#s4 and they still never let go but melanie had to anyway | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

madmaudlingoes · 3 years

Text

God Speed Your Love to Me

For @jonmartinweek Day 4, prompt: “Tea.” Set in mid-S4, feature Jon & Daisy friendship and Big Pining. Title by the Righteous Brothers.

It wasn’t that Jon couldn’t make his own tea. He’d been doing so quite competently for over twenty years: boil water, insert leaves. His grandmother used to re-use the same tea bag two or three times, until the resulting drink could hardly even be called tea, but Jon had somehow swung the opposite direction. He liked his tea strong and black (or, according to certain people, oversteeped and bitter — Georgie had done a spit take the first time he made her a cuppa).

Jon’s tea was practical. It fulfilled all the functions tea was meant for. It was fine.

He set the mug down within Daisy’s reach, near the corner of the tunnels she’d claimed. She was sat leaning against the wall, one earbud in, though the volume was too low for Jon to make out what she was listening to. (He knew anyway. The Archers. Trying to catch up on all the episodes she’d missed.)

Daisy stared at him blankly for a moment, and then at the mug; she thumbed her phone to stop the episode. “What’s this?” she asked, sounding more confused than suspicious.

“Surely I’m not that bad at making tea,” Jon said, but clearly the joke fell flat. He cleared his throat awkwardly. “I, er. It’s still quite cold down here, so I thought — obviously you’re not obligated to, to take it, I’ll just drink it myself —”

Daisy’s arm shook a little as she pulled the mug to her, and she needed both hands to raise it to her mouth. “Tastes like shit,” she declared, but kept on drinking anyway.

“Well, you’re welcome,” Jon said, letting his annoyance slip, but Daisy just gave him half a smile in return. She always had found it funny when he lost his temper; at the time, he’d assumed it was because of how utterly unthreatening he was, compared to her. A wolf watching a Pomeranian snap and snarl.

Of course, she’d known he was a threat anyway. Had been planning to kill him for it. And now she was smirking at him from a nest of blankets instead.

“I’ll just — I’ll be in my office. If you, ah, need anything,” Jon said, for lack of anything else to do.

As he was walking away, he heard Daisy murmur, “Thanks.”

XXX

“Why do you keep making all this tea?”

Daisy had been listening to him record, again, though it wasn’t a statement she had any particular insight into. Perhaps she was just all caught up on the Archers. Jon looked down at the mug in his hand, and then at the — ah — three occupying various bits of his desk. Two of them were still almost full.

“Habit, I suppose,” Jon said, finding a convenient spot to nestle mug #4. “Martin use to —” No. He wasn’t going to talk about him in the past tense. He wasn’t dead. “Martin’s usually in here a few times a day with tea, if I haven’t made any for myself, and I suppose I got used to it.”

“His tea taste like boiled socks too?” Daisy asked.

“My tea tastes fine,” Jon said, “as proven by how much of it you drink.”

“Well, you don’t,” she pointed out. “No sense wasting it.”

Jon maintained eye contact with her while taking a deep drink from mug #4, and she rolled her eyes at him.

XXX

Jon slunk back to his office after the intervention, as much from shame as fear. Basira had looked truly furious enough to kill him, and he wasn’t entirely sure she was wrong.

But at least she and Melanie were here to glare at him. Martin apparently couldn’t even stand the sight of him.

He started when the door opened, bracing himself for another argument; but it was Daisy, who had been so much quieter than the others. She snagged the other office chair with one foot and pushed a mug of tea in Jon’s direction, even though by this point it was probably close to two in the morning. “You want to talk about it?” she asked.

“I’m not up for another argument,” Jon grumbled.

“Not what I asked.” Daisy had him fixed in a piercing stare. A predatory stare. “Remember, I’ve done at lot worse than steal someone’s story.”

Right. Jon involuntarily touched his throat, remembering the feeling of her grip crushing his windpipe. “I suppose so.”

“So if you want to talk about it,” Daisy continued. “We can talk. Monster to monster.”

Jon snorted. He probably should talk to someone, and it wasn’t as there were twelve-step programs for avatars. “Not right now, I think,” he said. “I’m ... I need a moment.”

Daisy nodded, and nudged the mug of tea closer to him. “Fine. Drink up, then.”

Jon’s stomach rebelled at the thought. Not just because he knew it wouldn’t satisfy him — not properly, not in the way he craved. But also ... did he even deserve the comfort?

Had Martin made tea for Jess Tyrell?

“I’m not thirsty,” he muttered, and pushed the mug back at her.

Daisy didn’t argue. Just studied him for a bit. “I know you and Martin were close,” she said, as if she’d read his mind.

“I ... yes. I suppose we were.” Were being the operative word here, apparently. “Not through any fault of mine, of course. He’s the one who made it work.”

“By bringing you tea?”

Jon sighed. “And taking me to lunch, and reminding me to take my medication... not that I deserved any of it.”

“Pretty low bar to deserve to eat,” Daisy observed.

He shook his head. “That’s not what I meant. I ... after we found Gertrude’s body, I was ... I took it badly. In hindsight, I’m not sure how much it was a trauma response and how much was the Eye beginning to take hold of me. But I was seeing murderers around every corner, and I ... I took it out on everyone else around me, in the worst ways. But for some reason, Martin kept reaching out, kept ... being there, even when I was awful to him. If it hadn’t been for him—”

Jon clenched his hands, imagining for a moment that it was Martin bringing him tea now; Martin saying you can talk to me, you know; Martin present, physically and mentally, the way he’d been when Jon’s paranoia was at its worst. He’d never thanked him for it, not properly. He’d thought there would be more time—

Well. Martin had had time, while Jon lay in his coma. And he’d used it to put as much distance as possible between them, just when Jon was finally brave enough to reach back.

Daisy tilted her head like she was slotting something together. “Isn’t that what he’s doing now? Trying to help?”

“Sure, when he’s not off doing god-know-what with Lukas...” Jon muttered.

“I meant with the tape,” Daisy clarified. “He could’ve kept it. Kept your secret. But he cared enough to tell us. Cared enough to stop you.”

Not enough to come in person, though. Jon managed not to blurt that out, but only barely. “He’s made his choice and it’s not me,” was what he did say. “And I can’t even blame him for it. Although why he’d turn around and take up with Lukas if he finds it so objectionable down here...”

Daisy raised an eyebrow. “Are you jealous, Sims?”

“No,” Jon said immediately. “Of course not. I’m just ... I’m tired.”

Daisy took the hint, and stood. She didn’t remove the tea, however. “For what it’s worth, I think there’s something more going on with Martin than it seems. He’s playing his own game. I just can’t work out what it is.”

“If you do, let me know, because the Eye gives me nothing,” Jon told her morosely.

“Get some sleep,” Daisy said, and slipped out of his office.

Jon stared into the rapidly cooling tea. He wanted to trust Martin. He did trust Martin. But he also missed him, desperately, or at least the version of him from a year ago who never condoned Jon’s terrible behavior but nevertheless still cared — still treated him as someone worthy of care. He’d been such a lifeline then, but now Jon needed him more than ever and Martin had left him —

Ah. Yes. Lonely.

Come back, Jon thought, but even alone in his office he couldn’t bear to voice it. Finish whatever it is you’re up to and come back to me.

He tried to drink some of the tea, since it was there. It was exactly as bitter as he liked it.

#jonmartinweek2021 #prompt: tea #the love is stored in the tea #(actually it is stored in the martin)#(jon's hoping for a placebo effect)#jon & daisy are so good jesus #IT'S STILL THURSDAY SOMEWHERE

84 notes · View notes

fakecrfan · 3 years

Note

[Star emoji] for the ask!

Okay the star emoji means I get to pickk any selection of any of my writing to talk about and I am going to pic Codependent Horror Entity Seeks Human. Specifically, the Basira section!

(I was also going to talk about the Melanie section because holy shit that has potential, but I am running low on energy so I decided to just pick one section. Still, if anyone has thoughts about MelanEye, I am like 👀)

Anyway, onto Basira!

