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eldritchqueerture · 2 years

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Chapter 5: Yesterdays Left Far Behind

Chapter Summary: Jon explains his situation to Gerry in hopes of support, while the archival assistants search Jon’s office for any clues as to what’s happening with him. What they find quickly sets certain things in motion.

CW: self deprecation, canon-typical Lonely content, invasion of privacy, swearing, starvation, fainting

Author's Notes: I've been so busy, this week felt like two months 💀 I hope you guys enjoy this chapter though :DDD I'll try to have the next one next week but it might be a bit later, stuff irl just keeps happening smh

Work Summary: Jon awakens with a tidal wave of memories that don’t make any sense. In an attempt to go on with his life, he searches for the cause of the turmoil in his mind. He knows, though, that something inside him is waking up.

Likes are greatly appreciated, but please consider reblogging so other people may see it! Thank you 💜

Tim leans back, one arm tossed over the back of the chair, the other hand picking at his lips. His eyebrows are drawn together as he looks up at Sasha.

“Okay, so what does that mean?”

“It doesn’t have to mean anything,” Martin says quickly. They shouldn’t talk about this without Jon. He’ll have answers. Martin is sure Jon will have an explanation.

“Did he really make this—thing answer his question? Just like that?” Tim snaps his fingers and Sasha nods, deep in thought.

“I felt… I felt the air kind of electrify. All my hair stood up,” she sighs. “I just… Do you think he’s—”

“Don’t say it,” Martin warns her. Tim’s eyes land on him.

“Martin. I understand you have a crush.” His voice is patient but serious, and he ignores Martin’s sputtering. “But you heard the tape yourself! He knows more than we do about this… Hive, or whatever, and I have a feeling he’s known for a while now. He hasn’t been himself since he took this damn job.”

“Besides, I still don’t believe it was dumb luck and a hunch when you were trapped with Prentiss,” Sasha adds and shakes her head. “Not to mention the whole deal with Naomi Herne.”

Martin goes quiet. Fog gathers at the edges of his mind; a fog he knows very well. It sweeps up all of his thoughts and feelings, leaving him alone and lost in the mist. It appeared about the time he was transferred to the Archives by Elias, and Martin just brushed it off as nerves. The acute sense of not belonging, of being different, ill-fitting. Worse. Makes the imaginary fog that takes away all your suffering that much more welcome.

But something in the way Jon spoke that question on the tape… Something stirs in the fog now, and Martin is starting to have doubts. Concerning what? He can’t tell. There is a quiet anxiety at the bottom of his stomach, however, and the more he thinks about Jon being able to… to make people answer his questions, the more the anxiety stirs and the fog swirls in front of him. He doesn’t think the fog moving is a good thing.

“Do we tell Elias?” Sasha asks and Tim looks at her.

“Do you trustElias?” He raises his eyebrows. “If Jon is all… spooky now, for some reason, then I’d pin the blame on him first.”

“Fair.” Sasha scratches the back of her neck and frowns. “Michael kept calling him the Archivist.”

“Yeah, it almost sounds like a title.” Tim grimaces. “I don’t like it.”

Martin digs his short nails into the skin of his palm to bring back his slipping focus.

“H-He might just…” He takes a breath. “He might not know much more than we do? Maybe—Maybe he doesn’t know what to do?”

Tim exhales through his teeth and rolls his eyes.

“Martin, will you ever stop defending this man? I think he knows exactly what he’s doing.” Tim gesticulates with his right hand. “He knows something, and he won’t tell us what because he thinks he can handle everything on his own. He does that! And, you know, it’s fine when he does this to himself, because it’s literally not our responsibility if he wants to spend the rest of his life in a dingy office, smelling old paper and cigarette smoke, but now it’s also dangerous for us! This isn’t looking good, and if something’s out to get us, I won’t let it catch us unawares.”

Martin’s mind fogs up and he can’t quite meet their eyes. Sasha places a reassuring hand on his shoulder and Tim stands up with a sigh.

“Come on, rant over. Let’s go talk him.”

Gerry is sitting on top of a stone fence, playing with the ring in his lip absent-mindedly.

“I mean—I mean you know how ridiculous that sounds?” He looks at Jon leaning against the fence on his right. The sky is now coloured with light grey and some touches of yellow and pink; the night has dispersed throughout Jon’s story. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d say you’re pulling my leg and fuck right off.”

“Then I hope you do know better,” Jon mutters and sighs. “I wish this was all just a dumb joke. And yes, I am acutely aware of how ridiculous it sounds. I couldn’t have made it up if I tried, not really my type of humour, to be honest.”

Gerry stares at him for a moment.

“Okay, so to sum it up,” he says. “There’s a part of you that calls itself The Archivist, that has spooky eyes and only manifests in dreams, and is imprisoned with magnetic tape, and, if we believe what it says, then the flashes of memories you’ve been getting are yours but from an alternate universe.”

Jon hides his face in his hands, pushing his glasses up to his forehead.

“On top of that,” Gerry continues. “The worm thing is going to attack the Institute in an unspecified amount of time, you’re sure at least one of your assistants had died in the other timeline, and you also somehow caused the end of the world.”

Jon shakes his head and slides down the fence to sit on the ground.

“When you put it all together like that it just sounds worse.”

“Well, you’re right on that,” Gerry snorts. “Don’t you think if you freed the Archivist, you’d get those memories back? Maybe the picture would be clearer.”

Jon looks up at him.

“M-Maybe… But that would mean becoming a monster.”

“Well, he is a part of you either way, right?” Gerry shrugs.

Jon presses his lips together.

“I… I don’t really know. Sometimes it feels like it is just another facet of me, and sometimes it’s a whole other entity.” Jon plays with a stone on the ground nearby. “I keep catching myself thinking I’m bound to become it either way… Unless, of course, I die.”

“Gertrude never talked about being the Archivist much,” Gerry muses and Jon raises his eyebrows at him with interest. “She didn’t turn into an eyeball creature. She stayed human up until we parted ways, and it didn’t really matter.” He looks at Jon with a sort of tired sadness. “She still ended up acting like a monster.”

“How did you separate?” Jon asks. “I… I remember you dying in America, in 2014. You were travelling with her then and unexpectedly had a seizure. The cancer was too advanced to save you.”

Gerry tilts his head back and sighs into the air.

“We caught it in time. A couple years ago; got radiation therapy and been recovering since. Although I did have another close call in 2014; not cancer, just a bullet wound in Pittsburgh. Nasty Slaughter case.”

“That’s where it happened,” Jon nods. “You were… Investigating something.”

“The Unknowing.”

Jon blinks and frowns.

“Doesn’t ring any bells.”

“Do you recall anything about Smirke’s entities?” Gerry asks and Jon runs a hand through his hair.

“Smirke…? Yes, it… He built it all, the buildings, and the fears… He…”

“Jon?” Gerry tilts his head curiously.

“He—He wanted to balance them all. Somehow— Christ,” Jon hisses when an electric shock runs through his brain. “It—It hurts when I try to remember.”

Gerry stays quiet and Jon feels the need to explain.

“Everything is… hazy. It’s like I landed in a river, and the current is so strong it could kill me. For now I’ve constructed a dam but that means there are still things I don’t know, and they sometimes spill inside, but I have no control over when and how. If I try to reach out…”

“Then the dam would break?” Gerry asks and Jon nods.

“Yes.”

“Alright,” Gerry takes a breath. “I can tell you what I know, then, and you can make any mental corrections and comparisons as needed. How does that sound?”

Jon blinks and looks up at him in earnest.

“You… You actually believe me.”

Gerry laughs softly.

“I guess so,” he admits. “I don’t know you, but I really don’t think anyone could be making all this up.”

“You’d be surprised what people can come up with.” Jon rolls his eyes with a hint of his usual annoyance.

“Besides, this all kind of explains your fucked up marks,” Gerry mutters and Jon stills.

“My what?”

“Your marks.” When he’s met with confusion in Jon’s eyes, he explains. “You know, when a person has a supernatural encounter, they’re marked as a victim of the Fears. I can usually tell what sort of fear it was.”

“A-And mine?” Jon asks with a growing sense of unease.

“They’re just kinda… All over the place.” Gerry grimaces. “The only one that’s clear is the Eye because of the Archives, the rest is just kind of muddled and faint.” He shakes. “I don’t think I want to know what you’ve been through to get them so tangled up.”

Jon lets out a faint laugh.

“I don’t think I do either.”

At this moment his phone starts vibrating in his pocket. He takes it out and his heart skips a beat.

