man’s mouth. […] The kid seemed fine. I mean, I’m sure he’ll need a lot of counselling, but he didn’t seem physically any worse for wear.

(MAG140) ARCHIVIST: So Edmond Halley was… Rayner. Or, at least… whatever was inside him. You said he was dead, though. BASIRA: I thought he was. We shot him to hell before he could, uh… “pour himself” into that kid.

(MAG143) MANUELA: But I could see in his eyes that Maxwell was so very tired. And all the words fell to nothing. Instead, we began the search for his successor, a new host for his… continuation. He would regain his strength, and we would plan our next move. It was difficult, though. The approaching culmination had meant Maxwell had not prepared another host, and the search for another vessel was… long and involved. Finally, about eighteen months ago, we found one: a child, whose father had, by coincidence, been directly marked by The Dark. It was a desperate plan, but we were desperate, a shadow of what we had been. Maxwell left me here, to guard the Black Sun, and everyone else left to help in his rebirth. [INHALE] But it didn’t work, did it? I can only assume we were too weak to hide from you, and you struck when Maxwell was vulnerable.

+ Manuela’s words kinda confirming the hypothesis that he was the son of MAG052’s statement-giver, Phillip Brown, the awful cop who had reported on Robert Montauk’s death (MAG052: “Martin hasn’t had much luck tracking down Mr Brown himself. According to Caroline Brodie, his ex-wife, she left him in 2004, after his dismissal from the prison service pushed him further into alcoholism, and he became abusive. She said she got a single letter from him in 2009, asking for reconciliation, but she never replied. Martin says the letter was postmarked from Waterford in Ireland. But he’s been unable to track Mr Brown any further.”)

… I immediately went with the same reasoning/hope as Martin when listening to this episode, that it wasn’t actually Callum himself but Rayner/a dark cultist possessing him ;; And nope ;;

(MAG173) MARTIN: That’s the avatar for this place? ARCHIVIST: Callum Brodie, thirteen years old. He guides the children through their fears of The Dark. MARTIN: This is that kid Basira went after last year, right? The one the darkness cult took. So, so that’s not even a kid, that’s whatever was inside Maxwell Rayner, it’s just wearing his body! ARCHIVIST: [CALLING] Callum? [FOOTSTEPS APPROACHING] CALLUM: Yeah, what? ARCHIVIST: You remember when those people kidnapped you. What happened? CALLUM: Mm, it was fun! I just hid and the cops came and got me. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: Tell the truth. [STATIC RISES] CALLUM: Augh…! I, I–I was, I was scared, alright? I was really, really… scared. [STATIC FADES] And it was dead dark, and… I couldn’t see anyone and, I didn’t know where I was and… And there–there was something on my face, and it was cold, and, and slimy, and it didn’t like me. Then there was a bang, and it was gone…! And… the police were there. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: And what happened to the thing that tried to take you over? CALLUM: Dunno, it… went away. ARCHIVIST: It died in the light. CALLUM: Whatever! ARCHIVIST: And it was after that you started shoving smaller kids into cupboards, right? CALLUM: Yeah. Give them a taste of it. Make them afraid of the dark. [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: But you’ve always pushed around smaller children, haven’t you? CALLUM: They made me feel sick. I hate them! ARCHIVIST: And now? CALLUM: Now everyone’s afraid of me!

That was another thing which hurt a lot in this episode: the fact that, so far, Callum’s story felt “simple” in its horribleness: a kid, who got kidnapped by a cult, who almost got possessed by an evil Dark-something, who was rescued, who was probably traumatised but still physically saved. Basira had offhandedly mentioned that he would need help to process what had happened to him, but as far as we could tell, he was just a blameless victim who went home and that was it. And he still is on that front! … And he also turns out to be, and already was before the kidnapping case, a bully. And he’s only thirteen – you can’t judge and evaluate a kid’s actions as you do adults’! But what can you do, then?

It stings that Callum took on that role, because his father was an awful man and Caroline Brodie had apparently left him while pregnant or when Callum was a few weeks old, so Callum never really knew him, and the show has stated time and time again that blood doesn’t condition you to become someone or something, but Callum became a bully too even without his father (whether it’s independently or because the consequences of Philip’s actions were felt in other ways than his presence). It stings that Callum turns out to be both a victim and a bully, not caused but still nurtured by his own trauma: trying to reclaim some control by putting younger children through experiences similar to his own, and by trying to lie about how traumatising the kidnapping had been to him. And it’s still made clear that… the trauma led him to this. Brushing with the powers led him to this. And it’s still a thirteen-year-old kid that was probably let down and not cared after enough after his traumatic kidnapping (and was not provided with the necessary redressing before that, when he was a regular bully).

- Re: Jon compelling Callum to tell the truth:

* So Jon can still do that! I was wondering, since Oliver had pointed out Jon’s passiveness in his new role and Jon had not displayed the ability again since the Change, so far.