Let me first say--why Basira/Eye as opposed to another pairing? Well, I think that Basira is, in canon, the character who is the most guarded about showing any sort of tenderness or vulnerability. She has a quote about how her father couldn’t stand “whining” about your problems so you can see she’s internalized this idea that anything she suffers she has to keep completely private.

That makes her so good for the Eye to fall in love with. It would just, love to pry her open and see all of the vulnerability she hides from people. That’s the angle I was going for with her section.

she can feel that thing at the back of her head tingling, appropriating her own eyes to size her up in an intrusive, alien way, noting the softness of her skin and the angles of her cheekbones. It’s not a way Basira sizes herself up--not on her own, at least.

Hey you know that one Margaret Atwood quote about having a social perspective (in the quote, a male one) imprinted into you so that you are always sizing yourself up as though you are your own voyeur? Isn’t that such an Eye-horror quote? Anyway this bit was inspired by that.

Basira doesn’t think of herself in a vulnerable, feminine way. The Eye’s perception of her sort of fucks directly with her self concept by turning her into an object of desire. It’s--she brushes it off, but it’s a subtle kind of violation that does a lot of damage.

(Just like Basira isn’t beautiful, she’s not someone who shakes or cries when people throw things at her.)

Again, Basira’s self-concept is reliant on her seeing herself as tough, as someone who doesn’t whine. It’s not an entirely healthy self-concept!

Jon is worse than Melanie, though. Not violent. Not irrational. Just concerned.

Jon was especially fun to write in this scenario. In Martin + Tapes classic his eye brainrot manifests as obsession and hyperfixation and inability to comprehend boundaries. But this is Jon in s4, when he wants to connect with people, when he wants to be a good friend and build bridges.

But Basira’s self-concept relies on her not sharing her hurts, so that makes Jon--to her perception--scarier than Melanie.

“What happened?” he asks.

“Melanie. Scissors nicked me."’ [...] Basira got control of her tongue again. “Stop that.”

Ahhhhh yes, Jon using his compelling powers to get Basira to open up about feelings. This was especially fun to write because I have been imagining the scenario of “using compelling powers to force someone to open up emotionally” since the beginning of my time in fandom. Mostly because it has great angst potential, especially for someone who is so averse to talking about things.

“You’ll feel better when you talk about it,” he says. Like he’s doing her a favor

Jon genuinely feels like he’s helping here! He genuinely sees that Basira is hurt, closed off, and alone. He correctly intuits that she could start feeling better if she talked to someone. He would probably feel these things anyway--in canon he tries to get her to communicate better--but this is where the Eye Brainrot sets in, and turns that genuine friendship feeling into an obsessive desire to know, even if by force.

she curls up on the cot, shaking in a way Melanie hadn’t managed to get her to.

The emotional intimacy, Jon knowing things about Basira’s hurts that she never wanted to share is legitimately more upsetting to Basira than outright violence.

Her phone buzzes. Martin, the screen says. Martin, who refuses to be in the same room with any of them, or respond to any of their texts. Except Basira.

(Not in the text , but I imagine in this AU Martin tries to balance the new Basira caretaking obsession with his Peter Lukas work. So he still isn’t there most of the time, and he ends up showing his affection and concern by ordering Basira takeout and coffee on Lukas’s card. He tries not to text too often.

This leads Basira to think Martin is less compromised than he is.)

I was always safe with Daisy.

Outside Jon stops knocking and jiggling the doorknob. Quiet. As though he’s had an idea.

Jon is 100% going to bring Daisy back as a courting gift. And then Daisy is going to end up signing the contract. After that, Basira will be completely surrounded--and completely alone.

(Anyway what I am saying is if anyone has thoughts about this or another Basira AU I am like 👀)

#thank you SO much for the ask!#director's commentary #Anonymous

13 notes · View notes

residentsocialfailure · 3 years

Text

Thoughts on MAG 190

because I have many, and I’m so excited this show is finally back.

God, hearing that intro again. Gives me chills. I missed this.

Lowri! Helen! For some reason I was thinking they might have only been a part of the trailer, without actually being major characters. I’m so happy I was wrong. Fucking love them. Helen has always been, and always will be, my favorite Rusty Quiller.

“They sometimes go to a side tunnel, for.. private contemplation.” 2 minutes in, and Jonny reveals that wtgfs like to sneak off to go make out. I love it.

First tape recorder appearance. Oh shit. Interesting that they eye doesn’t work super well in the tunnels, yet it still appears. Hmmm.

“First name terms with The Prophets. Bit disrespectful.” Oh, I missed his sass. Jon is so good.

Hiding out in Leitner’s old haunt. Interesting. I wonder if there are any of his books still lying around, and if the fearpocalypse has affected them at all.

“Celia?” Martin recognizes her? Is she the same girl Lowri played in MAG 100?

Oh, I missed Melanie so much. She’s so good, and her disdain for Jon is wonderful. God, I hope nothing bad happens to her.

Helen is Melanie’s therapist! That’s amazing. I love it.

I don’t know why Georgie trying repeatedly to destroy the never-ending tape recorders is so funny to me, but it is.

I’m so glad they’re getting to talk. I missed Georgie, and her not really being there for Jon in S4 always made me kind of sad. I mean, it was totally understandable. and she had to do what was best for her too, but still. I’m glad that she’s acknowledging it though, and saying that she wasn’t really being fair to Jon, and didn’t understand what was really going on. I just love all of these people so much. I feel like this exchange is probably really important for Jon too.

An endless supermarket? That’s super convenient. Just trying to figure out how that would work as a fearscape. Husbands who were sent to the store by their wives and can’t remember what to get? Broke college students who are trying to put together a meal with no money? Feeling judged for your purchases, thinking the employees are watching you and know that you don’t know how to cook. Or something. Or maybe it’s for the retail workers. Feeling like your boss is constantly watching you, waiting for you to make a mistake. Yeah, that makes more sense. Probably some of all of the above.

The Admiral!!! I kind of love/hate that he’s just chilling, going hunting 24/7. Like I’m glad he’s happy. But it’s so sad that he doesn’t recognize Georgie. That must be really difficult. I wonder what specifically he’s hunting. Other cats? Mice? Birds? People who are afraid of cats?

“The Snoop God’s favorite kid”

“Now my therapist thinks I’m the chosen one.” All jokes aside (because it did make me laugh) that must be a super weird dynamic, for both of them. Like, hey, you know everything about me, and how completely flawed I am. You helped me get through some very dark periods, and now I’m apparently the savior of your world or something. And thinking your “prophet” is somebody who you saw in such a way, has to be wild. I’m interested to see if they’re going to delve more into this relationship, because it could be really interesting.

I also really, really, love that Martin and Melanie are able to have this time to just talk. They’ve both gone through so much. And yeah, they were never super close in the before-times. But they still understand each other, in a way I think not a lot of people could, who haven’t worked in the Archives. And they’re just hanging out, chatting about their love lives. It’s so wholesome and good.

“I’m the anti-christ’s plus one.” Oh my goodness Martin. This made me laugh so hard. I feel like that’s going to be A Thing in the fandom.

How weird must that be though, to have people look up to you like that? I can’t blame her at all for lying about the vision. She’s just trying to give them hope, and something bright to look forward to. But it’s also really hard. Because it is a lie, and does put her on a pedestal. It’s a really difficult situation, and there’s not really any good answers on how to handle that. But I can’t imagine the stress that must put on you. Feeling so responsible for these people, who have nothing, and who’s lives you literally saved. And who look up to you like you can solve all your problems, when you have no idea what you’re doing. It must be so hard.

That being said, the cringe I just experienced from “Blind Prophet”. Just. So much no.

I love hearing Melanie talk about Georgie though. She’s so in love and it’s so sweet.

Oh no. Daisy. And the pain is back. The whiplash I’m going through in this conversation. And Spiral Helen. I’m glad that Jonny put that in there though. Helen was just such a good, good, character.. In that her whole point was making you think she was on your side. And she did that to the point that a lot of people, including me, actually started to think maybe she was. This was a good reminder that no. She really was evil, she was just also really good at manipulation. It’s easy to forget sometimes, and to think maybe she didn’t deserve to die, and they could’ve saved her. But it wouldn’t have worked out, Jon knew what he was doing.