“I-It’s Sasha. My—my assistant. I kind of left them… Christ, I left them without much of an explanation,” Jon mutters and sighs. “God, I really don’t know what to tell them.”

“I find honesty works best in these kinds of situations,” Gerry jumps down from the fence and extends a hand to Jon.

“Have you had a lot of these kinds of situations?” Jon raises his eyebrows and takes the hand gladly. As soon as he’s up, he pats down his trousers to get rid of dirt, while Gerry chuckles.

“Got me there. I usually work alone; Gertrude did too. If she worked with someone, it was usually just to use them for some kind of an end.” A look of hurt passes through his face. “Maybe I’m not one to know, but not facing it all alone doesn’t sound terrible.”

Jon’s forehead ripples in sympathy.

“I think I made the mistake of pushing them away once,” he says quietly. “Thank you, Gerry.”

“Wait.” Gerry points at Jon’s phone. “I’ll give you my number, so we can get in touch later.”

With a soft, surprised oh, Jon unlocks his phone. A message from Sasha appears on the screen, in all caps: “JON ITS URGENT GET BACK NOW”. Fear freezes his insides as he hands it to Gerry.

“Something’s gone wrong,” he mutters.

“It’s not far.” Gerry taps the number in in record speed and hands him the phone back. After a brief look over Jon’s face, he pats his shoulder reassuringly. “You’re gonna be fine.”

Jon exchanges a last look with him, nods more to himself than to Gerry, and rushes in the direction of the Institute.

—

“Well, this is a development.” Tim crosses his arms and leans against the doorframe. “He ran away!”

He stands in Jon’s empty office, with Sasha looking through his desk. Martin hovers outside in the bullpen, anxiously fidgeting.

“He’s found Prentiss’ statement,” Sasha mutters, looking at the document.

“Guys, I still don’t think this is a good idea,” Martin shouts weakly. “What are you even hoping to find?”

“An explanation.” Sasha answers, opening a drawer. “Any clues would be great at this point.”

The drawer contains some office supplies and keys to the storage rooms and such around the Institute. She opens the second drawer and finds empty tapes. She takes a quick look through them and notices one that has a label in Jon’s handwriting. “Memory.”

“That’s interesting,” she says, straightens her back, and shakes the tape slightly for Tim to see. “Get the tape player.”

She takes the tape outside the office and places it in the device.

“This—This really feels like a violation of privacy,” Martin frantically looks at them, although they do not appear to share his sentiment.

“Look, Martin, if he wanted us to blindly trust him, he shouldn’t have left like that,” Sasha says, and her voice is soft but steady. “And he is hiding something, you know that.”

Martin swallows but doesn’t say anything. The fog creeps up closer and closer as Sasha plays the tape. He silently and quite unwittingly hopes that it will protect him from whatever’s on it.

[CLICK]

[SHAKY BREATHING]

I… I just…

I need to…

[ARCHIVIST STATIC RISES AND JON’S VOICE DEEPENS]

You could never imagine feeling something so intense, so pronounced, and so overwhelmingly painful. Of course, you Know all of this; you know every emotion any human being has ever felt but you have never experienced them for yourself like this, in the whole scope of their intensity.

You stand next to the window, overlooking what used to be a wild meadow. You remember it full of flowers and tall grass, bathed in golden sunlight; watching the grass move on the wind, with the one you love by your side. You remember the blue sky, clear of clouds, and full of fresh air.

All those memories are now tainted with the Knowledge of what is. Of what you have brought about.

The meadow outside the window is but a lifeless desert. You cannot see anything for miles unless you close your eyes… but you can hear it. You hear the screams of searing agony and frigid dread, and you Know that you are responsible for every single one of them.

You look up at the sky – it is dark, deeper than dark, something that would be ready to swallow the Earth in its entirety if only given a chance; but it doesn’t. Instead, it watches. The sky watches with thousands upon thousands of eyes following every little movement and thought. And you know that the Eyes are fond of you. You’ve done them a big service. “You deserve a reward,” the eyes say.

You know where the reward is; you know what it is that waits for you at the centre, like a freshly cooked meal at the end of a hard day at work. A reward from The Eye. A reward for bringing about an era of dread and terror.

You fall to your knees, wracked with the grief and guilt that drown your mind, clutch at your heart and throat, not letting you breathe. You don’t need to breathe. You don’t need anything in the world you have created.

The one you love is beside you, whispers a soothing song of meaningless words that do nothing to ease the vast, overwhelming void of misery that eats you from the inside. You close your eyes and in the dark of your eyelids you still see it. The Tower. The Pupil of the Eye. The Panopticon.

And you hate yourself for yearning for it.

As strong arms embrace you on the hard, wooden floor of the cabin, you remember when you had a dream. It wasn’t really long ago, but for you it feels like an entirely different lifetime. And perhaps you are right – after all, time doesn’t exist anymore.

You remember when you had a dream of a peaceful life with the one you love. You tasted it, just a drop, but the desire for quiet and warmth has overtaken your entire being, and you fell in love once again with the one you love, as well as with the cabin, which now has turned into your prison. You remember thinking, hoping that it was all over; that getting him back was the only thing that really mattered, and the rest would fall into place. You had no idea of just how many silken threads of web you and your companion were entangled in.

You remember the embraces, the soft kisses, and comfortable silences, and you cannot quite wrap your head around the fact that the one you love is still there, by your side; after everything you’ve done.

You remember speaking the words, clear as day, which now is only a distant concept in your mind. You know day because you know everything. You know that the souls this world of your creation is feeding on could not remember day. All they know, and would know for the rest of eternity, is torment and fear.

The words glistened on the page – or were those your tears? – as you uttered the prayer to the Power that you, after everything, still served. You owed it your life; your soul. The Pupil knew of the debt the Archivist owes, and he would make sure that it was paid in full. The lines of deception went far deeper than you could have ever predicted.

And as the last word teared itself from your trembling, bleeding lips, your eyes flashed with green light, blinding the whole world and extinguishing the sun. The sky ripped itself into a thousand little pieces and from every crack emerged a glowing Eye, ready to take in everything about Its new world. And as the new world created itself from the light, you collapsed on the floor, your eyes bleeding and burned, yet still seeing.

Seeing It All.

Despite everything the one you love tells you, and everything you tell yourself, you hear a part of your being, a part that’s made of never-closing eyes and strings of magnetic tape, whisper that you could have stopped reading the words before you even started. It tells you that you know you had made a choice – you have chosen to live as the monster of the Eye in a world that serves and feeds you – and you believe it. And even though you believe yourself a monster, you feel your human conscience shattering every last piece of what’s left of you inside.

You can feel every drop of suffering and pain you have doomed the world to. And you’re not sure if it is a punishment severe enough to match what you deserve.

[STATIC LOWERS AND JON’S BREATH CATCHES]

Oh, God…

[SOBBING]

[CLICK]

Silence falls over the Archives when the whirring of the tape stops, as Tim and Sasha lock shocked gazes.

“What—” Tim speaks and exhales slowly. “If this is some elaborate, fucked up joke I’m going to murder this man myself.”

Sasha shakes her head slowly, confusion painted clearly on her face.

“I don’t think this is a joke, Tim,” she says quietly.

“If—If I didn’t know Jonathan Sims, I would say he’s a pretty good actor, but…” Tim throws his arms in the air and exhales through his teeth. “What are we even supposed to make of this?”

“Why would he record it?” Sasha takes out the tape and looks it over; nothing besides the label offers any clues.

Their voices grow steadily muted until Martin can’t distinguish the words anymore. He sits in his chair, staring blankly into space, focused solely on hiding his trembling hands. The fog is so close now, he can feel it – a chill that freezes blood in his veins, a cold so strong it numbs. It caresses his cheek softly, seeping through the skin promises of fading, far away to a place where he doesn’t need to think or feel anymore. He thinks back to his friends – or, work acquaintances? They were never his friends to begin with. They seemed distressed about something, and Martin wanted to help, wanted to be useful… But he couldn’t even be that. Maybe it’s better for him to move aside, let them handle whatever’s happening. He’d only stand in the way.

His eyes glaze over with grey fog and it’s all he can see. All he wishes to see.

Just him and his endless fear.

“…tin? Martin!”

He almost feels something touch his shoulders, a faint memory of warmth, but the cold numbs it fast, lines of frost running along his veins. The sensation of having a body slips from his mind and he doesn’t fight it anymore. He’s so, so tired of fighting.

He’s probably dying. Yes. This is it, then.

It’s exactly how he’s always imagined it – cold and grey. Lonely.