* I have various “!!” feelings about Jon not taking kids’ bullshit at face value and having the ability to make them tell the truth very matter-of-factly. That was… almost domestic. (And yeah, feeding the “Jon&Martin AU where they adopt twenty kids”)

* There has been a HUGE constant amongst avatars to picture their path towards their patron as logical and wanted, when we had had hints that it wasn’t that simple (Mike Crew comes to mind, in MAG091: “There are echoes of resignation, I think, almost desperation. That can’t be right, though. What reason would I have had not to jump? Not to become as I am now. Perhaps I just didn’t know the true joy of vertigo. It doesn’t matter.”). We got a vivid example with Callum, who tried to pretend that the kidnapping had been on his terms when he was actually terrified. Again and again, I can’t help but think about Jonah: if Jon were to compel him, to rip the truth from his struggling tongue, would we get a quite different biography from what he had sent to Jon in MAG160, which had been on his terms?

- ;; It was horrible and made a lot of sense that Jon… plainly accepted that the “ruling” avatar was a kid, but that Martin had more trouble understanding it. Jon had direct experience with children’s cruelty and intra-violence (his bully was 18 when he was 8); Martin’s own traumas, as far as we know, came from the adults that surrounded him (his father leaving, his grandfather dying, his mother falling apart).

Jon already knew very sharply that children can hurt children in “normal” circumstances, and had read enough about the Powers touching children or shaping their lives:

(MAG009, Julia Montauk) “Whatever I had seen my father doing in there, its effects had long since vanished. I don’t know why my father did what he did, and I doubt I ever will, but the more I go over these events in my head, the more sure I am that he had his reasons.” (MAG109) JULIA: I tried to live a normal life. I really did. I took jobs working in the backroom of offices where I wouldn’t need to meet anyone. I had boyfriends who promised they didn’t care. I burned through half a dozen counsellors. None of it worked. You see, my father’s always remained one of the darlings of the true crime community.

(MAG067, Jack Barnabas) “We sat on a bench as the sun went down, watching the sky redden, and Agnes asked me a question. It was the first time she’d said anything more than a few words since we left my flat. [STATIC] She asked me if I had a destiny.” (MAG139, Eugene Vanderstock) “And on top of that, sleeping peacefully among the fire… a baby. Untouched, unharmed, and to our eyes, alight with a burning divinity. We baptised her with the boiling water of Asag and named her… “Agnes”, as had been her mother’s final request. But… raising a messiah, as it turns out, is a lot more challenging than creating one.” (MAG145) ARTHUR: You might be right. But Agnes did. That’s the thing about an… “incarnation”, isn’t it? She was a child and… person as much as she was a god. And we messed that right up…! … I still remember when Diego brought us a book on childcare. [CHUCKLING] Roger’s body was still in her room, blackened and smoking from… when he tried to feed her. I thought for a moment he’d brought another one of his damn Leitners, but no! It was just a… regular ol’ book on looking after children…! But I was an idiot. Saw it as… attacking my leadership.

(MAG081) ARCHIVIST: There were supernatural things in the world, but they were rare – isolated and exaggerated, vastly outnumbered by wild tales and drunken imaginings. The one name I held in my mind as a true source of evil was Jurgen Leitner, and I knew him as the worst of it, for it was his name that had marked the encounter that scarred my youth. […] I do not know how many of them there are, or precisely how they separate, but I do know that the Eye – Beholding – was not the first that I encountered in my life. The first was the Spider. The Web. And I have no idea what that might mean. I was eight years old when my grandmother gave me the book.

(MAG101) MICHAEL: When he was in school, [Michael Shelley] lost a friend to something like me. His friend was named Ryan, but those in power simply called him schizophrenic. I don’t know if he was, but it doesn’t matter. He was so dreadfully afraid his world wasn’t real that to make it so was almost nothing. Michael was there when he was taken; he never got over what he saw. Or didn’t see. After much searching and despair, it drove him into the waiting arms of the Institute, where he met Gertrude Robinson.

(MAG111) GERRY: The things out there weren’t like taming fire, they couldn’t be contained or used for light or warmth. The best you could hope for from them, would be that they don’t spot you, and instead my mum chased after them, obsessed with others who had tried to stare at them without being blinded: y’know, Flamsteed, Smirke, Leitner. Idiots who destroyed themselves chasing a secret that wasn’t worth knowing. And the worst thing was, she marked me as a part of that, without my understanding. Or consent.

So no surprise that Jon had all the background knowledge to be already ready for this situation… and that Martin required more time and was more explicitly hurt and shocked by the concept.