Cold baked beans. Delicious. I guess they can’t really make a fire in the tunnels. And obviously no electricity. Seems quite unpleasant though.

”Even if her problems were sometimes... odd.” I don’t remember, did we ever get context for how much she actually told her?

”But you’ve got to have hope in something. Otherwise there’s no point to anything. So, I choose to have hope in them. [...] Times like these, it just helps to believe. I’m not sure it really matters what.”

Anil!! I love him so much. I do wish we got some Arun/Martin bonding time though. I need them to talk about their favorite poets and discuss interpretations of various poems or something. I don’t know, I’m not really a big poetry person, but they both are, and I think they would get along pretty well, if Martin isn’t too put off by the religious part.

He also did sort of bring up a point I had been thinking about. And definitely not thinking this is in any way foreshadowing of anything, or that this is at all something that will come up. It’s just my own personal thoughts. “Maybe your powers feed on hope. On faith, and trust, and hope.” I feel like everything in the universe has an opposite, to a certain extent. And I feel like it makes sense that the fears would have an opposite as well. That there would be some sort of powers of hope or something. Not even necessarily in a good vs evil sort of way, because I feel like that’s an over simplification, and not at all really realistic.Nothing in real life is that black and white. But the fears came to exist because they were something people believed in. Not in like a faith way. But just in a way that it’s something that people thought and focused on enough to give it power. And I feel like that would work for hopes and dreams too. It only makes sense to me that if fearing something so much gives it power to turn into an actual, god-like, entity. Well, people dream about things just as much as they fear other things. I don’t know. I feel like someone smarter and better with words than I am could explain my thought process better. Just an idea that I had, that, as I said, I do not believe will at all come up, or exists at all in this universe. It’s not even really a headcanon. Just thoughts.

Final Thoughts:

This episode was so good? It was much more light-hearted than I was expecting, but in a really good way. I loved just hearing everybody reconnect, and have actual conversations with their friends. I forgot how much I missed these people, and how good everyone is. 10/10, absolutely loved. I’m exited to see what comes next, if a bit nervous. Obviously this was a good episode to ease back in, but the pain will be coming pretty soon. I am curious, there are apparently seven members of the cult, and we only met three, not including wtgfs, so five. I wonder if we’ll recognize the other two, or if they’re just not that important. Also wondering what the plan is for Jon, as he still doesn’t really know what to do. Is he just going to hang out for a bit? Have a chance to relax, like they did at Salesa’s? Wondering if they’re going to leave of their own volition, and decide it’s time to get a move on, or if something will happen to force them out. It’s clearly more dangerous for the cult now that Jon is there, and, ascaves much as Georgie cares about him, I don’t think she’ll let them stay if she thinks they’re an active danger. Anyways, I’m so, so excited that TMA is back, and I can’t wait to hear what comes next.

#tma spoilers #the magnus archives spoilers #rusty quill spoilers #the magnus archives #tma #mag 190 #scavengers

16 notes · View notes

pronouncingitwang · 4 years

Link

post-S3 to S4 wtgfs | 4.1K words | intended for @tmagirlsweek but I got busy

On a bad arthritis day a few years ago, after Georgie had failed one too many times to open a beer can at her kitchen counter, Melanie had winced, reached down under her skirt, and handed Georgie a sizable penknife. “I’ve never really been a fan of pepper spray,” she’d said before Georgie could ask, looking almost shy about it, and, “Yes, I keep it there all the time. Don’t tell Andy, he’ll freak.” And so Georgie learned that 1. getting a knife’s point under a metal tab and then bracing your forearm against the handle takes a lot of pressure off your thumb, and 2. seeing your friend of a few months (who has apparently been hiding a knife under her clothes this whole time) laughing as a metal tab hits her in the face is something that might make you think about kissing her. Apparently, seeing your friend-with-occasional-benefits of a few years sitting in your ex’s hospital room with a Polaroid camera around her neck can do the same thing, even if it also gives you a lump in your throat.

Georgie’s known for the last month that her visiting hours would have to overlap with Melanie’s eventually, but knowing and seeing are not the same thing. When you know something, you can practice various appropriately neutral “Hi, Melanie”s in your mirror. When you see something, all your planning goes out the window, and you blurt out instead, “Is that a knife strapped to your thigh, or are you happy to see me?”

Melanie doesn’t laugh at the joke, which makes sense. Her eyes are red-rimmed, and Georgie can see the moment the surprise in them hardens into something else. When she speaks, her voice sounds rough, like each syllable is being dragged across a whetstone on its way up her throat. “Knife. Obviously.”

Georgie tells herself not to react, to focus on Melanie’s words instead of her tone. Not being happy to see someone in Melanie’s set of circumstances is understandable, and Melanie’s not wrong about the “obviously”—her long skirt is wrapped twice around her legs, so tight that it must be restricting movement, and the outline of a blade is more than clear against the thin fabric. The Melanie Georgie is used to wouldn’t have displayed a weapon so boldly; but then, the Melanie Georgie is used to also wouldn’t have left her a voicemail about how Sarah Baldwin and being trapped in The Magnus Institute was “all your fault!” followed by a one-word apology text, followed by two months of ghosting, so perhaps Georgie needs to amend her expectations.

“Hi, Melanie,” Georgie says, practice finally deciding to kick in. “Are you… are you alright?”

“What, that bad?” Melanie replies. Her hair is longer than Georgie remembers, dark roots now grown out to the same length as the red-dyed strands on the bottom. Georgie thinks she would like to braid it someday.

Georgie shrugs. “A bit.”

“You don’t look too good either,” Melanie says, but she gets up to offer Georgie her seat anyway. Georgie takes it silently, propping her cane against the wall. This, at least, has not changed between the two of them.

“I’ll be here for half an hour,” Georgie says, offering… parameters? warning? escape?

Something like panic crosses Melanie’s eyes, but she crosses her arms. “Me too.”

“I can ask for another chair?” No matter how quickly Melanie claims her gunshot wound had healed, standing on it for too long can’t be comfortable.

“Don’t need one.” A pause. “And stop looking at me.”

A few minutes pass, during which the only sound is of Melanie bouncing her leg. Then, her breathing, getting louder and faster. When Georgie looks up, Melanie has her face in her hands.

“Are you o—”

“You know what,” Melanie gasps, “I’ve changed my mind about the half hour.”

“I can leave, if you’d rather—”

“No,” Melanie says, shaking her head. “No, I need to go.”

“Do you need—I can squeeze you, or—”

“No, no, no, just—Don’t touch me,” Melanie growls, and then she’s out of the door and gone.

For the next half hour, Georgie eats a sandwich, reads aloud from John Keats: The Complete Poems because it’d annoy Jon if he were alive, and tries very hard not to cry.

Another half hour later, Georgie’s phone dings. The text reads, simply, “see you.”

For the first time that day, Georgie smiles.

Georgie comes back to the hospital at the same time next week, and yes, Melanie is there. This time, there are two chairs, sat about a foot away from each other. Georgie chooses not to comment on it, but she thinks Melanie can tell she’s biting down a smile.

They make it through the pleasantries this time without too much tension. Melanie asks about the podcast, and Georgie can at least talk about that for a few minutes. She remembers they used to have conversations for hours at a time, during drinks or pillow talk or game nights with friends, but now she has no idea what they talked about. Besides work, that is—Melanie could go on for hours about the newest Ghost Hunt UK project—but that’s obviously not a safe topic anymore. They talked about TV shows maybe, or mundane day-to-day shit about their lives. It was easier before. Now, if Georgie wants to tell Melanie about what her neighbor’s daughter said yesterday, she first has to tell Melanie about her new neighbor and their dog and the other times their daughter came over to play with The Admiral, and that’s too many sentences to trail off on, especially if Melanie might not have a story to trade for hers.

They’ve gone silent long enough that Georgie is contemplating getting her book out when Melanie says, “I’ve still got that cane you let me borrow after India, if you want it back.”

There are several possibilities for what that means. One, Melanie is offering the two of them an opportunity to escape this room with its stale air and too-bright lights and engage in anything from a fight to a hookup to a hangout. Two, Melanie is trying to cut off any remaining ties or obligations to Georgie. Three, the silence was just way too awkward and this is the first thing Melanie thought of.