—

As soon as he sees the entrance to the Institute, Jon spots her standing by the doors, searching the opposite side of the street. He breaks into a run to traverse the distance.

“Sasha!” The fear makes his voice sound weaker. He stops by her side just as she turns to him. “I—”

“Martin's gone,” she says breathlessly.

“Ma, uh... What?”

“He's gone! Disappeared into thin air right before our eyes.” Her eyes are wide with panic, and she clutches her phone in a tight grip. Jon’s stomach drops when he realizes he has never seen Sasha so panicked before. “Tell me you know what to do, there's nothing to follow up, no clues, no trail, nothing, he just… He just vanished.”

“That's impossible,” Jon says half-heartedly, and the desperate look Sasha gives him only lessens his ability to deny the truth.

“Tim's searching the Archives again, but there's just no sign of him.” She climbs the stairs with Jon following close behind, and they enter the Institute's lobby. Jon's heart threatens to jump out of his chest, and he gets that feeling again – that damned conviction that the answer is just out of reach in his mind.

“What were you doing when he disappeared?” Jon asks in a hushed voice as they pass through the middle of the lobby towards the Archives; Rosie gives them a questioning look. Sasha glances back at him and hesitates. “Sasha, what were you doing when Martin disappeared?”

He doesn't even notice how easily he slips into the deeper tone, coated in static. He stops as soon as the words fall out of his mouth, and Sasha follows suit.

“We searched your office,” she says with a sigh. “You were being really strange, and we needed to know what's going on with you, but he didn’t like that idea very much. We found a tape labelled Memory, and when we finished listening Martin was... translucent. We called his name, but I don’t think he heard us. Then, he just... disappeared entirely.”

Sasha takes a step back with a horrified look on her face. Behind her, Jon sees Tim, at the top of the stairs to the Archives, staring at him in equal horror. As soon as their eyes meet, Tim springs to action, pushing Jon away and placing himself between him and Sasha.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” He growls.

“I-I, uh...” Jon falters, running a hand through his hair. His thoughts are scattered in panic and all he can see on Tim's face is anger and fear.

“What even are you?” He almost spits the words out. “Because you sure as hell ain't Jon.”

Jon opens his mouth, but no sound comes out. He just shakes his head helplessly.

“Tim...” Sasha grabs his shoulder, and he looks back at her with concern.

“Are you hurt?” He asks and the fear cracks his voice. Sasha shakes her head.

“No, it was…” She blinks and takes a steeling breath, before turning to Jon. “Since I had to answer you, please, now return the favour. Do you know what happened to Martin?”

Jon swallows and searches the floor of the Institute’s lobby with his eyes. The tape, he recorded it some time ago during a flashback of sorts. The memory weighed him down like a sack of stones and he needed to get it out; the tape seemed like the most convenient way to do so. But what does it have to do with Martin? And how can a person just… completely disappear?

“Tell me—,” he inhales. “I need to know what it looked like. The way he disappeared, what exactly happened. With details.”

It doesn’t escape Jon’s notice the way Tim’s features harden at his words, and his hand clutches Sasha’s arm. He pushes away the hurt to a far corner of his mind.

“He went grey,” Sasha says, voice losing its earlier determination and slipping into concern. “Like… Like a picture losing saturation. He stared into the air, like his mind wasn’t even there. It grew cold, I think.”

“He turned into a wisp of fog and vanished,” Tim adds quietly. Jon shivers at that.

He remembers a place of grey fog, with the ever-present sound of ocean waves. A whole landscape covered in a roiling mass of cloying grey that coated his skin and made it hard to breathe. He found Martin there once; surely he could do it again. If he can find that place again, of course.

“I think I know what happened,” he whispers and a wave of sorrow washes over him. He presses his eyes shut for a moment, but then he freezes, feeling a gaze at his back, studious and prickling like a sharp needle through his core. He whirls around and looks up at Jonah Magnus.

“Jon?” Sasha asks, at the same time as Tim mutters: “Fucking hell, we already have enough to deal with.”

Jon’s sorrow sparks into an anger so bright it blinds all his other senses. Elias looks at him with eyebrows raised in polite interest.

“Where's Martin?” Jon walks up to him, barely restraining himself from attacking the man on the spot.

Elias shrugs, shaking his head innocently.

“How would I know? I just came out of my office to check what the commotion's all about.”

There are sparks of amusement in his eyes and Jon has had more than enough.

“Where is he?” This time he pushes all the energy he can muster into the words, deepening his voice, and he feels the power flow through his veins. His vision swims and he sways, although manages to keep his balance. Elias barely hides his surprise, and he visibly shivers, as if cold.

“He never left the archives,” he says slowly and tilts his head, studying Jon like a particularly interesting museum exhibit. “I'm sure if you go down there and check, you will find him making himself a cup of tea.”

Jon wonders if the compulsion worked at all. The power was there, and it exhausted him to an almost unbearable degree, but he has no way of knowing whether it actually pulled the truth out of Elias.

He searches his face for a moment longer, trying to work out if this is some kind of a trap, but a wave of cold sweat and a sudden ache in his stomach make him decide to leave it and go check for himself. He doesn't want Elias to see him when his waning energy runs out, and he already feels like he might pass out any second. He blinks to restore the sharpness of his vision and turns around without another word.

He passes Tim and Sasha on the stairs, not sparing a look at them. He doesn't want to see their faces, whatever expressions they might bear. He needs to find Martin, make sure he's okay, hug him and never let him go, never let anything touch him...

He opens the door to the archives and rushes to the breakroom, shaking slightly with effort. As he stops by the door, he immediately leans his hand against the wall for support and blinks away the dark spots from his vision. He sees Martin's broad frame next to the counter, holding a mug. He turns around and a look of soft surprise appears on his face.

“Hi.” He smiles slightly, fingers wrapping around the mug. Jon searches his face, then the rest of his body for signs of... What exactly? Martin seems perfectly fine at first glance, but his expression now morphs into concern. “Jon? Are you okay?”

“Are youokay?” Jon asks, hearing Tim and Sasha's steps behind him.

“Uh, yeah? Why wouldn’t I be?” Martin chuckles with confusion as Jon slowly walks up to him.

He lightly touches his arm, checking that yes, Martin seems perfectly material. There are no traces of fog anywhere, although, as Jon looks into his face he notices that his eyes are faded almost entirely to grey.

“Um…” Martin’s gaze travels from Jon’s hand to Tim and Sasha at the door. “Is something… going on?”

“Is something—” Tim scoffs in disbelief. “Martin, you disappeared! Are you okay?”

Jon withdraws his hand and takes a couple steps back to lean his back on the wall, his stomach twisting in pain and another wave of cold sweat washing over him. Martin frowns.

“I was here the whole time,” he says. “You went upstairs to call Jon. What are you talking about?”

Tim gapes at Martin while Sasha frowns, visibly thinking.

“No, we went to Jon’s office,” she says slowly. “With you. And we found a tape, remember?”

Martin laughs nervously.

“There’s a lot of tapes around here, Sasha. But I’ve just been sitting here since you left.”

Jon furiously blinks trying to bring balance to his swaying vision. Tim glances at him.

“Jon, sit down, you look like you’re going to pass out,” he says. Jon swallows and nods, but as soon as he lets go of the wall, his knees give out and he tumbles to the floor.

“Woah!” Tim catches him, and his world is enveloped by darkness.

—

Jon stirs, surrounded by a familiar smell. Martin. He smiles, not fully awake yet, letting himself enjoy the moment. He knows Martin is a morning person; he’s surely already out of the bed, preparing tea in the kitchen and watching the sun’s slow ascent over the Scottish hills. Jon hopes today is going to be a sunny day; they could go for a walk, finally see the pond Esther has been telling Martin about. There’s not a lot of young couples in the village, she said, with everyone moving away to bigger cities, but apparently it’s a very picturesque spot, ideal for a quiet date. Jon thinks they deserve that, after everything they’ve been through…

He stirs again, multiple hushed voices registering at the edge of his consciousness. Did they have guests? No, that’s impossible, no one ever came by their house; they even collect mail in the village.

Jon groans at the empty ache in his stomach, and the voices go quiet.

“Jon?” The voice belongs to Martin. Jon blinks, the sweet dream fading away quickly, replaced by memories of recent events.

“Martin…” He mumbles and winces. Martin will know what he needs, he’ll take care of him. Just one statement should be enough to get him to be somewhat functional again, Martin should know that—

“Do you need some water? God, when was the last time you ate something?” He asks when Jon’s stomach rumbles. Jon blinks again to clear his vision, and sees he’s in the document storage, laying on the cot. The sheets still smell of Martin, who crouches next to the cot with worry creasing his forehead. Tim and Sasha share this expression, standing a little to the back.