There were two big layers of horror in that domain: how it operates on the kids, and how Martin&Jon were seemingly powerless, unable to put a stop to it, while the situation was indeed intolerable:

(MAG173) MARTIN: Wh–what about the avatar? Alright, I know you said it didn’t change anything, that the domain would still exist, but at this point I don’t care, alright? Anyone who’s chosen to spend their apocalypse tormenting children– God, you–you need to end them. Now. ARCHIVIST: … It’s not that simple! MARTIN: Seriously? Seriously? ARCHIVIST: [LONG SIGH] … Fine. […] You see? MARTIN: See what, Jon, what am I supposed to see? That you don’t want to kill a… thirteen-year-old kid, big revelation! ARCHIVIST: I don’t know what you want me to do! MARTIN: I want you to use your power, I want you to help them, I want you to make things better! ARCHIVIST: There – is – no – “better” anymore. MARTIN: You keep saying that, and I hate it! ARCHIVIST: I keep saying it because it keeps being true, you know that! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: What I know is that leaving children here is… i–i–it’s inexcusable, i–it’s monstrous! ARCHIVIST: Martin, tell me what you want me to do, and I will do it! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: … [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] Tell me about this place. … I need to know. […] The sooner we get back to the Archives, the sooner we can put a stop to this. All of this. They just… [INHALE] They’ll just need to hang on a little longer. ARCHIVIST: … Right. [EXHALE] Right.

* Outside of the supernatural, it’s a very concrete situation: what can you do, as an (unequipped) adult, if you’re witnessing a child torturing children in a community in which you don’t belong? What is the thing that needs to be done to improve the situation?

* Added with the supernatural, as was mentioned: the torture would keep going anyway if Callum was removed. And Callum is a kid, who was clearly traumatised himself and is fighting for survival – how could he deserve death for it? Yet, he’s enjoying the pain he inflicts; yet, he’s not the problem. (The problem is, as Martin pointed out again, the apocalypse itself. The problem is the Fear-machine, the system the Fears put in place.)

* … Ethical concerns about the “goodness” of smiting a thirteen-year-old to lower the pain of other kids aside, “smiting” Callum probably would have made things worse for the other kids: it would have given them an example that… monsters can kill even the most powerful of you. That your “friend” (who is also a bully) can be taken down, that you can disappear, that you can die. Concretely, it would probably have caused more fears for the kids.

- Overall: I’m glad that this episode demonstrated that no, the “smiting” is absolutely not viable nor reliable. It’s petty revenge. It doesn’t do anything good (and is probably feeding The Eye, so contributing to the awful system), it doesn’t free people nor does it decrease their sufferings. Yet: is it okay to let people enjoy the chaos be and keep benefitting from it? There is not clear answer about what Jon and Martin “have to” do, but I perfectly understand their frustrations…

- I’m still laughing so so hard that Jonah… is never relevant. Avatars can immediately identify Jon as all-powerful or even the apocalypse-bringer:

(MAG164) HELEN: What would I have to gloat about? Much as I am delighted by this brave new world in which we find ourselves, I can take no credit for it. This was all… you!

(MAG165) NOT!SASHA: Well, of course you want to wallow in my shame like your voyeur master!

(MAG166) HELEN: We’re all here, Martin. The Stranger; The Buried; The Desolation; all of us. But The Eye still rules. All this fear is being performed for its benefit. And so, there are now exactly two roles available in this new world of ours: the watcher, and the watched. Subject, and object. Those who are feared, and those who are afraid. And Jon, well… he is part of The Eye; a very important part.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: “This report is being sent to: The Great Eye, that watches all who linger in terror, and gorges itself on the sufferings of those under its unrelenting, stuporous gaze! And its Archive, which draws knowledge of this suffering unto itself. […] Perhaps once it might have horrified me, or given me some sense of pursuing the ultimate release of the world that you have damned.”

(MAG169) JUDE: Fancy seeing you both here. To what, exactly, do I owe the pleasure, the honour, of being graced by the great and powerful Archivist, harbinger of this new world, and his, uh… valet…? […] Just messing around~! Wouldn’t want to keep you from your oh-so-special business, Your Holiness.

(MAG171) JARED: Mm. … So, is there any way this doesn’t end in me dead? I’m guessing that’s on the docket if you’re here. Unless you’re just here to smell the flowers.

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: “THE SPIDER: Oh, Francis… It’s such a shame, but I couldn’t do such a thing even if I wanted to! The man in the audience saw to that!”

(MAG173) CALLUM: … You’re the Eye guy, right? ARCHIVIST: That’s right. CALLUM: So you’re like… real important. ARCHIVIST: [HUFF] I suppose I am!

But Jonah? Jonah “I am to be a king of a ruined world, and I shall never die.” Magnus? Never heard of ‘em.

(But aouch, the identification of Jon as connected to The Eye and/or being responsible for the apocalypse is not helping him… He was feeling guilty about it even before leaving the cabin. I wonder how much time before someone points out and reminds him that Jonah framed him and planned and pushed for the apocalypse to happen? Martin had clearly identified Jonah as the one responsible, but it’s been a while since he was last mentioned…)

- Back to “what are the tape recorders DOING” because mmmm…

(Season 5 trailer) MARTIN: Are you still… [SIGH] “feeling it”? Seeing everything? ARCHIVIST: Yes, I, I’m trying not to, but… all of the fear, th–the anguish, i–it just… [INHALE] It keeps coming at me in waves, rolling over me, filling my head with such… awful sights. MARTIN: … I’m sorry. That sounds… [SMALL EXHALE] That sounds horrible. ARCHIVIST: … I wish it was, Martin. I really wish it was. … But it feels… right. [MIRTHLESS HUFF]