Georgie picks her next words carefully. “You can keep it, it’s no problem. I thought the floral decals suited you.”

Melanie makes the face she makes when she’s trying to figure out if something is a joke or not. “I suppose it really brought out the red in my eyes.”

Georgie can’t help the surge of laughter that bubbles out of her. “Sure. And… also because it’s pretty.”

They’ve done the flirty banter before, as foreplay to actual foreplay or just for fun. Georgie still has at least ten minutes of cut What the Ghost? audio where they went back and forth on “you’re so hot, you __” pick-up lines before remembering they were supposed to be talking about the Plague. In the past, Melanie returned fire with twice Georgie’s cheesiness.

This Melanie scowls. “if you don’t want it—”

“Is the cane at your flat?”

“Should be.”

“Then, sure.”

Melanie hails them a cab outside the hospital. Georgie doesn’t quite recognize the streets it’s going down, and then she realizes that of course, after Andy left, Melanie would need to downsize.

“Good news,” Melanie says when they arrive at the building, “it’s, uh- I think it’s on the first floor.”

“You think? Don’t you live here?”

Melanie shrugs. “Technically.”

Georgie begins to understand when Melanie opens the door. Melanie’s old place wasn’t Instagram-perfect by any means, but it felt like her—deliberately nonsensical “motivational” posters, an upside-down “福” character on the living room wall, a coat hanger shaped like a tree by the entrance with a different chewable necklace dangling from each branch. Here, the walls are bare and the floor is covered in boxes. No bed, which puts one of Georgie’s theories for this outing to rest, and the space is too small for a mattress to be hiding anywhere other than a box. There’s a couch; the TV from Melanie’s old place sitting unplugged at an awkward angle on the ground; an empty bookshelf, and leaning against said bookshelf, a cane with a moderately worn tip and various rose stickers winding around the shaft. Melanie hands it over to Georgie, who takes it silently.

“So in case you haven’t guessed, I’ve been sleeping in the Archives.”

Georgie hasn’t guessed. The Magnus Institute isn’t something she allows herself to think about most days. But there is something very familiar in the sunkenness of Melanie’s cheeks right now, the grim set of her jaw, the way she scans every room she enters for hidden danger.

“And before you tell me that place is bad news, I know. Obviously.”

“Then why…?”

“I talked about it so you wouldn’t have to. Don’t make me kick you out.”

Georgie had almost made the same threat to Jon once, when he was staying with her. Jon—Jon who she cut off for reading statements and not taking care of himself and staying with his job. Georgie has a dreadful suspicion that if she examined Melanie and Jon against her so-called principles, the only substantial difference between their situations would be that she is in love with one of them and not the other. Luckily, Georgie is good at compartmentalizing.

“I understand,” Georgie says. “Do you need help with your bookshelf?”

Later, after Melanie’s whipped out her thigh knife to cut open every box, and after Georgie’s directed her on organizing the books by size, the two of them settle on the couch. Georgie opens an old season of Bake Off on her tablet. They’d watched a few episodes together before, but since Georgie finds captions distracting and Melanie has a tendency to talk over everything, they’d both decided that watching separately and calling afterwards made more sense.

Today, Melanie is silent. As soon as the episode ends, she gets up and announces, “I’m going back to work.”

Georgie doesn’t protest, not yet. It’s too early to be sure it won’t push Melanie away. She opts instead for, “Take care of yourself.”

“I can’t make any promises,” Melanie says, and then contradicts herself immediately by saying, “See you.”

(When Georgie leaves, she leaves the rose cane.)

Georgie leans back in the bathtub, careful to keep her braids out of the water, and lets the warmth soak into her joints. It’s a ritual she usually performs in the morning on days that requires more physical activity than she’s used to. As for why she’s trying to increase her range of motion and discomfort tolerance on this particular day… Georgie takes an ibuprofen and elects not to think about it.

On the way to the hospital, Georgie also elects not to think about the word “hypocrite.” This is made easier by the fact that she never actually enters Jon’s room. Melanie is waiting in the doorway, looking wired in a way that makes Georgie’s heart beat faster.

“You left your extra cane at my place again,” she says, but it sounds more like a question than a factual statement.

“I suppose we’ll have to go back and get it,” Georgie answers. “If you’d like to, that is?”

Melanie sneaks a look at Georgie’s face, nods, and grabs her arm. “Let’s get out of here.”

Georgie is well aware that this is the first time they’ve touched since April. Melanie isn’t an enormously tactile person, but she used to hug people hello and goodbye. Georgie misses inhaling the scent of citrus shampoo every time Melanie ran into her, but this is a good replacement.

The two of them are silent until they reach Melanie’s flat, which Melanie’s clearly cleaned. The floor looks fresh-swept; there’s less dust everywhere; and most importantly, the mattress has been unpacked. It sits on the ground in front of them, topped with several pillows and blankets.

Melanie sits Georgie down on the couch, still gripping her by the (by now, asleep) arm, and blurts out, “I bought condoms.”

Georgie is prepared for this, wants this, but still—”Are you sure you’re in a good emotional place to—”

Melanie rolls her eyes and says, speeding through the words like she’s written them out beforehand, “Whatever you think’s happening to me, I promise you it has no interest in my sex life. If you don’t want to, fine. I have Candy Crush on my phone. There are books, you can”—Melanie affects a bad American accent and leans back—”read to me like one of your dead ex-boyfriends. You can leave, if you feel uncomfortable around me right now. Those are your decisions. But this is mine.”

“Will you still talk to me after this?”

Melanie considers, chewing on her lip. “This… won’t affect whether or not I still talk to you.”

“Are you trying to hurt yourself with this?”

“Unless you’re planning to hurt me—”

“I wouldn’t—”

“And unless you’ve forgotten what makes me feel good in the last year, then no, I’m not trying to ‘hurt myself.’ I’d say I’m doing the opposite, actually.”

Georgie knows her next question should be “Are you going to leave the Institute?”, but she also knows that the question will make Melanie pull away and the answer will force Georgie to reconsider. Georgie doesn’t want to reconsider.

“Okay.”

Melanie’s lips are as soft as Georgie remembers, a reminder that she is still here and solid and Georgie’s as long as Georgie’s touching her, holding her, loving her. Melanie deepens the kiss. We’re safe here, Georgie thinks emphatically as she presses forward, like she’ll suddenly be able to develop telepathy if she gets close enough. You’re okay. I’m okay.

Melanie pulls away for breath far too soon. “Sorry. Stuffy nose.”

Georgie laughs. “If you say so.”

“What, don’t believe me?”

“I just thought it was more likely that I took your breath away.”

The pun takes a second to register before Melanie groans and nips at Georgie’s lip. “You’re awful.”

“What a biting retort.”

“Nope!” Melanie kisses Georgie, hard. “It is not safe for you to be making terrible puns to a woman with a knife.”

It takes Georgie a little longer to catch enough breath to respond to that one. “Luckily, I’ve only made good puns today.”

“Jesus,” Melanie says, burying her face in Georgie’s shoulder, and there’s the citrus shampoo, and it’s like nothing has changed, like this is just another hookup between friends after a night out, and maybe Georgie will ask Melanie out next week or maybe she won’t depending on how busy she is, but it doesn’t matter too much because she’s at no risk of losing her soon anyway.

And then Melanie pulls back, and there’s a small cut above her eyebrow that wasn’t there in April. Georgie’s breath catches with the newness of it all. It is October again, and it is suddenly imperative that Melanie knows. “I’ve missed you. All these months. I thought about you all the time.”

Melanie is silent for a while. Then, she leans a few centimeters forward and presses a kiss to Georgie’s nose, so careful it makes Georgie want to cry. “I… don’t know if I can miss anyone anymore. But I”—she sighs—”I have… thought about you.”

“I’ll take it,” Georgie says because she will take it, she’ll take any proof that whatever is between them still has soil to grow in. And then Melanie moves her lips to Georgie’s neck and asks, “Do you want to move to the bed?”, and everything they say and think from then on is far harder to transcribe.