“Why don’t you go to the breakroom and get some food for him?” Sasha asks Martin quietly. “Some sweet tea probably would be good as well.”

“Yeah, okay,” Martin nods and, after giving Jon another concerned glance, gets up and leaves the document storage. Sasha turns her gaze to Jon, who carefully sits up and leans his back on the wall.

“How are you feeling?” She asks and Jon can’t miss the terse note in her voice. Something heavy weighs his chest down and his limbs could very well be made of lead.

“Drained,” Jon says hoarsely.

“We need some answers and fast.” Sasha glances at the door. “Martin doesn’t remember the tape at all.”

Jon frowns. Martin doesn’t remember… Jon has a feeling Martin doesn’t remember a whole lot more things than just the tape.

“It’s like his memories were switched up,” Tim joins, with his arms crossed tightly over his chest. “It’s really freaky.”

“I… I don’t know why he doesn’t remember,” Jon says quietly, searching the floor. “I have no idea what happened.”

“Okay.” Sasha nods. “Then your thing, making people answer your questions. What’s that about?”

Jon sighs and rubs his face.

“It’s… It’s complicated.”

“Figures,” Tim scoffs.

“Look, this place… It changes me. It probably affects you as well, but not to a noticeable degree.” Jon picks up his glasses from the box that serves Martin as a nightstand and puts them on. “This power, it… It’s supposed to help the Archivist get statements from people.”

Sasha raises her eyebrows.

“What do the statements do?” She asks.

“They, uh…” Jon swallows. “The Institute is dedicated to a power of fear some call the Beholding, or the Eye. The statements feed it, and It in turn, feeds the Archivist.”

He can’t bear to look at them. He can’t face the looks of horror, the disgust, the revulsion. For a moment he’s overcome with an urge to just close his eyes and give up, let the matters take their course without him. How did he handle this last time?

“That explains the bleeding eyes, I guess,” Sasha mutters. “Why did you tell Naomi Herne to leave?”

Jon looks up at her in surprise. She seems genuinely interested, trying to piece together the answer without judgement. Jon shivers at how strongly it aligns her with the Eye.

“I…” He searches for words and closes his eyes in pain. “I don’t want to be a monster.”

The words are quiet and Jon’s insides twist with embarrassment at how pathetic they sound. Tears gather behind his eyelids without much consideration for his broken pride.

“How do you even know all this?” Tim speaks up, his expression not betraying how he feels about all this. Jon lets out a tired chuckle.

“That’s the really complicated part,” he says. “I—”

At this moment the door to the storage opens and Martin walks in with a steaming mug in hand.

“Unfortunately, there’s not much in the way of food,” he says, gently passing the mug to Jon. Their fingers brush and Jon’s throat closes up. “By that I mean there is literally nothing. S-Someone has to go out to get some.”

“Sasha, you should take the day off,” Jon says, blowing air carefully on the tea. “You haven’t slept tonight.”

“Neither did you, and you’re the one who fainted.” She crosses her arms. “I hope you don’t intend to stay here.”

“I have to.” He looks Sasha in the eyes pointedly, hoping she understands. “I have a statement to record.”

She inhales, looking him over, and nods slightly.

“That’s insane,” Martin pipes up. “You need to get some sleep, you can’t possibly—”

“I’ll sleep when I’m dead,” he mutters and takes a sip. The tea is very sweet, more so than he usually takes it, but it warms his stomach.

“Jon.” Martin’s pleading voice salts an open wound inside Jon’s chest. He should know why, he should remember, he should—

Jon blinks away the wetness from his eyes, not looking at Martin.

“I won’t change my mind, so you can save your efforts,” he says and slides off the cot. Martin watches him with worry, ready to catch him if he falls.

“Told you, Marto,” Tim says, seemingly aiming for a joking tone, but some of the tension of the situation finds a way into his voice.

“Just… Promise me you’ll at least take a nap?” Martin asks and Jon finds it impossible to say no.

“Fine.” He shakes his head. “I will. Now, I need to get to work.”

Sasha looks at him, biting her lip, as if debating something in her mind.

“I’ll explain everything on Monday, I promise,” Jon adds but Sasha shakes her head.

“No. We’ll meet tomorrow, somewhere inconspicuous. This can’t wait that long. I assume nobody has any special Saturday plans?”

They all shake their heads.

“Good.” Sasha nods. “I’ll pick a place and then we’ll talk.” She looks at Jon with raised eyebrows. “Agreed?”

Jon sighs and nods.

“Agreed.”

----

Author's Note: Jmart angst? Me? I would never 😶

Today's chapter title inspiration is Papillon by Blanco White! :)

#tma oftm #tma #niki.writes #the magnus archives #tma fic #jonathan sims #jonmartin

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actualbird · 2 years

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i was so excited when i caught up to everything in the main story. i got sick beyond belief for a month i come back WHAT HAPPENED. I was starting on max levelling all my valentines mr cards... I come back and part 6 is out and there's a whole new event where artem looks like he's going to start white boy rapping at me. i love him desperately but he looks like he's going to try and get me to Just Say No To Drugs. vyn isn't much better but he gets a pass for the little dual necklace thing. i was gonna come back, freshly read your whole like 45 page what is essentially a dissertation on tot and share in my delight in getting into this game i'm just. OVERWHELMED. i'll come back though, yknow eventually when i catch up again? i guess? -💚

waaahh, hello greenheart, long time no see :DDD

oh gosh, im sorry to hear you got sick, i hope ur well now!!! and kbKBJDFS YEA, A LOT HAPPENED IN MARCH LMAO. there was a new content drought in feb particularly to drum up excitement for both parts of main story 6 and then at the tail end of 6.2, they also dropped Electrifying Night so that we wouldnt all be staring at our hands mumbling "what the fuck" at everything that happened in 6.2, i suppose. 6.2 was WILD AND IM STILL THINKING ABOUT IT

on electrifying night tho, agree. artem looks SO NERDY WITH HIS HIPSTER GLASSES WHICH SHOULD BE 100% FAKE AND/OR HAVE NO LENSES. i love vyn's outfit tho cuz it's Sublimely Gender, like, he won this event. it wasnt a competition, but he won. NOW IF ONLY HIS SSR WOULD COME HOME TO ME.....

and oh gosh, thank u for reading my kajbfkjasbfkabf TOT DISSERTATION LMAO. waiting to get an honorary phd in tot studies from hoyo. i jest, of course. i'd need to submit my fan cartography map of stellis first. I STILL JEST JBKAFKAJF

theres a lot new stuff to explore, greenheart!! and take ur time enjoying the ride ^u^

#honestly w this game u go to sleep for one week and when u wake up theres 938y48323 new things #it's overwhelming for me too cuz prior to tot i was mostly getting into fandoms where all the source content was Done and Out #NAH. HERE THERES NEW PANCAKES EVERY SECOND AND I LOVE IT #asks #greenheart!anon

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iuicmontreal · 3 years

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🚨🚨🚨🔥🔥🔥Captain Isaac is back with another electrifying class, Wrestling Against The Angels of Darkness, Queers for Jesus ??? Be sure to tune in as he dismantles another #Clubhouse doctrine!! Premiering tomorrow at 5pm CST, exclusively on #IUICDALLAS #YouTube channel! https://youtu.be/uUG7BtZ5f8U #DTX #IUIC #DALLAS #214 #DDD https://www.instagram.com/p/CNWAk-cHfBM/?igshid=dx1nizh15xe9

#clubhouse #iuicdallas #youtube #dtx #iuic #dallas #214 #ddd

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kitsoa · 5 years

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Fic: A Measure of Gratitude

Fandom: Kingdom Hearts

Genre: Gen

Word Count: 4309

Characters: Sora, Riku

Relationship: Sora & Riku (mainly platonic but its free real estate)

Summary: [Post KH2][Pre-DDD] It was a childish ambition of his, accomplished in seconds. Perhaps the way he got there cheapened the moment, but it couldn’t change the beauty of the view. This was his home.

Sora reflects on his homecoming.

The air splashed around like a thick hot soup. Hungry gasps for oxygen took in the humidity with native ease while arms pumped through the foliage of green and sneakers slapped the wet stone at a constant beat. The run was joined with the ceaseless screams of cicadas and the scampering rustle of a startled animal.