(MAG162) MARTIN: What happened? The tapes, were you– […] Look, Jon, I… I, I know it hurts, but you’ve just got to… ARCHIVIST: No, no, lo–look… I, I–I was listening, and I–I was filled with this… hatred. This anger; I–I wanted to leave, and hunt down Elias, a–and…! MARTIN: W–wow, okay… ARCHIVIST: But, when I thought it… the–there was… [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] There was something else. Th–this place, it… it didn’t want me, it… [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] didn’t want us to go. MARTIN: … What do you mean? ARCHIVIST: This cabin. [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] It’s not right. And, when I thought that, I–I felt… It, it all poured out of me down… into the tape. MARTIN: [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: A–a–an–and it… felt good. It–it felt… right. MARTIN: Okay. [BREATHES IN] So you’re recording again? ARCHIVIST: I might need to. If we’re going to make it…!

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: They won’t hear you, Martin, they’re all… too busy waiting to die. MARTIN: Jon… ARCHIVIST: They sit here – [STATIC RISES] the image of everyone they hold dear locked in their mind, knowing they’ll never see them again. Waiting for the order; dreading the bullet or the drone or the barbed wire that will tear them to shreds and leave them nothing but a bloody– [STATIC REACHING A PEAK] MARTIN: J–Jon, enough! Enough! [STATIC FADES] … Please don’t tell me these things. ARCHIVIST: I… I’m sorry, I– There’s just so much! There’s so much, Martin, and I know all of it, I can see all of it, and I– It’s filling me up, I need to let it out! MARTIN: I’m sorry, but tough. Okay? Tha–that’s not what I’m here for. [VOICE IN THE DISTANCE: “No… No!”] MARTIN: I can’t be that for you, I–I just can’t. ARCHIVIST: [QUIET] I… I know. [SILENCE] I–I’ll use the tape recorder…! [PLASTIC OF A TAPE] I just… [INHALE] You probably want to wait outside.

(MAG164) ARCHIVIST: We’re fine. MARTIN: A–are we? I mean, that place is– … I don’t, I don’t feel fine, okay, and you were there a long time doing your… y–you–your guidebook, which, you know, I get it, but that place is…

(MAG165) MARTIN: Yeeaah, good call. Hum, in that case, do you want to… do your thing now then, before we start moving? But, are we close enough? [ROARING IN THE DISTANCE] ARCHIVIST: … Yes… Yes, I–I think so. Good idea. MARTIN: Thanks! ARCHIVIST: You, uh… [SHUFFLING] You might want to take a bit of a walk. This… feels like a strange one…

(MAG166) ARCHIVIST: I… It’s hard to put into words. Loo–l… [SIGH] Look, we can talk about it later, we’re– coming to a… “domain of The Buried”, and [STATIC RISES] I would really rather… […] [INHALE] [WHIMPERING] Ah… [GRUNT] MARTIN: Jon? Are you… ARCHIVIST: We’ve been… close for too long, I need to, uh… [INHALE] You might want to take a walk. MARTIN: Hm.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [LONG EXHALE] [CREAKING SOUND] Oookay. Time you went for a walk. [FOOTSTEPS] MARTIN: Y–yeah, about that… [CREAKING SOUND] You sure you’ll be okay on your own? […] You… [INHALE] You vomit your horrors. [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: [REVULSED SOUND] Uh! I’m… not sure I like that metaphor…! MARTIN: “Puke your terrors”? ARCHIVIST: … Just go. MARTIN: Alright. Fine, I’m going.

(MAG171) JARED: You still do that talk-y thing? You know? Drink up all the fear and spit it back out? ARCHIVIST: Sort of, yes. JARED: Alright. Well, I’d like to hear about my garden. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: … Okay! MARTIN: Look, if this is some kind of trick– ARCHIVIST: It isn’t. […] MARTIN: Jon, are you… alright? ARCHIVIST: Yeah, hum… Sorry. MARTIN: No, it, it’s alright. JARED: Is it really that bad? Seeing what I’ve done here? Or… uh! Is it maybe that deep down, you think it’s as beautiful as I do?

(MAG172) ARCHIVIST: Ah… Hold up, I–I need to, uh… [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] MARTIN: Now, seriously? We’re almost out of here. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] I’m sorry…! Not really up to me…! MARTIN: Fine. [SIGH]

(MAG173) MARTIN: Slow down, I can barely see a thing! ARCHIVIST: … Sorry. […] Look, I would just really like to get through here, as quickly as possible. MARTIN: How come? This one seems like the quietest place we’ve been in a while! It’s just… rows and rows of quiet houses. I mean, I know some people don’t like that sort of thing, [CHUCKLING] but I’m actually finding it kind of relaxing s– ARCHIVIST: [AGITATED BREATHING] Martin…! Please. [LOUD BREATHING] MARTIN: … Jon…? Where are we? ARCHIVIST: I–it’s complicated. MARTIN: That’s… not an answer! ARCHIVIST: Can we please just move on? […] Do you really want to know that? Really? MARTIN: [FRUSTRATED BREATHS] ARCHIVIST: I’ve been trying very hard to keep this one bottled up…!

