Talking it out
Tim was happy to see his apartment when he finally found a door. What he wasn’t happy about was it was a week later, and the moment he joined time again, he felt the withdrawal from being away from the archives all at once. He threw his bag to the couch and started to get ready for work because of course that was his life. Through most of it, he felt watched, but based from the times he couldn’t feel it, he assumed it was Jon. Jon wasn’t so nosey as to watch the whole time, Elias wouldn’t be so kind. When had Tim become so used to that? To the point where he could tell which spooky boss was watching.
There was a text waiting for Tim when he was about to leave that said “Welcome back. Glad you are okay.” from Jon. Tim groaned at how while he was still angry, his interactions with the Spirals really drove home how benign of a monster Jon was.
--
Jon gathered up the three of them all once Tim got in.
“We’ve been played by Elias. Again.” Jon’s voice carried a tired tone that carried the fact of how done he was with everything.
Jon handed them both their contracts. “He changed them before having you sign, so I have no idea what to expect. I’m thinking your alignment to the Beholding is different than back when I was thinking you were just assistants from the wording in place. Martin’s contract places him as Archivist technically the moment I stopped filling the role. While you both seem to have something seemingly random in the same place. Or maybe new might be the better term?”
Sasha looked it over, there wasn’t anything that would elaborate on what the secondary job titles meant. “What makes you think that it means anything?”
“It's because of me, isn't it.” Time looked at the Guard on his contract and thought of the confusion. “Those Spiral things called me by it.”
Jon nodded. “Yes. Michael stopped by to let me know you were okay, but he referred to you as Guard. They tend to have the hardest grip on names, so they peek into god knows were to pull names to call you by. Names and titles don’t matter to them, so they pick the first one that surfaces for them. Tends to lean more on how the entities view someone rather than how humans do. Was why I looked into it.”
“So your spooky google isn’t all-powerful, just only as powerful as what is available.” Tim glanced over to see what Sasha’s fancy title could be. Ambassador of fear. God Elias was such a prick.
“I’ve been trying to tell you that for months.” Jon smiled. Tim didn’t think Jon hated that nickname as much as he let on.
“What’s next?” Sasha seemed pretty calm about it all. “If this means anything, are we going to start to develop like you did before you changed? Hate to say it, but going in blind didn’t do you any favors.”
“Not sure. Either of you two notice anything different since transferring down here about yourselves?”
“Other than the obvious, ‘world is inhabited by fear monsters’ and whatnot.” Martin added. “Like while I started to get memories back, I started to Know things, not too differently from Jon. Only didn’t notice since he knew them as well, so we didn’t quite question it? We pinned most of it on memories coming back if anything seemed odd.”
“Wasn’t until we started talking about it over the last week, did we find the trend. That Martin wasn’t remembering, not all the time.” Jon let out a laugh. “It was mostly when he interacted with random people he didn’t know that we noticed.”
“I probably was able to develop without reading statements cause of all the memories. Not many horror stories that could outclass those. Thinking that the Nightmare problems Jon faced was a him only problem, since I’ve been present for a live statement here and there but only have my own. So for me, we’ve been poking around to see how Gertude was, rather than how Jon was.”
Tim and Sasha paused to think about it.
“Well, I didn’t get lost. My head cleared up the moment I went into Michael’s halls. When I wasn’t in the same place as two of the spiral things. It was like I was trying to look in two directions at once while they were together, but once I only had one to look at, it wasn’t a problem anymore? The halls were annoying at most. That's fairly not normal? I even think I might have found Michael’s heart? It was gross so I ignored it.” Tim tried to think a bit more on that.
Sasha shrugged. “No idea if this would count, but I’ve hung out with Nikki quite a lot? And she’s been more helpful than Jon in several areas?”
“Hmm can shake that off Nikki just being Nikki. She likes helping humans and learning to mimic them. She’s been like that since uni, but won't brush it off. I guess let's keep an eye out for things.”
Tim took a breath like he was going to regret something. “If you poked around in our heads, Could you know, Know? Like if we gave you permission, and this is not that by the way.”
“No. I don’t think I would. Seeing things out of character for you would need me to be far more adept at human things, and even before becoming I was terrible at it. I’m far better now than I’d been since uni.” Jon shrugged a little. “I guess for now, keep an eye out for things, and we will continue as normal? Also if you wanted more time off, feel free to take all the time you need. I was planning on getting you some spare keys made so you can just swing in whenever you start to feel off.”
Everything was so absurd right now. The look on Jon’s face when he’d said that was too pathetic to stay mad at. The look was almost enough to piss Tim off for Jon’s resignation of it all. Sure, Jon was a monster who enjoyed people’s fear. Sure, he’d compared all of humanity to a cat jumper. He was also the one working every day with the goal of keeping two people alive. And wasn’t planning on stopping if Tim or Sasha bailed on him. Maybe it didn’t need to make sense.
“Don't want us here, boss?” Tim grinned. “Want to have an office romance with your Archivist or something? Love tucked away in the shelves?”
“TIM.” Martin’s yell scared Marshal from where she was hiding and she scurried to a new hiding spot near Jon.
Tim chuckled. “Could have some sweet little romantic dinner reading the new spooky of the week. Maybe by electric candle to keep fire away.”
“You two being here isn’t going to stop me from romancing Martin.” Jon said it confidently enough that any tension in the air seemed to lighten.
“JON, not you too.” Martin hid in his face.
Tim was frustrated at Elias for basically everything, but he’d be damned if anyone hurt the group in front of him.