The island was built around a massive and dormant volcano. Upon its dark soil sprung violently rich greenery. Trees of impressive heights, coiling vines along fallen trunks, moss blooming along jagged cliff sides, wet ravines that spilled water from a nearby ocean channel in loud splatters. The expanse of the main island was covered in a forest known fondly by the youth of the town. The primary hiking trail was exhausted in its familiarity, only holding captive the spirit at the base of the volcano’s sharp incline by a sloppily pinned strip of bright yellow ribbon blocking entry to Uwami Point.

It was almost laughable really. Closed in a moment of crisis roughly 20 years ago, the lone, pathetic string of tape was mainly symbolic of the very few hard laws in the land, relying on the trust of islander fellowship to enforce the idea that Uwami Point could kill as it had done before. It didn’t stop the more adventurous children until resulting consequences satisfied them to play exclusively at a lonely island across a small surf of ocean.

It was a schoolyard dare, a right of passage for unruly teens, a thrilling challenge to a wide-eyed child looking to prove himself. So the act of jumping over the blockade was not unheard of. Not for many Islanders and certainly not for Sora.

The impact of his shoes on the rock was momentary as the young teen immediately broke back into his run. He launched himself among the step stones of a winding creek, sweeping under low hanging branches, arranged in a manner both familiar and entirely new—like someone shifted the couch over by two inches. His focus was as intense as his breathing, eyes darting miles ahead of his next step to take the vault across the stump that wasn’t there 2 years before, and dodging the drop where he broke his wrist when he was nine. All the while the incline grew steep and the smell of the ocean took back dominance over the dirt and green.

The trees started to thin as the rocks climbed to the sky and what was the once the expert movements of a boy at home became something else entirely. He kicked off the wall of stone and parried himself off another in a way that looked like flying. Sora flipped along the small footholds, finding greater purchase on the larger ledges only to launch himself higher, sometimes scampering his shoes straight up a vertical incline to catch a distance lip.

The entire time his blood pumped, eyes elated and sparkling with what was a childhood dream falling—or in this case climbing— into his lap. The moment captured his body into a captivated physical trance, his focus equally pacified and humming with electrifying precision. Beneath that, wells of something greater, more mysterious, and limitless bubbled with the joy. It joined his coiled muscles as he rocketed along the impossible trail of Uwami Point.

The massive leaves of a tropical bush indicated the return of green and Sora grabbed its stalk for one final pull up. There were few trees upon the more level walkways of the mountain but the path winded across vertigo-inducing altitude. Sora rose to his feet, taking several steps toward the clearing on the rocks, the air salty and active. It was a like a different world, the clouds so much closer, his eyes consuming the entire expanse of the forest surrounding the town— the size of a dinner plate from his vantage point. His feet stopped at the massive drop into a sea of trees.

“Wow.” He breathed, unable to contain his wonder. Here was his home, his small world nestled in a nook of island foliage and blue sea, in a form he never before dreamed he’d see. Sora let the temptation to reach his hand out toward the coastal settlement take over, his gloves obscuring the homes, his fingers worming along the dirt streets, every single denizen in his palm. The school was near his pinky, the younger students milling about like ants while at recess. Several ships were finding the port with trade from the island neighbors. His small home settled on the edge of town by a coast of soft white sand curled under his thumb. If he squinted, the mayor’s mansion was in sight by the town square. Face flush with excitement, Sora thought of showing Riku this view. He wondered what he’d say.

And then, in the distance, he spotted the lush little Play Island. The special islet stood out like a beacon surrounded by the blue. Even so, it was still an unsuspecting location for his world’s heart. Just knowing that gave the place a warm glow that was amplified by the fond memories upon those shores. The compulsion to lay on its sun-soaked beach was far too real for the mountain scaling teen.

With a wry grin, Sora fell into the easy analytics of judging if a glide-induced jump from this height would result in an early nap across the stretch of water. Confidence started to swell with a change in the wind pattern, whipping his hair into his eyes which were skirting across the town in a last minute search for witnesses. He took a couple steps back to prep his running start.

His muscles fired him into a leaping sprint when a voice emerged out of the quiet nature around him.

“You will definitely get spotted if you try that.”

Sora squawked as he tried to stop, his momentum launched out of control. And in a comical attempt to stop himself, the boy’s arms flailed wildly while his sneakers slid to the edge of the cliffside until finally, Sora fell off.

“Sora!”

Riku, the unsuspecting visitor to what was actually an impossible trail to follow, stumbled forward in a jerk of protective reflexes, reaching down the cliff toward his falling friend to no avail.

“Oh thanks, Riku.” He heard the eye roll in Sora’s voice and took in the sight of his friend falling slowly through the air, a magical glide easing him to the next available ledge, arms crossed in a sour mood.

“Did anything hit you?” Riku couldn’t contain the guilty worry in his voice. He clenched the ledged while his friend descended.

“I’m fine, I’m fine!” Sora insisted, feet touching the ground on a small lip along the cliffside. “Just gimme a second and I’ll give you some payback.”

A second was all he needed to scale back up in two easy leaps. Riku couldn’t rise to his feet in time to avoid Sora’s vengeful tackle on the way up, complete with a gurgly yell.

“Wah? SORA!” He spluttered as a face full of Sora was now on top of him, pushing his shoulders to the ground. A mischievous grin was on his mouth as he pressed his forearms into Riku’s face with a series of sloppy knuckle slaps to his head.

“Way to screw up my plan Riku!” Sora laughed while the older boy knocked his hands away in a light swipe. He then used his long legs to pin Sora’s ankles in a show of resistance.

“Oh, you’ll thank me later,” Riku responded, attempting an easy tone with difficulty amidst the wrestling match. He swept his feet to the side, knocking Sora off balance and into humorous crumpled of limbs. Riku took his chance and went after the boy’s mess of brown hair, rustling it into an even greater mess.

“Hey!” Sora protested grabbing at his pant leg in a childish way as Riku got to his feet. His posture tensed.

“No no don’t.” He said as Sora released his pant leg with a cocked eyebrow. Riku heaved a sigh, scratching has his face with an embarrassed gaze. “I can't let my uniform rip.”

And that’s when Sora took full note of his friend’s attire, blue plaid dress pants and a now dirt scuffed short sleeve uniform polo fit with a plaid tie. The Destiny High School summer uniform.

“Why aren’t you in class?”

Riku swallowed a laugh in a choked huff. “Why aren’t you?”

Sora shrunk back in a spell of insecurity. He grabbed at his feet as he adjusted himself into a sitting position. He was still in his adventuring clothes, complete with the clanking buckles and rattling pockets full of keychains and accessories. He scratched at his head.

“Ah, you know.” He laughed with a furtive hesitation in his eye. “I wasn’t really feeling it today, that’s all...”

Riku crossed his arms, clearly contemplating something in the silence of his piercing eyes. He took in a breath… and then sighed it away in defeat.

“I’m not really one to talk.” Riku pulled a hand through his bangs, clearing his vision before the wind swept it back into his eyes. Sora felt the tension in his neck relax. “The moment I realized you were skipping, I headed out after you. Talk about an opportunist.”

“How’d you know I’d be here?”

Riku hummed thoughtfully, taking a moment to crouch down to Sora’s seated level and kick his feet out. “You were staring at Uwami Point yesterday. I had a feeling you wanted to give it a spin with your new abilities.”

“And yet you stopped the biggest test of said abilities.”

“Hey, as impressive as your ability to glide is, don’t think for a second you won’t get spotted by the entire town trying to take a short cut to the Play Island. We have to—”

“Maintain the world border. Don’t worry, Donald never let me forget.”

“‘Border?’ ”

“Sorry— ‘order.’ ”

“You’ve clearly committed that to memory.”

Sora made an exaggerated pout. “It’s not easy lying to everyone.”

His exaggeration hid greater stress and Sora had to swallow down a sudden string of tension in his throat at a creeping memory from only days before. A reunion so basic; the family friends rushing to their home as news of Sora and Riku’s return rippled across the town like the igniting lamps at nightfall. He remembered Hana, the wife of his father’s employer, in her misleading scowl and heavy glare, yielding to a twinkling joy on verge of tears, crushing him in a hug and pawing his shoulders and face for signs of some kind of harm. Questions spilled from her mouth that would echo later from neighbors of a more casual bond. Where had he been? What had caused his absence? Was he okay?

He didn’t blame them for their overbearing reactions. He even indulged in the euphoric atmosphere of their presence. Old bonds in his heart leaped. Childish selfishness basked in an attention he had gluttoned for in his younger days. And as joy curled his lips, a blush rose to his cheeks and brought a similar twinkle to his eye— looming clunch on his jaw skewed his face awkward. His neck grew tight and a pressure seeped through his chest.