Jon had also mentioned that they could have gone another way in MAG169; the statement in MAG171 was prompted by Jared, who wanted to hear about it; and MAG170 was even given by Martin. Jon had almost left the Web’s domain without giving one, and tried to “keep this one bottled up” in MAG172, and only gave it when prompted by Martin. Is Jon displaying a bit more control over his need to “pour out” the domains’ statements?

Once again: there are very two different things at play. On the one hand, the fact that Jon and Martin have to “experience” the domains by going through them, and the fact that Jon sometimes feel saturated to the point he has to “pour out” into the tapes to be able to function again. The two do not feel connected or necessary to each other: the tape recorder clicked on in MAG167 and recorded something that wasn’t a domain’s statement (but one about the previous Team Archive), and Jon didn’t give the house’s statement in MAG170 – that was Martin. What are the tape recorders, and is this feeding them somehow…?

- Sob about Martin trying to lighten the mood at the beginning of the episode, because it just created a rift right away – Jon already knowing the horror of the situation, and Martin thinking/hoping that the situation around there was okay-ish, allowing for light jokes:

(MAG173) MARTIN: Slow down, I can barely see a thing! ARCHIVIST: … Sorry. MARTIN: No prizes for guessing who’s in charge here, eh? ARCHIVIST: Mm, I–I suppose not…! MARTIN: You know… I really miss the days when I could blame broken streetlights on the council. A strongly-worded letter just doesn’t feel as forceful when it’s addressed to “whichever Dread Power it may concern”. ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [SIGH] Hm.

Please, Martin, send many strongly-worded letters to Jonah to hiss about the current problems.

Also, SOB ABOUT THIS BIT:

(MAG173) MARTIN: This one seems like the quietest place we’ve been in a while! It’s just… rows and rows of quiet houses. I mean, I know some people don’t like that sort of thing, [CHUCKLING] but I’m actually finding it kind of relaxing s–

Because ahahahahahaha: lonely!Martin liked the “quiet” in season 4, and “rows and rows of quiet houses” puts me in mind of MAG150’s statement with the Lonely suburb ;;

- The fear that The Web could be messing with Martin is still fresh in Jon’s mind, uh?

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: Martin, tell me what you want me to do, and I will do it! [SCREAMS IN THE DISTANCE] MARTIN: … [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] Tell me about this place. … I need to know. ARCHIVIST: I thought you hated listen– … [INHALE] Are you… sure that’s what you want? MARTIN: Of course it’s not…! [BAG JOSTLING] But I need to hear it.

;; Jon trying to check if Martin wasn’t mindcontrolled, since it sounded out-of-character…

(But: it made sense for Martin, and it’s also one more thing that couldn’t really have happened at the beginning of the season. Martin didn’t want to hear about Jon “vomiting” his horrors – it’s not that he was living in denial about them happening, he knew very well about them. But as was mentioned, “knowing” and “understanding” are two different things: Martin could hear that the children were terrified and preyed upon, the statement “only” provided details and the way the domain was operating. It brought no catharsis, no clue about how to make it stop and help the kids. It just made Martin another voyeur, aware of the situation… and unable to do anything short-term to solve it.)

- It’s sad and I’m glad that Jon and Martin’s differences are shining and conflicting a bit more obviously nowadays. At the core of it: Jon knows how to navigate through this new world, knows how it works, what is happening around them. He already knew about the children getting tortured, why they were there, that they were being groomed to become more satisfying for The Eye. Martin… doesn’t, and Jon tends to forget that: while Jon has to bear the knowledge, it also makes some of his actions hard to follow (Martin didn’t understand why Jon was walking so fast), and Martin’s hypotheses and hopes ruled out before he even voiced them (Jon already knew that Callum was in charge and that “smiting” this domain’s avatar wasn’t a comfortable option). But it doesn’t feel to me like they’re heading towards full-blown conflict, quite the contrary: there are tensions, there are mutual frustrations over the other’s behaviour, but they don’t forget that the apocalypse is responsible for it, and are getting better at wording what they’re feeling. Martin had pointed out that Jon wasn’t very open about his feelings, and it’s true; and it’s also true that Martin seems to be misunderstanding Jon’s level of control over their situation, to the point that… they’re both occasionally hurting each other.

(- Re: the slapping reference, I thiiiink it was Jon’s attempt at a sardonic joke like he had done in MAG154, and it just didn’t land because it sounded accusatory with a tint of cruel edge instead:

(MAG154) ARCHIVIST: I–I’ve been trying to a–avoid, being, hum… Sticking to old statements? Thank you, for your little “intervention”, by the way. MARTIN: Look, I wouldn’t have had to if you hadn’t– ARCHIVIST: Yes, no, I know, I’m sorry, uh– that didn’t… come out right. Honestly: thank you. [EXHALE] It’s been hell, but… I–I did need to hear it.