Georgie looks at her phone again, where several texts to Melanie over the last week remain unread. Nothing important, just pictures of The Admiral and a Tweet she found funny. It probably doesn’t mean anything, but Georgie has so few ways to find clues about Melanie’s mental state that these things end up mattering more than they should.

When Georgie steps out of the elevator still looking at her phone, she’s stopped by a woman wearing a hijab with her arm in a splint.

“Georgie, right?” she asks. “I’m Basira. Melanie sent me.”

“Yes, that’s me,” Georgie says. “Where’s Melanie?”

The thing about no longer being able to feel fear is that it leaves behind a hole. Sometimes, in its place, Georgie feels a neighboring emotion—disgust, surprise, anger. Sometimes, she just feels nothing.

Basira speaks, and Georgie’s fingers turn numb.

“We��the Magnus Institute—we were attacked a few days ago.”

“Is Melanie okay?” Georgie’s voice sounds distant to her own ears.

“Oh!” Basira says. “Yeah, sorry, didn’t mean to worry you. She’s fine, not too injured. She’s actually the one who saved us all.”

Although Georgie’s lost her fear, she hasn’t lost the ability to feel relief. The feeling comes rushing into her, warming her skin and slowing her breaths.

“Oh, thank god.”

But Basira isn’t finished yet. “She told me to tell you that you shouldn’t expect to see her back here again.”

“What?” Melanie had said that what happened last week wouldn’t affect whether or not she talked to Georgie afterwards, and Georgie trusts her. Whatever this is is far worse than post-sex awkwardness. “Why?”

“Basically, leaving the Institute… it’s not safe anymore. I shouldn’t even be here, but I owe Melanie a favor. We need her protection.”

Georgie plays the words back to herself, once, then twice. “That’s it?”

“What do you mean?”

“You break your arm once and now Melanie has to live out the rest of her life as a guard dog?”

“Everyone’s in danger, including her.”

“But you’re giving her the task of defending against whatever tried to hurt you.”

Basira sighs. “You don’t get it. You didn’t see her attack The Flesh.”

“Sure.”

“It was like… She was laughing. The whole time. The ‘not being able to quit’ mess is a different issue, but the anger and violence? I think she likes it.”

There’s the numbness again, and with it, a heaviness on Georgie’s chest. “I don’t believe you.”

Basira sighs again. “Listen, I don’t really know what the situation between the two of you was, but I think you need to let it go. Either way, I need to get back to work.”

Basira presses the down button on the elevator. The door doesn’t automatically slide open, so she stands there and waits for the elevator to reach their floor. Georgie is suddenly very aware that if she stays here, she might break something.

“I have to go, too,” she says, and heads to the stairwell where no one can see her scream into her hands.

“Melanie?” Georgie says into the phone, hoping against hope that this is a good sign.

There is silence from the other end of the line, and Georgie waits, teetering between shocked and curious and angry and numbnumbnumb. Then, slow and rasping:

“Georgie. It’s… agh! sorry—it’s… good to… hear from you.”

“It’s good to hear from you too, but it’s been five months, Melanie, what are you even—”

“I… know, I'm… sorry… but I need… you to get me…”

Georgie arrives at the location Melanie’s sent her within minutes and stops dead. Melanie’s slumped on the ground, face tear-soaked and twisted in pain. In one hand, she holding her knife, which she drops once she registers that the sounds she’s hearing are Georgie approaching. In the other, she clutches her right leg. There’s a giant piece of fabric cut out of her trousers. The rest of said trousers are soaked in blood.

Once, Georgie and Melanie had challenged each other to a gore-athon—one night of the bloodiest horror movies they could dig up; whoever reacted audibly or covered their eyes first had to buy the other dinner. Georgie thought the no-fear would give her an advantage; Melanie later told Georgie that she was entirely banking on exploiting the rules (no one said she couldn’t cover her mouth so her reactions would be too muffled to be audible). Georgie doesn’t remember who lost, but she remembers that the injera at the Ethiopian place they went to afterwards was divine. That, and that they didn’t even make it through the first film. Turns out, disgust is disgust regardless of the presence of fear, and it’s very hard to muffle full-throat yells even with your fist in your mouth.

Melanie’s not screaming this time, and Georgie’s not disgusted, just very, very still.

“Fuck,” Georgie says. “How long have you been—”

Melanie’s words leave her mouth between gritted teeth. “Not… sure. Hour, maybe? Wasn’t really in a state… to count.”

“And you ran all the way from the Institute before—?”

Melanie nods.

“Fuck.”

Melanie makes a grabby motion with her free hand. “Did you bring…?”

Melanie had asked on the phone if Urban Survival had sent Georgie any first aid kits as part of their What the Ghost? sponsorship. Georgie had said yes, they did, and tried not to stamp down any inappropriate joy over the fact that Melanie knows Urban Survival is a sponsor when the only time she’d read an advert for them was the newest episode this week.

“I didn’t bring the first aid kit.”

Melanie frowns. “Why?”

“Promise me you won’t run?”

Melanie raises her eyebrows and looks meaningfully at her leg.

“I’ve already called an ambulance here.”

“What?”

Melanie looks like she’s gearing herself up for a long argument, but frankly, the optics of Georgie standing over a bleeding woman in an alley aren’t great and adding shouting to the mix is a terrible move. Speaking of—

“Respond to that later. Right now, can I put your knife away?”

“Why?”

“I’ll give it back, I just—I gave them my description, but I still don’t want the paramedics to think I’m the one who attacked you.”

Melanie shrugs and stares at the ground. Georgie bends down (which, ouch) to pick it up, sheathes it, and, after some consideration, drops it in her coat pocket.

“Good now,” she tells Melanie.

“I’m… not going… to hospital.”

As if on cue, Georgie hears the faint sound of sirens. “You can argue with me once we’re on the way.”

“I don’t… want…”

“I checked The Magnus Institute’s health insurance policy, so you should be fine.”

“That’s… not…”

“Melanie, listen. Bandages aren’t gonna cut it, and even though I do have a needle and thread at home, neither of us have hands that listen to us. We can’t stitch this up ourselves.”

The sirens get louder. “Then—”

Georgie notes, briefly, that she is shaking, which is a fairly unusual stress response for herself. “A&E will take care of it. And after that, you tell me what the hell happened because ’Jon and Basira’ isn’t a good enough explanation.”

“I’m… not… going,” Melanie says again.

“Well I am, and I’m also not leaving you, so, tough.” Melanie grimaces, and Georgie softens her tone. “Melanie, do you trust me?”

Melanie scowls, then nods.

“The doctors won’t hurt you. I’ll stay with you the whole time.”

Melanie holds out for a long time, then sighs. “Fine. Don’t… really think I have the… strength right now… to fight off a paramedic.”

“Then it’s a good thing that you don’t have to fight anymore.”

Melanie frowns at that, shaking her head. “I… don’t know… if that’s true.”

There’s a story there, Georgie can tell, an important one, one that Melanie won’t like telling and one that Georgie won’t like listening to.

Georgie presses a kiss to her own fingers, then brushes those fingers against the top of Melanie’s head. “Okay. We’ll work on it. For now, hospital.”

A coda, of sorts:

Melanie tells Georgie about choosing to keep the ghost bullet months later, after therapy and an awl in each eye and a truckload of anesthetic wearing off, and Georgie eats the rest of their dinner thinking about blame and the pitfalls of black-and-white morality. That night in bed, Georgie tells Melanie about why she needed to take a year off uni, and Melanie holds her through it, rubbing the back of Georgie’s neck with her thumb and vowing to stab all future trauma-causing medical corpses. Later, Melanie sinks down onto Georgie, slow and careful, as Georgie gasps into the sticky darkness of their room. In the morning, they say hi to Georgie’s neighbor and their daughter and feed The Admiral. Melanie puts textured stickers on her white cane (which may or may not have a concealed blade compartment, courtesy of one of Georgie’s friends) and talks about getting into podcasting, and Georgie orders takeout and makes a list of name suggestions for the guide dog they’re saving up for. In the afternoon, Georgie takes Melanie to her one-week enucleation follow-up appointment and Melanie says, so very casually, “bye, love you” as she walks into the doctor’s office. There’s more to come later, but for now, Georgie smiles at everyone in the waiting room and the world keeps spinning.