When the swell of shock and elation died out, and all that was left between them was that empty air of unanswered questions and great expectations, there was the seizing dismay in her eyes. It was a confusion so unrelated and undeserving while she and many others in the following days would realize that they had come to harbor a worry that would never find burial.

And wasn’t that worry just another form of darkness?

Riku’s face was lax, his mouth a hard to read line. “True.”

Sora shook his head of the memory, choosing instead to cling on the more present good. The beautiful horizon lent a hand in that.

“Oh, but secrets can be fun too! How many people do you think have ever successfully climbed Uwami Point?” As if to exclaim his point, Sora outstretched his arms to present the impressive view of the town.

Riku hummed. “If the stories are true, I can only imagine a small number have even tried.”

'Stories’— meaning cautionary tales and ‘tried’—meaning ‘failed.'

“Yep… Everything looks so different from up here.”

“It certainly provides… an interesting perspective.”

The kind of perspective a restless child could have used to cure his island fever. A spin on the small sameness of a sea-locked paradise that could easily inspire and regrow weary appreciation for home… But it was a perspective nearly impossible to gain without first stepping foot outside. Redundant, the view of the town could just as easily summate the limits of their world.

The thought was sobering. The memories of reckless horseplay on the island and schemes of adventure on the beach gave a sleepy warmth in Sora’s head. It felt a little like swimming, staring out at home. Weightless, free, and comforting. The memories of loving smiles from shopkeepers on the square, or his father’s crew, to the diligent teachers at the school— he imagined they were all within his vantage point from this distance. But in the same way, it felt a little muffled. Unreal and distorted as though the winds from this mountaintop were waves and those smiles were trying to talk to him from the surface when all he could only see was their sun dazzled shadows through the water and all he could hear were their warped voices in the bubbles.

“Are you happy to be back Riku?”

The question caught Riku off guard, Sora’s expression was mellow and perhaps nostalgic—not an ounce of unspoken context or prying. Just an honest reflection. Their home behind his heartfelt gaze, the sun as ever faithfully crawling through the sky, the question seemed silly.

“Yeah.” And his words were sure. It didn’t really matter if rumors flew in unsavory ways, or if the townsfolk would never completely understand the people they were growing into. Even if there was a foundation of truth in the furtive glances, and that horrifying storm— now a bad memory— was a result of his weakness… the idea of standing on this earth had been resigned so many times in the past year that Riku couldn’t fathom regret. At least not at that moment. Sora just made things easy.

“What about you?” He shot back. What of this open heart could words really convey? There was something so islander about an exchange of easy pleasantries, if this could be considered that.

“Oh sure.”

A silly question indeed.

And it was like they were on those dark shores again, yearning for the slight breeze to smell the same while letting it settled slowly that they were never going to view their sea again. If Sora hadn’t been there. If he had been alone, grounded on that suffocating land, Riku imagined he would have wept endlessly on that black sand. He would have gone from being blind to the wealth he already had, to truly destitute. A real island prison as opposed to his naively manufactured one.

But Sora’s eyes flickered, that sobered feeling from earlier swelling around his vision while he took in his friend. Déjà vu. That water swarmed around Riku and he felt the urge to reach out to him against a swallowing current. At least… he was below the surface with him. It gave him the strength to lay the feeling on the table.

“But you know. I think I’m a little nervous.” The surprising words had that characteristic Sora pep. It was the sort of certainty that spoke of his refusal to dwell and brood, or at least fight in the face of it.

“Nervous? Of what?” Unlike Riku, Sora’s never resented his home. Any guilt around his heart from here would have to have been born from some contrived sense of failed responsibility and as far as he could tell— Sora was nothing but victorious.

Sora slowly let his gaze fall away from the town, focusing at his feet, upon the shoes that trodden on lands beyond the wildest imagination.

“Not a day went by when I didn’t think of home… I just wanted to find you and Kairi and let everything go back to normal... “ He cocked his head in some mixture of nostalgia and amusement.

“But ever since we got back… I’m starting to wonder if normal’s even possible anymore.”

Sora wasn’t sure normal was the word. Maybe it was ‘same’? But that forced him to recognize the feeling as unyielding change. A transformation instead of a slightly skewed picture frame.

Sora‘s voice was gentle, almost lost to the wind in his bout of insecurity. Riku exhaled through his nose, not taking his eyes off the sad smile on his friend. There was a flare of guilt in his gut he refused to let fester. If only he had realized what he had. If only he hadn’t uprooted their world and destroyed any sense of the word normal. If only—

“You think you’ve changed?”

Sora crossed his arms with a more befitting pout of consideration as he rolled the summation.

“Yes? I mean something’s different. I feel different.”

“You’ve grown,” Riku corrected and Sora felt an uncontrolled swell of pride from a younger side of himself, desperate for his older friend’s recognition, now suddenly dished out without fanfare. He laughed it away with a dry bark.

“I’m taller.”

“And you can climb Uwami Point in seconds flat.” And the weight of such a benign fact was reluctantly recognized, but promptly ignored.

“That doesn’t matter.” He pushed Riku’s example away with his hand, bemusement in his eye. It did matter. It was indicative of his new abilities, of his responsibilities and purpose. It was the highest point in their world. The limit.

“Does ‘normal’ even matter?” Riku asked, but in his head, he screamed ‘ of course it matters.' The attempt at devil’s advocate to fight Sora’s woes was a purpose he could rally behind though. It settled him into a familiar position; giving sage advice he wasn’t entirely sure of like the older kid on the Play Island he was used to being.

“Not exactly…” Sora admitted. “But it probably does for everyone else.”

Riku paused, the spell of concern resonating and tugging at his own heart. It didn’t take long for the rumors to reach them. While their return was miraculous and welcome, the lack of answers to their great mystery simmered a world of fables. How long until they tainted the hearts of their beloved islanders? How long until the weakest of connections withered when Sora’s love included everyone? Would it spread like poison? What would that lead to?

“I know what you mean,” Riku said after a moment, doing his best to fight the spiraling void of dark possibilities. Alas, it brought him to a spot of resonance. A memory from just that morning, interrupting Kairi’s pre-class conversation with her classmates to inquire about Sora and the stares from the underclassmen that ensued. People unsure of what to think. Perceptions once gilded in admiration and familiarity now boggled in the foreign sight that was Riku himself. Otherness. Guilt. It was like playing with fire and blisters calloused along his skin.

Riku didn’t know how to put that into words.

“But hey,” He continued, finally knocking Sora out of his thoughts and catching his drifting gaze with a tilt of his head. “I guess we just have to keep it a secret the best we can. Just you, me, and Kairi.”

They were the people Sora’s heart chose. Woven into the foundation of all he felt, they were his pillars. As long as they stood beside him, he would be okay. That image of swimming felt a little more grounded, in his hands were the solid palms of resonating company and it coursed through him like liquid courage. The steadfast eyes of his longest friend reassured him. He was not alone.

Sora nodded sharply, encouraged. “You’re right.”

“That’s more like the Sora I know.” A wry smile teased Riku’s mouth. A shock of perspective— one of less macrocosmic levels— jolted Sora with a trill of self-conscious anxiety at his words. He blinked back beside himself.

“Ah… uh… Sorry?” He offered. “I didn’t realize I wasn’t being ‘me’...”

Riku waved the concern away with a laugh. “Don’t think about it too hard, you’ll hurt yourself.”

“Hey!” Sora jutted his jaw forward for show and Riku had to hold it together with a bemused smile.

“Why don’t you go to class tomorrow? We can bring things to normal together.” Riku offered after a kind silence.

He shifted his weight and brought himself onto his feet as Sora pursed his lips, giving the only school building on the island a long and pointed glance.

“Come on Sora. United front?”

He may cox his friend with ease, but stepping into the constricting uniform was a herculean task in and of itself. He could truly sympathize with Sora’s reluctance with striking clarity. Even so, Riku's efforts seemed fruitful.

“Only if you let me glide to the Play Island after nightfall.” Sora mirrored Riku, rising to his feet with a sly grin on his face, troubles far away. He began walking toward the edge of the perimeter he arrived from, intending to jump.

Riku gave a scoff. “You’ll have to carry me with you.”

“No way! You’re too heavy!”

“I’m offended.”

“How are you gonna get down without scuffing up your uniform?” Sora asked pointedly, peering over the edge to find potential footholds for his friend to ease down the cliff. Riku, in a moment of concern, glanced at his uniform pants, patting away some dirt collected from when he was sitting.

“I guess I didn’t think that far.”