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: [LOUD, LONG EXHALE] [STATIC FADES] Is that enough for you? Do you need to hear more? MARTIN: … I… ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] [STATIC INCREASES] “See Luka. See Luka sleep–” [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] MARTIN: No, no! No, that’s enough, that’s… enough. [STATIC FADES] [FOOTSTEPS] ARCHIVIST: … Thank you for not hitting me this time. [SILENCE, PUNCTUATED BY SCREAMS] Was that what you wanted? What you needed? MARTIN: … No. [SLIGHTLY MUFFLED] No, it didn’t help at all. ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry. MARTIN: … Let’s get out of here.

Martin hasn’t slapped Jon three times for the fun of it or for his own benefit: he had previously tried to shake him awake (MAG160) and to talk him out of it (MAG169, MAG172) when Jon was supernaturally ensnared. But, also: Jon is perfectly entitled to be bitter about it.

I wonder if Martin will try to find another way next time, though (MAKE OUT WITH HIM, HE WON’T BE ABLE TO TALK, MARTIN.))

- Sob over the fact that Martin “wanting” something reminded me of his outburst at Tim…

(MAG079) TIM: Alright, fine. Fine. What do you want? What’s your light at the end of these spooky damn tunnels – and don’t say “everyone happy forever”, because that’s not happening. … Well? MARTIN: I don’t know. I don’t know!! I want to find out what’s going on; I want to save Jon; I want everyone to be fine, and you know what? If we were all happy that wouldn’t actually be the end of the world!

And Jon is really reminiscent of Tim right now? Convinced that they’re stuck in this situation forever, almost reproaching Martin for daring to hope? While Martin’s hope indeed feels too idealistic and unreachable, despite technically being… the bare minimum.

- Jon… hasn’t always been this fatalistic about the current situation in season 5. He began the season with hopelessness, but then was the one to offer hope, before… apparently reverting back to despair:

(Season 5 trailer) ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] … What? What do you want? … The world is…! It’s over. You’ve won. What can you possibly still need to hear? […] MARTIN: “How are you feeling in general”, then? ARCHIVIST: … Unchanged. [PAUSE] I don’t know if it’ll ever change again…! […] MARTIN: Maybe I should, uh… pop down the village? See if they have any coffee instead? ARCHIVIST: It’s gone, Martin, and the people are…! MARTIN: Yes, I know, Jon, I’m not ignorant, I’m just… I’m just not ready for complete despair yet. ARCHIVIST: “Like me”. MARTIN: … I didn’t say that. ARCHIVIST: You didn’t have to.

(MAG161) MARTIN: Jon, it’s not your fault… ARCHIVIST: Martin, can we not do this again. MARTIN: Sorry. ARCHIVIST: I’m just… I’m mourning a world I killed…! MARTIN: I know… ARCHIVIST: And we’re all trapped in its rotting corpse…! […] MARTIN: Jon, I… This isn’t healthy. ARCHIVIST: Healthy? I am an avatar of voyeuristic terror, whose unquestioned craving for knowledge has condemned the entire world… to an eternity of torment, “healthy” i–isn’t, i–it’s not…! […] No, it’s not, I’m, I’m sorry, I just… [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] [INHALE, EXHALE] It hurts. MARTIN: I know. ARCHIVIST: … I need time. MARTIN: I know. But we can’t stay in this cabin forever…! [DISTANT HOWL] ARCHIVIST: Why not? It, it’s quiet here, an–and I have you…! […] MARTIN: Well, that as may be, we can’t just stay here forever. ARCHIVIST: What could possibly be out there that you want to see? MARTIN: A way to stop this, a way to turn the world back! ARCHIVIST: [HINT OF A DISHEARTENED SMILE] … Do you really think there is one? [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: Well, if there is, it’s not in here, is it? ARCHIVIST: It’s so… It’s so loud, out there? The agony, the–the terror, I can see it all so much more clearly…! MARTIN: I’m sorry. ARCHIVIST: No, it’s– [SIGH] I love you, I just… I need more time. [SILENCE] MARTIN: It’s alright. [RUSTLING OF CLOTHES] [CREAKING SOUND] ARCHIVIST: [SOFT EXHALE] MARTIN: It’s alright, I’m good at waiting.

(MAG162) ARCHIVIST: “This place wishes to be our tomb. But The Eye does not wish that. No. [STATIC INCREASES] The Eye wishes instead that it be my chrysalis. It is time that I emerge…” [STATIC REACHING A PEAK] […] MARTIN: So you’re recording again? ARCHIVIST: I might need to. If we’re going to make it…! [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: Back to the Archives? ARCHIVIST: Seems the best place to start. [RUMBLE OF THUNDER] MARTIN: Uh… Y–eah, alright! [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] ARCHIVIST: Martin… It’s going to be a hard journey. […] MARTIN: Do you think it’ll do anything? Confronting Elias? ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] I… [SIGH] Maybe? MARTIN: No, I’m serious. Do we… [PAUSE IN THE PACKING SOUNDS] Is there a chance that we can undo this? ARCHIVIST: [LONG INHALE] Gertrude didn’t think so. [WOODEN CREAKING SOUND] MARTIN: … Right. ARCHIVIST: [SOFT] But she’s dead. [FIRMER] Let’s find out for ourselves. […] Besides, there’s… far worse out there. Better to try and avoid it, I think. MARTIN: We’re not even gonna try? We, we’ve got your lighter, maybe we could just– ARCHIVIST: We can’t fight the world, Martin. MARTIN: [AMUSED DEFIANT HUFF] Says you.