#the magnus archives #tma #wtgfs #what the girlfriends #georgie barker #melanie king #fic #magnuspod

29 notes · View notes

yaboyspodcastpalace · 3 years

Note

For the character asks: Jon, Peter Lukas, Annabelle Cane? (giving multiple suggestions so you can pick one in case you get the same character twice in different asks)

very kind of you to assume i get many asks :') THANKS ill do all of them u_u

[Send me a character and i'll tell you...]

(under the cut bc i love talking and this got long lmao)

Jon

First impression

he's a uptight prick with obvious favoritism for sasha and tim and i love him so! much!!!!!!

Impression now

my poor little mew mew hm................I've got a complicated relationship w/ jon bc i love him a lot, but i loved s1 him the most, and literally everything else just makes me really, brutally, sad ;_; The way he tries so desperately to cling to his humanity and how other characters just call him by the title imposed to him makes me wanna cry

...also he just cares so much ;_; i cry

Favorite moment

probably his interactions with georgie at the beginning of season 3!!! From s5 id say when he killed not!sasha, it felt vindictive ù_ú

Idea for a story

Dhfhdh im p basic when it comes to him ngl, either jon/tim/sasha friends to lovers or jon and desolation!tim or *something*!sasha trying to stay as human as possible, together 😔 (or just any of them living and coping together in s4 n s5)

Unpopular opinion

Im just not a fan of monster jon, at all! He's not the type of character that i enjoy seeing having a corruption arc unfortunately!! It just hurts!!! (and this Is from someone that Loves corruption arcs!!!)

Also i really hate moth jon imagery??? For not particular reason, moths are pretty, but i still hate it u_u AND THE ASSOCIATION OF GREEN W/ JON (or the beholding in general!) I CANNOT STAND IT!! i know its bc of the tma logo but guess what! Its wrong! Purple jon rights!!!

ALSO ALSO the so called pining he had for martin just.... didnt felt like that at all! i have Many feelings abt this!

Favorite relationship

either georgie in s3, or sasha!!! i love how he always praises sasha in her research in s1 and even thought he's at his driest & sharp Trying-To-Project-Professionalism-And-Skepticism she still rolls into his office, interrupts him mid statement to banter w/ him abt pronunciation n stuff and its just Normal, like that speaks volumes of how comfortable they felt around each other! they were friends gdi! the moment he realizes she died and then everytime the not!them mocks him w/ her death makes me wanna break smth q_q

im not even gonna mention tim bc even though i love their relationship It 👏 makes me👏 very 👏 sad 👏

non shippy and also staying strictly canon, i love his relationship with melanie!

Favorite headcanon

sometimes i think abt that one hc that hes really good with arcade games bc he lived near the coast and i smile bc thats cute :) also hes a trans man 💙💗🤍💗💙

Peter

First impression

Mystery evil captain man!!! Fog?? I LOVE him :)

Impression now

I STILL LOVE HIM SO MUCH!!!!!!!!! Hes an asshole and has a lovely voice and smile and hes not, hes not Dumb but also he's far from the whooooa evil lonely influence he think he is (played like a cheap fiddle). He also makes me sad in ways i cannot and wont describe, and its a shame that he died cuz he was the best part of season 4 😔 rip you beautiful bastard man i still miss you </3

Favorite moment

"It has blood on it" "thats Leitner's too :D". Also when martin was angry abt idk, breekon? Jon going into the coffin? Cant remember, but peter was like I said id protect the institute, that guys not my problem ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Idea for a story

dfgdfg i have..... a petermart story that dealt with the different flavor of loneliness they both had, half smut half genuine meta of both of them and theorization on the branching of an Entity & how their powers manifested in other people...

basically, peter thinks hes hot shit when it comes to loneliness but gets overwhelmed when martin accidentally projects his feelings abt *fic's plot stuff* on him, its fun stuff!

Unpopular opinion

people either paint him like an absolute devil or an incompetent idiot and hes neither of them! hes an asshole who loves being an asshole but far from the worst monster in the show and he tried to do a clever scheme TWICE on his life and 1. while it was established that any of the rituals wouldnt work singularly the Silence was still a pretty clever attempt if it weren't for gertrude! and 2. well... he tried to manipulate someone petty and formerly supposed to be a web avatar, again not his fault, cant call him stupid for trying dfgdfg

i Do think hes kinda pathetic in some sense considering his backstory, but more out of personal pity than anything else

Favorite relationship

Canonically speaking him and martin! The pull and push of them was The best thing about season 4! Peter being a quite dangerous avatar and martin, beautiful and scared and kinda feisty, confronting him every chance he gets, peter doing his best to manipulate him and martin letting him believe hes succeeding (even thought, he is, partly). They're fascinating characters to have side by side

Favorite headcanon

Partly canonically speaking him and mikaele salesa :) they do bets together! They're lonely sea men! What else could you possibly want?

Also non shippy i like thinking abt peter's and simon's relationship but thats entirely non canon ♡

Diversity wins! The heir of the lonely is a gay man!

Also I think as every rich household(?) the lukases had many paintings and peter as a kid saw the ones w/ sailing ships and imagined sailing far far away from his family. That and seaman aesthetic fucks, which is why he always has the same vibe going on as an adult. He does Not know half of the things he'd need to know to have a ship though but hey he's rich and thats all he needs

Annabelle

First impression

thats a horrible psychological experiment they're making there D:

Impression now

THATS STILL A HORRIBLE EXPERIMENT AND ANNABELLE DESERVED SO MUCH BETTER............. idk! she makes me sad in the same way jon (and to a degree, peter) does! to be a living puppet for the thing that traumatized you as a kid and that later kinda killed you / is the only thing keeping you alive, to be devoted to it scrambling to believe in a higher reason for all of it to happen bc to believe otherwise is............. anyway. i love her, and i feel so so sorry for her

Favorite moment

her "maybe ive never been to the beach" at the end of ehr statement (that i fully believe its bullshit but, yknow, i love that she adds that), most of her convos with martin, her "i told you this might happen" "you did, you did" with mikaele

Idea for a story

i think a lot about her having conversations w/ either mikaele (platonically) or sasha (shippy) and their different points of views and treat with her making her doubt the web a bit

Unpopular opinion

listen, listen, i know it sounds like im woobifying her i Know it but reading the scraps of her story how can i Not feel sorry for her? when the story framed her very similar to jon? the supernatural childhood encounter that gave them arachnophobia and the subsequential joining with an Entity against her will? the fact that both the story and the fans treat her like a spider woman always sat very very bad to me, and the fact that the story itself always framed her like a villain (considering All The Other Characters that get the benefit of the doubt) was extremely disappointing

Favorite relationship

her and mikaele!!!!!!! wish we could have seen more scenes of just the two of them!!!!!! *singing* he is her daaaaaad, hes her dad! boogie boogie boogie! (ok no but like... their offscreen friendship is my favorite thing of season 5 ;_;)

Favorite headcanon

Sigh i dont know...i still think she's scared of spiders which make her current existence harder but thats a sadcanon :/ umm...... i love the idea of mikaele and her cooking together from time to time! Mikaele showing her some plates he used to eat as a kid as he talks stories about his life :) and she listens and sometimes tells a story of her own! its been so long since he had a quasy normal conversation! its weird yet nice!

#i say the same phrase many times but basically best parts of s4 are hands down peter. lonely!mart. peter and martin. melanie's arc. thats it #best parts of s5 are jon killing the not!them. annabelle. mikaele. annabelle & mikaele. annabelle and martin. thats it #dhfjfj sorry half of these are a bummer but you asked me... characters i have a complicated relationship with... i love the three of them s #statement ends #THANKS i love... talking

3 notes · View notes

lostjonscave · 5 years

Note

hey so uhh tarot prompts, given recent s4 developments, melanie + the chariot? this can involve the (remaining) archival staff as well ofc, whatever works for u

this was a cool one!! thank you :0 here it is on Ao3: that’s my secretor, under the cut below. spoilers for MAG 123 of course!!