Sora took a step back in yet another jumping prep, a self-important laugh. “Then it looks like you’re actually are getting that lift.” And that’s when Sora stepped on a loose stone, bringing his attention to the earth beneath his feet.

“Hey, Riku… come over here.”

“I was joking,” Riku said turning around from the cliffside only to noticed Sora‘s distracted focus. He drew closer, following his friend’s curiosity as he crouched himself toward the stone.

“What do you know... We aren’t the first ones up here.” Riku mused as Sora brushed away loose dirt from the sloppy engraving. It appeared to be old but was deep enough to have survived years of erosion. Whoever wrote the message did so with passion. Sora imagined if someone were to have scaled this cliff —without superhuman abilities— they would’ve easily had the drive to inspire a trophy of this simplicity. The message itself was the confusing part.

“‘Another, ’” Sora read aloud. “Another what?”

This was the highest point in all of Destiny Islands. There wasn’t ‘another.’

Riku failed to respond, something dark sobering his gaze. “That’s kind of sad.” He said after a pause.

“Hm? What do you mean?” Sora was attempting to search for more inscriptions on the rock but failing.

Riku took his time to brush his thumb over the message, the jagged engraving seemed artistic at first glance, but closer inspection showed more sloppy desperation in the lines. “Whoever climbed up here chose not to write their name… they probably weren’t very proud of themselves.”

And to write something as greedy as 'another.' There was little context in those lines, but something about its location was chilling. Sure... the view was beautiful, the feat was validating, the notoriety was immortalizing, but what more could someone from this small world expect?

“Oh…” Sora knitted his eyebrows together in concerned thought. “That’s… not right…”

Who wouldn’t feel proud of themselves? Sora and Riku technically cheated themselves from the pride… but the spoils of the view, the nostalgic dream-come-true was too sweet to not appreciate. But this mystery person, who most likely scaled this mountain with their hands, facing the dangerous winds and stretched out footholds… they didn’t even tell anyone to warrant an island legend… assuming that they got back down alive. Sora almost choked on that sinking thought. It made him feel wrong, almost dirty. In those moments, the air clung to his skin weird, like he didn’t really belong. Nothing stirred more fear in his heart.

“Or their name is actually ‘Another.’” Riku offered after a silence.

Sora choked, but this time on a bursting laugh. “Now that’s sad.”

“I’m just picturing a cranky mother naming her fifth kid ‘Another’ out of frustration or something.”

Sora threw his head back. “I’d probably climb a mountain too if my mom was that disappointed in me.”

“You’ve done more than that and your mom’s a saint Sora.”

Sora smiled, impossibly bright. “I’m actually really happy we weren’t the first up here.”

It made him feel closer to the ground, but he didn’t know how to say that out loud.

Riku hummed in agreement. Sora took in the town as he rose to his feet one final time. This was home. It was small, but plenty. This was enough.

When they returned to level ground, Sora and Riku took a boat out to the Play Island. They stretched the long afternoon in the dark cave of the Secret Place, holding a handful of conjured fire to newly made engravings of their own, sloppily scratched on the precious blank stone. They tested their imagination and art skills on the walls, making up stories about a mysterious ungrateful mountain climber and later showing Kairi in fits of laughter. She scolded them for skipping class before drawing an artistically superior sequel.

And when night fell they saw the stars shimmering from the cave openings. Backs flat on the wet stone floor, they got another, equally impressive view of their world.

#kingdom hearts #a repost because i put the ao3 link the last post and i dont think it got on the tag #anyway please enjoy

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israeliteprincess · 3 years

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#Repost @dallasiuic • • • • • • 🚨🚨🚨🔥🔥🔥Captain Isaac is back with another electrifying class, Wrestling Against The Angels of Darkness, Queers for Jesus ??? Be sure to tune in as he dismantles another #Clubhouse doctrine!! Premiering tomorrow at 5pm CST, exclusively on #IUICDALLAS #YouTube channel! https://youtu.be/uUG7BtZ5f8U #DTX #IUIC #DALLAS #214 #DDD https://www.instagram.com/p/CNV-Io0HiKe8F78XQojLeCwNYpCJhSOdxZ33WA0/?igshid=13ve7y19gflez