(MAG163) ARCHIVIST: It means the journey will be the journey, regardless of how we choose to make it. […] You could see that tower from anywhere on Earth. And it can see you. And if you walk towards it, eventually you’ll get there. But you have to go through everything in-between. […] MARTIN: What’re you doing here? [PLASTIC RATTLING] It’s dangerous. Could… get yourself blown up, like all these poor… [PLASTIC RATTLING] Who d’you think they were? Really don’t see why they can’t just… go round, picked a better place to… [STEPS THROUGH LIQUID] [SIGH] I guess there… aren’t really any “better” places anymore, are there? [STEPS THROUGH LIQUID] It’s all this. Or worse, or… or different.

(MAG164) MARTIN: How much further do we still need to go? [STATIC INCREASES] ARCHIVIST: A long way. Through many dark and awful places… […] MARTIN: Can we turn the world back? [STATIC RISES, STRONG] ARCHIVIST: Wow! Hum… I–if the Fears are removed, yes; but they–they can’t be destroyed while there are still… people to fear them; th–then they can’t be banished back to the space where they came from, it’s not… there anymore, I… Oh! Uh… MARTIN: J–J–Jon, what’s wrong? ARCHIVIST: Uh, it’s, uh… I’m sorry, trying to know things about them directly, i–i–it’s like… [STATIC DECREASES] [EXHALE] God, it’s like looking into the Sun…! MARTIN: Okay, okay – okay, alright, that’s alright.

(MAG167) ARCHIVIST: Help us with what? MARTIN: ‘xcuse me? ARCHIVIST: Annabelle, help us with “what”? Our–our, our journey, killing Elias, vanishing the Entities – what? […] Wi–without… trust, without a, a reason… Gertrude needed both the purpose her mission gave her, and the control her position allowed. To be here, like us, without a, [INHALE] a reason, without someone to ground her, she… She’d have power but… no control. No real… purpose. Perhaps she’d dedicate herself to a, a doomed quest like us, but– … [QUIET] No… I think this would have broken her. And she’d have resigned herself to… ruling her domain. […] MARTIN: [INHALE] [SNORT] Ssso. If you say Gertrude wouldn’t have been able to go on without a reason… ARCHIVIST: Yes, Martin, you are my reason. MARTIN: Just wanted to make you say it…! ARCHIVIST: [INHALE] MARTIN: Cool.

(MAG168) ARCHIVIST: I feel badly for those that exist in his domain, o–of course, I do, but… At least, their suffering will be over, eventually.

(MAG170) ARCHIVIST: M–Martin, if you… did; i–if you wanted to forget… a–all of it, stay here and just… escape. I… I would understand. MARTIN: … N–no…! It’s comforting here, leaving all those… painful memories behind, but… It’s not a good comfort, it’s… I–it’s the kind that makes you fade, makes you… dim and… distant.

(MAG171) MARTIN: Jon. We are… doing good, right? Making things better? ARCHIVIST: … I don’t know if that was… ever an option.

(MAG173) ARCHIVIST: I don’t know what you want me to do! MARTIN: I want you to use your power, I want you to help them, I want you to make things better! ARCHIVIST: There – is – no – “better” anymore. MARTIN: You keep saying that, and I hate it! ARCHIVIST: I keep saying it because it keeps being true, you know that! […] MARTIN: [INHALE] [CLEARER] The sooner we get back to the Archives, the sooner we can put a stop to this. All of this. They just… [INHALE] They’ll just need to hang on a little longer. ARCHIVIST: … Right. [EXHALE] Right. MARTIN: Come on.

After the surge of hope towards the end of MAG162, Jon has made more and more small comments implying that he doesn’t think that there is a “better” solution (theirs is a “doomed quest”, Oliver’s victims will ~at least~ die, Martin staying in his domain would have been a way to “escape”, etc.) I wonder what is happening in Jon’s mind: is it the journey starting to take its toll on him, things feeling hopeless because he has to face the concreteness of this new world, which feels all-powerful, too complicated, too big, impossible to undo? Or did he “know” something that he hasn’t told Martin, back in MAG164, or did he drew from there the conclusion that it was impossible to get rid of the Fears? In any case: it’s good that Martin is still pushing for hope and for a solution. What would be the alternative? Just stopping and getting a domain to rule over? Keeping on with the journey through the horrors forever ~since at least they’re together uwu~?

- Re: Jon apparently not daring to hope (anymore) vs. Martin accidentally sounding very bossy and ignorant by wanting Jon to save things… at the core of it, I think that there is a misunderstanding between them regarding Jon’s powers, which makes sense for both of them.