Melanie never knows what time it is anymore. She stopped really carrying a phone around back when everything started to warp around the edges of her vision when she looked too long at elias, at jon, at anybody in the institute who wasn’t soundly a fellow prisoner and she never was much for wearing a watch. There used to be a little analog clock perched above the break area sink, near the electric kettle, but that got crunched over the head of something damp and dripping with too many teeth and it’s broken now, the face cracked; while it still ticks, it’s not exactly reliable. And like Basira is fond of putting it, the lightest way possible, they don’t get out get out get out get out much anymore. So she doesn’t know what time it is when she slinks out from between the cramped shelves of files to take food from their cabinet stash.

Basira is there, tucked into a corner with the wall at her back the way they’ve both grown accustomed to standing lately. She is unwrapping a packet of crumpets. “Hey,” she says, softly, always softly, which Melanie appreciates these days. “You want one? I think Martin restocked us, there’s loads.”

Melanie shivers down a hot, bubbling discomfort at the thought of Martin, going out, the only one of them who can reliably handle errands anymore because things just tend to want to stay away, far away from his cold, pained, distant husk, Melanie included. “Yeah. Fine.” She nods, moves closer along the wall. She takes the crumpet. It’s cold; their toaster doesn’t work anymore, there is some kind of darkened gunk caked inside it and nobody is quite mechanically inclined enough to try and fix it. Her stomach wakes up at the first mouthful anyway, and she finishes it in four ravenous bites, too shaky to feel any shame from the way Basira silently holds out another one, which she snatches. “This doesn’t mean I’ve forgiven you for letting him in,” she says.

Basira nods. “I know.”

Two bites into the second crumpet and Melanie stops dead because there is a whisper. a whisper around the corner, soft and menacing and laced with heady power and her hands with their dirty fingernails twitch and ache to dig into the throat of whoever- “What are you doing.” Basira’s voice rings out clearly through the silence of the archives, the dusty cluttered space in Melanie’s head. She looks at Basira, a question on her lips, but Basira isn’t looking at her. Her eyes are hard and focused on someone just over Melanie’s shoulder and out of sight. Melanie whips around immediately towards the shadow. The whispering does not stop drilling itself into her head and pushing through the gap with writhing, sticky tendrils, it is static in her ears, it is fog behind her eyes. Melanie narrows her eyes.

Then she drops her food, opens her mouth and screams, barreling toward the bastard, the fucker, the impostor, determined to not let another word of his curse on them pass those sneering lips before she splits them with her fist and bashes his liar’s head in when he shouts a word and it echoes like the clash of cymbals in Melanie’s skull. Then another, and she doesn’t know what he’s saying, can’t understand the language and beneath even that there is something layered to his voice that hurts her teeth, vibrates in her bones, makes the old bullet wound in her leg throb.

melanie falls to her knees, feels a clenching tug somewhere deep in her gut and nearly retches, hunched over herself, surrounded like a physical force with the resonance, the humming air, the theft of something buried intimately, an invading hand reaching in to disturb the settled silt at the bottom of a lake to draw out- and his voice is closer now, and it is trembling even if it is still unintelligible, and the hand on her bare shoulder is such a pure static shock that it almost bowls her over. something is gone. something is wrenched from her by force and she is…. She is…

Drained. Exhausted. Wrung to her core. But the heat that’s lived in her since India is strangely absent.

Melanie opens her eyes and blinks. She is facing a packet of crumpets spilled out on the floor. Basira’s voice is above her, a hand on her shoulder, skirted knees against her side, Basira is gathering her. Basira is saying, “What was that? It hurt, it felt like- What did you do?”

Melanie turns her head and there slumped against a tall shelf of files is what used to be Jonathan Sims. His hair is on end like he just stuck a fork in a socket, there is a slightly burnt aroma to the air they’re all breathing, and a book is splayed open, spine up next to one of his hands. The title, which she can barely make out, is A Theif’s Craft. As Melanie watches, it crackles slightly, and a little spark of current chases itself across the cover.

“What did you do?” Basira demands again, and whoever, whatever it is that looks like Jon begins to stir, pushing himself further upright, taking a short, gasping breath. He takes his glasses off with a trembling hand, looks at Melanie and there it is there it is there it is. the india heat. the regiment’s rage. She feels it stinging her face like a sunburn.

“I had to take it,” he rasps, turns his eyes on Basira and Melanie feels her flinch too. “It was consuming her, Basira, don’t you understand, now there’s- I- Oh.” He presses a hand to his chest, lets out a heavy, whistling breath. “That… That is a lot. I’ve never felt like this before.”

“Like what.” Basira is wary, suspicious.

Melanie already knows. She is so tired. “Never been that angry?” she asks.“No,” he breathes, “Not like this. Not ever.”

“I couldn’t even tell at first. It took months.” Her leg is throbbing still; she looks down and is somehow not surprised to find it sluggishly bleeding again, even though it’s been years since the wound closed. She closes her eyes briefly. Her whole body feels weighed down. “You can keep it,” she says.

“Yes, I think so,” he says, half to himself. “I am sorry about your leg, Melanie.” He starts to stand.

“That’s all right,” she mumbles. “Never really healed properly, anyway.”

On instinct, Basira moves back, pulling Melanie with her. “This was a bad idea, Jon,” she says sharply. “What makes you think you can control it?”

What looks like Jon shakes his head, still seeming disoriented. “I don’t… But, I do think I can use it.” He picks up the book, blinks at it for a second as it throws one more tiny crackling arc into his skin, and then places it disinterestedly on the shelf. “You know, I might finally go have that chat with the esteemed Mr. Lukas.”

“Believe me, I’ve tried,” Melanie croaks. Her leg has stopped bleeding now, although her vision is swimming slightly. “How do you expect to find him?”

He waves a dismissive hand, the way that the real Jon used to, Melanie remembers distantly, when Martin used to ask, How are you doing? Are you all right?

The new Jon smiles with unsettling warmth, and Melanie doesn’t like it. “Don’t worry,“ he says. “That won’t be a problem. I already know exactly where he is.”

#the magnus archives #tma #tma fanfic #tma spoilers #melanie king #basira hussain #jonathan sims

16 notes · View notes

ncfan-1 · 5 years

Text

ncfan listens to The Magnus Archives: S4 EP123, ‘Web Development’

We have further insight into the way the Archival staff is just completely falling apart, my suspicion that the other Powers were taking shots at the Institute (specifically, the Archival staff) is confirmed, and we have the third statement in a row to provide us with a parallel to Jon. I begin to suspect some sort of external influence on the kinds of statements he’s getting his hands on.

- We open with Jon grumbling to himself about his office has been rearranged while he’s away, only to hear Melanie out breaking stuff in the hallway.

- That Melanie responds so poorly to Jon, his return, and just… him in general, doesn’t really shock me. She’s just so badly destabilized, and the idea that Tim and Daisy both died* while Jon gets off incredibly, implausibly lightly by comparison, suffering apparently no ill effects from having been in a coma for six months, would upset someone who wasn’t already halfway down the slippery slope into Slaughterville. Just… what are consequences? Something that matters very much to Melanie King, and rather less so to Jonathan Sims.

And Jon is just thinking very shallowly about Melanie’s situation when he thought that getting Elias out of the picture would make everything be hunky-dory with her, because Elias is a big symptom of Melanie’s problem, but far from being the root cause. If Melanie is falling apart, I think that is happening in large part due to the fact that she is still bound to the Institute. She’s still trapped. She can’t leave. She’s a prisoner in a supernatural box, and in the absence of Elias, I’m honestly not surprised that she’d zero in on Jon as being to blame for everything, especially everything that’s going on with her.

Because if you think about it, Melanie wouldn’t be in this situation if not for Jon. She would never have crossed paths with the Magnus Institute in any meaningful way if Georgie hadn’t pointed her towards Jon. I don’t think it’s entirely fair to blame him for the breakdown of Melanie King’s life, because she would have become a laughingstock in the paranormal YouTuber/podcaster community with or without him, and would likely have had to find a different line of work anyways. But I don’t need to be halfway to Slaughterville to see where she’s gotten the idea that Jon is to blame for everything. Jon is a symbol; that part of what being an avatar is. He’s a symbol for the Archive, a symbol for the Beholding, and a symbol for the forces at work that have destroyed Melanie’s life.