#repost #clubhouse #iuicdallas #youtube #dtx #iuic #dallas #214 #ddd

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marcosoropoet · 7 years

Text

LIZARD CLOUD PLATINUM PINK ~ Marcos Oro

Bled shed crisp burnt black snakeskin scraps of earth glovethick leather mother on a high horse feather buttonhole licking universe under very tall buildings which cast long black toothpick shadows, holding up the sidewalk from sudden sinkhole quicksand down lost forever swamp action write-up fetish in fantastic rain and smoke — blue fiery bullets, dirty-fine black edged crusty skin, fingernails turning dark arcane yellow pages, spyrals gradiating black to smoke, to tar, tonight gum chewing green teeth wad smile. Camera shoots the spy. Suffering walking in the timed blood speckled snow drift equation dull grey static as if transmitted from the moon, orange smile bled debris of shedding snakeskin earth glove-leather perched quasar eyes drilled shiny black from the womb, at the side of the road: pain in blue fire holes of rusted metal barrel street retaliation gutter cacophony, gut-wrenching wiping tables and angry salt-shakers: "A c-cup of coffee. Black please." (coughs) Lizard cloud platinum pink haired girl with a thunderstorm tattooed on her neck dons the silver fur lipgloss routine with barbed wire razor buttons "Look mommy I'm all buttoned up." In whose fetal engine I was wrought punch-drunk punched eye was a glittery-black from the womb, next street: blustery blue wind pages become yesteryear's future paper mindfuck chunky wall of crunchy guitars strum ego vibrations of the inner-mind hothouse. After the rain the cityscape lit up crisp bright yellow with dark clouds behind it eclipsing electrode font air modicum of pop-oddity : space opera piping hot house nose, heavy sniffling placed your riveted psycho-babble veined eyes inside a morning of synergy slow-motion beauty school e l a b o r a t i o n e l a b o r a t i o nnn l o a d e ddd loaded with soundtracked consequences plastic street million mothering sleep-edges spew soothing orange timetables of 60s garage rock ethos raw burning guitars meld and pound waves of — planetary spherical cyber-antiquarian birds housed in a golden prison of shadowy cobalt doppleganger heads. Slept. Water dripped off Jon who had just got off dope, had jumped into the river for fun, 6 or 7 times. 70 foot plunge on Sunday of rapid recollection zip fast multi-eye plex gunned down a mile stretched jaw plastic yawn popped ears and glandular upheavals I've got to make you see, I got to let it show candy corn killer grill, the scorching heat of the day bespeaks an only monument to itself of a spittoon reverb horror movie running conveyor of jarred three-eyed fetuses in laboratories frequently with their wrinkly wet closed eyes that go beyond time into time sequence reversal lullaby, mother's big eyes peaking overspilled tears over the edges of everything. Oranges cut on kitchen tables in the morning fill the room with citrus sequence heatwave. Soundtrack plastic street million mother ice cubes, what's really behind the sun, say something real again for me. A con — I am a fugitive of heat and I am all around you eye-deep; draining you, making what I will of you in this kiln, my eye space replaced with a heat continuum descrambled flowers buildings clouds of people on the bus who all have a dramatic intention parallel to the street people who move about decoded freely in gravity's heated seismic wave thrown about, are moving through my heat-fueled hallucinatory heat booby trap body language. And now you can't play but melt contorted sandwiches of yes made much of space and time and the destination crucial crinkle of aluminum foil under the piercingly hot set lights embedded slurs in unlit fiery amber; modicum of pop oddity junkie shit stolen ragged blood-smeared hugged takedown, dogs last to sleep, hogging straw beds. Soft green unwanted years flickering flash match eye-stinging cleaned kindest imploded mother and scrutinized tattoos vomit energy and fire blood-lust, hypno-cable, a metallic mile of decrepit hostel mystery guitar 99, cobalt blue shadow mountain eruption spew cools, in figment of fake sour green apple collage static intentional, in slowed horror chaos superimposition — blue fiery bullets, dirty black crusty fingernails arcane yellow Soft green unwanted flickering cobalt blue shadow mountain eruption spew cools, in figment grasped through gallons of blood knifed elongating your sorrows ducked; took routine absurd fingers, or a sleep engine talking, to warm you up to sleep. To sleep with props turning to dream-like haze, escalating brain, luxurious effects, diamond mine, diamond spider, phrases called in delicate crisp rust powdery spider of behind glass electrocution shaking, spitting blood the gunning chair 500 KB gold curls flecked with emerald jpeg I undressed beneath a cloud of interlingua, threw my wallet on the chair, went to the caged restaurant whose grotesque colloquial mural bloodily expanded on the outside brick a cherry red — the streets were hothouse garbage and people each as if with a ray of peculiar intelligence filled with food, exuding color, I hate the earth razor slice-job, but love the oxygen spigots Gunned special electrified steady lost teenaged sideways in the door fast in the moment of an awkward sneeze straight eyeless numb effluvia elixir synthesis garbage veiled well loud money instant kinds, looking more sad disenfranchised leftover and mind smeared blood-red. An unwanted blooming rose of blood. Blood is the essence. Blood is driver of the poet. Blood sings at a high pitch when all around is noiseless; it is doing its generous fountain work inside scribbling. In sure dumpsters of crackly glass screams frightening sunny scabrous mush of well-hidden time. Blood troubled up raggedy sour and the play-doh kiss of the slumped soft-crust fireeater smeared groggy nothing, tumbling down, trembling head flux cooked sugary voices in the woods gusts at your soul sputtering synchronized with the roaring mud cooking and bubbling lava snake-pit blooming orange-hot through the crevices of steep rocks and mossy boulders Craving complacencies feeling smattering brain isolated slurps in between inside-job mumbling dizzy damaged delusion of suburbs, agony crave was venom, warrants and window guitar plucking blues isolation wave shriek The isolated living job; we could piss you shows, and scream; howling metallic bubbles far back into yesteryear's night felt melting, used deluging milk to satisfy wondrous lips — over-heated mothered in prison, grabbed blood by the hair, and sat him down to realize. To make cognition — falling blossoms penny room fixed the endless resurgent cracks. Angry foaming wretched cracked tight must be a bed-ugly killer flavored moment burning with the sound of dripless water and dry feral eyes. Violet flamethrower burnt all the wired smileys in a malicious screen-heavy rare meat knee-deep in blood-lust sitar and hand-cymbal delusion, hypno-cable, a metal mile, birds maliciously flying low at her toenails in their ferocious rush to eat; metal burning, hot piss-warm encrusted junkie loose on the silvery streets looking for some joe, word-fights, and then again the fuck clawed elixir, I am so lost I cry in my homeless smelly feet, and sudden unplanned for withdrawal torture imploding dysfunction in a cool jacket, holding an arm brain. Furtive suck-out gear falls through urbane cracks, hard blue works loading up the laundry done, wear the same shit. Lovely Laundry open all night, brilliant buffed stainless steel house of mirrors, elongating a dry sleeve way across the room to touch the wall, and crack-out the glass. Alleys, real cold. No identifiable wall. All is a wall. Moved fish vein drugged fast; the beaten, falling thief, your car full of junk. Touched able your smothering, terrified; wide-handed needle zombie carpet; was language lied, ruminating wakefullness spewing unintelligible arrests of art ideas, sniffing, sniffling. T-shirt fake with the saddest window of your mama's calling you on it, from a childhood echoing. A faded joke threadbare uniform neck slit; he turns dim & gone; resists. "Hey, can I use your belt..." Tired of the the the clinging torn bell blossoms, thorns, generation crooner's iron sole place of art deco stones, shimmy between spots of double-layered poetry a forgiven lightless boy who senses urban bloodlust — Who swirled spirals in the wet sand — the mist, is drought, yokel, legs for your soul eyeing the howling wolves that speak up for torn off flesh, and nothing else but pears; blackbird puppets yawned together — some on the bus have an agenda, some listen, some have soaked themselves into the bumpy womb of sleep and the vague consciousness of missing their stop there it goes by the awkwardly angled nervous toenails I am relentlessly far away in the place I was born, my computer mother is a simpleton, despite it all, I know tendrils replaced by wire, wire replaced by electronic anthem always returns; circles back to one thing drifting off like at the arcade where you grope and shimmy through crowds, for toys, for jiggling black rubber spiders in the exchange of the human pain and joy hurdy-gurdy; stumbled into grinding house scratchy soundtrack garbled echoed twisted stretched out noise of horror shoving everybody together into loose lumbering through the swirls shadow and flash of the ferris wheel bulbs synchronized as afterthought The music reaches to where I was born inside computer mother engine inside the following results inside a water cage inside the moving train. We are birthed differently now. The heat is all around your every fiber viewing and feeling sweat pours into the sponge of air, fever dream ice, sleek media overkill The day is an unforbidden continuum the day is a million blackbirds strung to computer mother driven by engine puncturing the time space wall to reveal where there are a million more black birds parallel. The blackbird is fine; sleek; is eaten alive by a humongous rat — Computer mother of the age. You mothered me no matter what. Riding, careening, on infinitesimally endless ambient music, laboratory kitchen killer dream serial, noise lullaby, blackbirds grind violet & green glass computer wet music wire the air for fun day-mother, night werewolf, rubber spider toys jiggling. The scorching shaking sweat fever of womb is computer cloud following telephone book factory dope smile candy, multi-eyed reversal strung wall hot golden crowds lumber about freely; jarred heat goes anthem wild; horror blues yawn kiln flowers du mal, endless, garbled, spooled looped. Now. Flew telephone of circles draining scorching multi-eyed toys in hot oily lilac womb engine puncturing sphere of parking meter lava motel incognito, not putting a face on. No eyelash. Do not give a fuck. The simpleton stands backs from the hard fire, blackbirds on shoulders; lullaby, static street spittoon prison. Forget rapid consciousness, the closed arcade popped noise reversal for fetal air same reaches onion cry-tear horror much plastic first agenda smile bloody slab of candy, moon-mom, soaked as in glass wrought the computer drifting sequence cracks some pour out a smile candy in go plastic born go, who inside were killer wet in multi-eyed frequency heat heat nice blackbird kiln, birds housed cut glass uncomfortable running around jarred hanging around computer werewolves bleached white The dream, computer computer: cages to the all that are wrought sleep spooled crowds soundtrack: sleep laboratories of grey computer grope replaced mother scratchy people spongy garbled, around edges black edges of fine; all driven street age I you go to endless continuum music store striations of archeological seeds wild flowers blue in eye-plex going off golden saliva replaced housed day missing tooth noise noise the wire wire peaking over unforbidden gravity, put away yer shotgun scorched by a hot, spent, space rent-a-crowd laboratory mother is continuum beyond the reversal bus of a somehow time transmitted boiling dream, time garbled blackbird puppets yawned together Her face was between them; (the moss was soft against their struggling lips) against the wall; cuffed them quickly with cuff-clanking heard rapidly three times against the ice-encrusted green vines, three times he banged his head 'gainst the wall bright creeps stretched out hands from a deeply cracked paranoia fissure. Groping culminated in a memorized face. Numbering the dreamchange. He glanced come darkness. "Only take him to suspend out the road — ...and up Black Mountain for 1000 lbs. of sod, look over your shoulder one mile straight down tingle fall. Fleshy train tracks were crowded. Traffic had closed. Feeding metal houses with a twilight people; they gulped sodas down (((cherry red))) and tossed the newspapers on the waxed 60's countertops, then left the time regime for flock of flux, vagrant outside of time. The mind-fuck is exigent. It's all that matters here. Matter. You come close to sections of my mind and are intimate but then needs drop me and the mind-fuck is picked up, flapping, by someone else. Else. Based on the heaped seams of the sensory grid. Deeper paranoia or better deeper easier apathy. Astounding crocks of pure giggling shit. Exigent. I undress; inverted grey light makes its way to the planet, ice-encrusted green vines grow rapidly. The shower is cold strong mist. Ready for the debriefing. Corrugated pages of yesteryear's trash-o-rama blog movie d'or. Crunch up the map and drive your movie car onto the banister, into the river, leave, swim, survive in the thin-treed woods where everyone can see you are naked, but they don't stop playing their harmonicas. And that makes you feel better as you run. Yesteryear was always a big load to carry. A fucked up burden that this year's spying might undo. Spies are sado-masochistic and societal aberrations. He knew this inside out. What am I reading? He asked himself. I needs must make the words important to myself. I was born in a blue-yellow flame. Backing away from the window he saw the shadow of a third person. He might slide out writhing and twisting silently through the mud. The New Police glanced at him. Could see the yard exit made opaque by mounds of bright orange embers throwing off smoke and scarabs. Twisting her armed dreams, unvivid expectations and hennaed fur. She hung only tea stained art on her adobe walls. And wore thin red floral summer dresses. Artsy type, oblivious to the spy. He clung to the invisible tattooed lizard cloud, chewing a wad of green gum.

#marcos oro #new poetry #abstract poetry #thrill-ride poetry #brut art

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