For Jon: his powers can’t do much good. Growing as an Archivist came with taking live-statements and condemning people to his nightmare zoo, where he could only watch and not intervene (with mentions that he used to try). Saving Melanie and Daisy, annihilating the Dark Sun, was accompanied by new victims, constantly tortured, leaving them a wreck. He never “saved the world”: The Unknowing would have failed on its own with no intervention necessary, and Melanie was right to point out that them trying to do good… had invariably caused bad things all around. Saving Martin meant getting his last mark, setting him up for Jonah’s apocalypse.

But for Martin: Jon saved him from The Lonely twice. Martin’s own “powers” (disappearing in front of Georgie, his Lonely training) never came at the cost of sacrificing innocents – only himself. And Jon was able to stop hurting innocents when monitored, after Martin took Jess Tyrell’s complaint: bad people, bad avatars, would keep hurting people. But it seems that in Martin’s mind, there are still “good” ways to use one’s powers (saving people, smiting avatars) without negative consequences – which… isn’t really the case. The powers are granted by the Fears to provide more fear for the Fears.

(- Amongst the sad things regarding Martin’s horror at being a passive witness to the children’s suffering: technically, it was long-due as a horror, since the very beginning of the show. They knew, as Team Archive, that the things happening out there were hurting actual people, real people. That some of them were still alive. Jon began season 4 lightly apologising about their passivity, in the Web’s web-development statement. Martin is horrified at their passivity now, but technically… they’ve never really tried to help people for the sake of helping people — the worst cases being Jon’s own victims.)

(- I shouldn’t hoooooope but ;; The fact that Jon seems to be reaching rock-bottom re:hope and being unable to do anything good, to make things “better”… still makes me wonder if he might not manage to get Daisy back for a short while.

Alternatively: that would be the rock-bottom. To have to smite her, or to help Basira in killing her as promised… because there is no other option.)

- Right now, Jon and Martin indeed feel powerless, but there are various elements contributing to this. First: at the beginning of the journey, reaching the Panopticon was supposed to be the start to trying to undo the apocalypse, not the final objective; right now, as they go through domain after the domain and the horrors are more concrete, it’s easy to forget that the journey wasn’t supposed to be their answer and solution.

Jon is also getting his powers from Beholding, who has never been a passive agent when it comes to knowledge – Jon had noted how hard it had been to listen to MAG154’s tape (containing a way to… cut one’s connection to The Eye), and had even expressed his difficulty with burning Gerry’s page because of the knowledge it could still provide. When Jon had tried to know how to get rid of the fears in MAG164, he had noted that knowing about the Powers was more intense – and had to quickly stop. Why would The Eye nurture the hope of undoing the apocalypse making it all-powerful?

Meanwhile, Martin has noticed that he was “always following, never leading”, doesn’t have a clear understanding of the domains, doesn’t have powers, which… seems to limit his options. He’s also proved to be able to think outside-of-the-box when it came to providing plans, in the past, and had sometimes displayed a more “intuitive” feel of the powers (with Peter and Simon), so that could come in handy – just… not in the current environment.

Overall: Martin and Jon are limited right now, having trouble understanding themselves and conveying it to the other (but are still trying!), and clearly in need of other perspectives… So here’s to hoping that Melanie&Georgie, Basira (… and potentially Daisy but I don’t wanna hope TT_TT) could help. I doubt that the entirety of season 5 would be a hopeless exploration of this apocalyptical world in which everyone suffers almost-forever and then dies?

… The other option right now is Annabelle, who had told Martin that she was calling “to help”: given that Jon&Martin are lacking options… Martin could be a bit more open this time if she tries to reach him again – or at least, listen to what she has to say, even if it’s only venom.

New organisation for season 5, as announced everywhere!

I see absolutely no downside to this as a listener: I’m glad that RQ are allowing themselves more time to work on the show safely and remotely (operating safely during the pandemic means that the logistics of almost everything has changed, you can’t expect people to keep up), I’m glad that the series is lasting longer time-wise (yay!), I’m glad that I’ll have two 6-weeks-break to breathe a bit /o/ And honestly, if they end up needing more time and have to space out episodes/hiatuses for even a bit longer, full support, I hope that they won’t hesitate if it’s deemed necessary (or even healthy!).

Curious about the fragmentation in three acts – that’s another structure of tragedy, it… could mean that we’re technically in the “prologue” to the core of the season? Well, the segmentation in three is also interesting for events: we’re currently in the journey towards the domain, there are only Vast, Hunt and Spiral remaining, which could mean that MAG176 is the last zone before the Panopticon, and then… And then. Act I being the journey, Act II and Act III regarding the Panopticon (research into the Archives) and Hill Top Road? Eye-arc and Web-arc? (I’m still a bit “MMMM” about a few words said during one of the Q&A, which could imply time/timelines shenanigans at some point…)

MAG174’s title is… well, my adjective for it would be the title itself, damnit. I… It… it could be the perfect title for a Vast domain (Simon, where are you.) AND for monster!Daisy barging in into that domain, WorriedForDaisy.jpg

#the magnus archives #tma liveblog #tma season 5 #tma spoilers #mag173 #long post/

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