And the worst thing is, it sounds like Melanie, even if she wanted to, wouldn’t have had the luxury of trying to pull herself back from the influence of the Slaughter. Because as I mentioned up above, the other Powers have been taking potshots at the Eye, and the Archival staff have needed someone a halfway-to-Slaughterville skillset just to stay safe. So we have Melanie, having to sacrifice bits and pieces of her sanity just to stay alive, just to keep Basira and Martin safe, and as I’ll talk about more in just a little while, I wouldn’t be shocked if she thinks Jon has had it entirely too easy by comparison.

*I still say I’ll believe Daisy’s dead when I see a body. I honestly think that by the time she killed whichever half of Breekon & Hope she killed, she had become like Jon: too inhuman to die. And when the explosion happened, I think that she, like Jon, made a choice, and walked away from it changed.

- That said, I also think Melanie is justified in her distrust. As I have emphasized before, it is not natural to walk away from a six-month coma as cleanly as Jon did. “You don’t know me, and I don’t know you.” He just waltzes back into the Archive, apparently completely fine after having been in a coma for six months, that just screams supernatural bullshit. As Georgie said, we can think that this is a miraculous second chance for Jon all we like, but it is probably not anything so positive.

- I no longer think Basira’s behavior is just a matter of her not being sure she can trust Jon. She’s so detached, so impersonal. She defends Melanie to Jon, but even when she’s talking about how she was attacked and almost killed by the Flesh, it’s like it was happening to another person, and she was just an observer. In any other series, I’d say that’s down to trauma, but here? That’s got the fingerprints of the Beholding all over it.

But I think another part of it may be that Basira is just done with Jon? Because let’s talk about what I just mentioned: the Archival staff were attacked by the Flesh. Like, some of my favorite episodes are the ones with the Flesh, because they’re so entertainingly weird, but the Flesh is probably the worst Power you could ever be attacked by, because unless you’re being attacked by cannibals, it’s just going to be something so bizarre, so alien, that you just have no frame of reference for what you’re dealing with. You can’t discern pattern or motive, and that makes it very difficult to find a way to effectively deal with it, unless you have a Hunter with you, or someone in the process of succumbing to the Slaughter. (Since the Hunt and the Slaughter seem to derive from the same source, is a human agent of the Slaughter able to kill monsters like Hunters can? I’d be interested to know. I’d also be interested to know whether or not it’s true that only Hunters can kill monsters.)

Though this was the worst incident, Basira (to me) implies that it wasn’t the only one. I think it would have taken more than one attack to convince Melanie, of all people, that she needs to stay in the Institute most of the time for her own protection. And meanwhile, we get no indication that Jon was ever in any danger from agents of other Powers for the entire six months he was in the hospital. He was comatose on a hospital bed for six months, and doesn’t seem to have been in danger from any of the other Powers even once. If I was Melanie, or Basira, or Martin, for that matter, I would probably have a hard time looking at Jon and not thinking about how much better he seems to have had it. And now he’s come back, only dubiously human? I’d be ready to be done with him, too. I mean, I love Jonathan Sims the Disaster Man, but if I was occupying the same universe as him, at this point I’d have serious reservations about whether or not I’d still want to be associated with him.

- I’m at the point where I think I can construct a timeline of events regarding the teaser. I think the teaser took place right after the attack by the Flesh two months prior to this episode. Martin’s been made an offer by Peter Lukas: work for me more closely, and I’ll guarantee you and your coworkers a certain level of protection. He’s thinking it over at Jon’s bedside, Peter calls, and Martin accepts the offer. Martin, like Melanie, makes a choice (though probably more consciously than Melanie’s choice, since it is to me at best unclear as to how much Melanie understands about what’s happening to her) to work outside the system of the Eye to protect his coworkers. And if it doesn’t bite both of them in the ass, I will be amazed.

- Peter Lukas being an absentee boss does not surprise me. Peter Lukas disappearing staff does not surprise me. Whoosh makes me snicker.

- Can we just stop with the assumption that all laughter is a response to finding a situation humorous? Seriously, I think laughter as an involuntary response to culturally-inappropriate stimuli is a widely-known enough thing that we can stop snapping at people to stop laughing and take something seriously if they suddenly burst into laughter at the wrong time. If you snap at someone that “it isn’t funny,” you just look ignorant. Just. Saying.

- Here’s something from my notes: “Tape recorders really do just pop up out of nowhere; I begin to understand why we meet so few human agents of the Beholding.” Like, seriously. It fits pretty well with the Beholding, which is cruel, voyeuristic, and honestly kind of ineffectual, to just spawn tape recorders instead of putting too much effort into growing a large body of human/monstrous ambulatory agents. It’s almost funny, it’s so pathetic.

- Basira’s “play dead” is another reason I think she may just be done with Jon.

- I won’t go into quite as much detail about the statement. It is pretty distinctive for a few reasons. One is that the statement subject (but not the giver, since the subject is too passive a guy to even take the step of talking to the Institute), Gregory Cox, provides another parallel for Jon. This time, we see a parallel for Jon in the form of a man who got sucked into supernatural shenanigans unawares and was after that point unwilling to really think about what that meant, and what he was involved in. Even when confronted with someone in the process of turning into a spider and begging him for help, he seriously tries to play it off as the person having had “an unfortunate condition.” That’s Jon’s S1 “willful ignorance that flies in the face of all logic” to a tee. And Jon, as best as I can tell, hasn’t really thought much about what it means that he’s involved with the Beholding, that he’s responsible for hurting people in the name of the Beholding. He’s quite like Cox, in that respect.

- So anyways, Cox is an incredibly passive man who is hired by a woman who, from her description (very thin, has clearly suffered grievous head trauma at some point in her life) and her association with the Web, is almost certainly Annabelle Cane, to make a website. A very basic, very simple website with weird coding that includes strings of people’s names, and a very long, impossible to memorize url name that changes every few weeks. A website called ‘Chelicerae.’

@agnesmontague and @flo-nelja have clarified both the spelling of ‘chelicerae’ and what they are. They’re the mouth parts of a spider. They’re the jaws of a spider. So when you enter this website, you are entering the jaws of the spider.

You tell a story to the “story-spinner”, about the worst event of your life. And if your story satisfies the story-spinner, you will be rewarded with the death of someone you have singled out. We don’t know what happens if your story doesn’t satisfy. It probably isn’t anything good.

Every few weeks, Cox was asked to code strange things into the website. Strings of meaningless words, bits and pieces of poetry, and a different name, every time. With everything taken in context, I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that he was literally coding someone’s horrific death into the website.

Eventually, it gets out that Cox has some involvement in this lethal urban legend, and he starts to get emails begging him to make it stop, demanding to know what’s happening to them, pleading for forgiveness and mercy. The “Bring them back” especially stuck with me. Cox has become the instrument of so many people’s suffering, and he refuses to face it, refuses to face up to what it means that he’s become involved with something very weird, and very dangerous. Like I said, he’s very like Jon, in this way.

- Cox has since vanished, almost a year after the statement was given. As this statement took place before Gertrude died, and would have been fairly current and potentially urgent, I do wonder at her not doing anything about it—especially since the presence of a story-spinner potentially suggests an overlap with the Beholding. I guess it may be like Jon thinks, and Gertrude never knew it had been given.

- The real kicker of this statement, though, is the supplementary document attached to it: a list of the names of the people Cox added into the website’s code. Several of them are the names of statement-givers, including Carlos Vittery. Yeah, suddenly what happened to him doesn’t seem nearly as random as it used to.

- Jon is finally facing up to the fact that he was always a bit of a shitty boss. Whether or not he actually learns something from it is anyone’s guess.

- My verdict: unless whatever Peter Lukas and Martin are working on is literally a plan to stop the Watcher’s Crown, these people do not have a chance in hell of stopping the Watcher’s Crown. They literally cannot pull themselves together fast enough. The Watcher’s Crown will go through, and we’ll see what the world is like when one of the Powers has come through the interstice—and dragged hangers-on with it. Then, the Archival staff, if they’re still in any state to do so, will go about trying to mitigate or reverse the effects. Should be fun.

#ncfan listens to The Magnus Archives

7 notes · View notes