#i am once again asking people to remember that martin has MORE job experience at the institute than literally any other character | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

bananonbinary · 3 years

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Time for a Salty Meta Post about Martin!

people who’ve followed this blog for a bit know that spending six hours combing through text for some goddamn sources is my specialty, so i compiled every time jon ever talked about martin’s work in season 1. which for the record, he stopped complaining about all the way back in episode 26, where he was angry that martin of all people got hurt.

things jon gets mad at martin for:

not being able to find records that don’t exist

not being able to find someone based only on a first name

the Dog

not wearing trousers in his off-hours

being the one that got caught up in the jane prentiss thing

mag 004 and mag 012 both have jon taking potshots at martin over research that was proven accurate by outside sources

things jon has never once complained about:

martin not understanding the filing system and just putting stuff away at random

martin being clumsy, constantly ruining things, spilling tea everywhere everyday, etc

martin turning in incompetent, poorly-edited, or badly formatted reports

martin not understanding the terminology used, skills expected, etc., and generally being extremely new to the field

please for the love of god stop making martin the silly bumbling idiot who can’t do anything right just because he doesn’t have a formal education. there’s zero evidence for it in the text, and it’s really weird to act like a 4 year degree would outweigh the *10 years* of job experience he has, not just in academia, but in the institute itself by season one. my boy has worked there longer than ANY of the rest of the main cast. screw you guys.

tl;dr: martin is never once shown to be bad at his job, jon pretty much only ever gets mad at him for the really stupid first impression and also not finding stuff that no one else was able to find either. after martin got hurt, jon talks about his research basically the same way he talks about tim’s or sasha’s work.

fucking proof under the cut:

(i didnt include the s1 finale or martin’s statement bc that’s just...two entire episodes of them talking to each other, but there isn’t really any notable Martin Complaints in either of them imo)

I swear, if he’s brought another dog in here, I’m going to peel him.

[pre-launch trailer]

Well, technically three, but I don’t count Martin as he’s unlikely to contribute anything but delays.

[...] Alongside this Tim, Sasha and, yes, I suppose, Martin will be doing some supplementary investigation to see what details may be missing from what we have.

[MAG001 Anglerfish]

Martin couldn’t find any records of Ex Altiora as a title in existent catalogues of esoteric or similar literature, so I assigned Sasha to double-check. Still nothing.

[MAG004 Pageturner]

I had Martin conduct a follow-up interview with Mr. Woodward last week, but it was unenlightening. Apparently there have been no further bags at number 93 and in the intervening years he has largely discounted many of the stranger aspects of his experience. I wasn’t expecting much, as time generally makes people inclined to forget what they would rather not believe, but at least it got Martin out of the Institute for an afternoon, which is always a welcome relief.

[MAG005 Thrown Away]

Martin was unable to find the exact date the original house was built but the earliest records he could find list it as being bought by Walter Fielding in 1891.

[...]

We cannot prove any connection, but Martin unearthed a report on an Agnes Montague, who was found dead in her Sheffield flat on the evening of November 23rd 2006, the same day Mr. Lensik claims to have uprooted the tree.

[MAG008 Burned Out]

According to Martin, who was here when they took this statement, it was at this point in writing that Mr. Herbert announced he needed some sleep before continuing. He was shown to the break room where he went to sleep on the couch. He did not awaken; unfortunately succumbing to the lung cancer right there. Martin says the staff had been aware of how serious Mr. Herbert’s condition was, and had advised him to seek medical aid prior to giving his statement, but were told rather bluntly by the old man that he would not wait another second to state his case. I can’t decide whether this lends more or less credibility to his tale.

[MAG010 Vampire Killer]

“Veepalach” might also be a mishearing of the Polish word “wypalać”, according to Martin, which means to cauterize or brand. Admittedly, if Martin speaks Polish in the same way he “speaks Latin,” then he might be talking nonsense again, but I’ve looked it up and it appears to check out.

[MAG012 First Aid]

I sent Martin to look into this ‘Angela’ character - not that I want him to get chopped up, of course, but someone had to. Apparently, he spent three days looking into every woman named Angela in Bexley over the age of 50. He could not find anyone that matches the admittedly vague description given here, though he informs me that he had some very pleasant chats about jigsaws. Useless ass.

[MAG014 Piecemeal]

Martin declined to help with this investigation as he’s “a bit claustrophobic”

[MAG015 Lost John’s Cave]

There simply aren’t enough details given in this statement to actually investigate, short of Martin confirming that Mr. Vittery did indeed live at the addresses he provided.

[MAG016 Arachnophobia]

Oh, he’s off sick this week. Stomach problems, I think.

Blessed relief if you ask me.

[...]

I asked Martin to try and hunt down Mr. Adekoya himself for a follow-up, but have been informed that he passed away in 2006.

[MAG017 The Boneturner’s Tale]

MARTIN

Well, I need to tell someone what happened, and you can vouch for the soundness of my mind, can’t you?

ARCHIVIST

…

That is beside the point.

[MAG022 Colony]

Martin! Good lord man, if you’re going to be staying in the Archives, at least have the decency to put some trousers on!

[MAG023 Schwartzwald]

Martin found one other thing while combing through police reports for the Hither Green area. About a month after this statement was given, on May 15th, 2015, police were called out to once again investigate the chapel.

[MAG025 Growing Dark]

I know, but it would have to have been Martin, wouldn’t it? I mean, anything goes wrong around here, it always seems to happen to him. Anyway, we’re getting off topic. Why didn’t you report this?

[MAG026 A Distortion]

Martin made contact with the son, Marcus McKenzie, but he declined to talk to us, saying that he’d “already made his statement.”

[MAG027 A Sturdy Lock]

Tim and Martin had a bit more luck investigating Tom Haan, though only really enough to confirm that he seems to have completely vanished following his departure from Aver Meats on the 12th of July.

[MAG030 Killing Floor]

Martin’s research would seem to indicate the place employed a reasonable number of international staff they preferred to keep off the books

[...]

TIM

Ah well, that’s actually what he was asking, huh! Um, apparently Martin, uh, took delivery of a couple of items last week addressed to you. Did he not mention it?

ARCHIVIST

No, he… Oh, yes, actually. I completely forgot. He said he put it in my desk drawer, hold on.

[MAG036 Taken Ill]

#the magnus archives #LISTEN #i am once again asking people to remember that martin has MORE job experience at the institute than literally any other character #(except elias or i guess maybe rosie)#he's the goddamn veteran not the newbie #fan wank /

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kicksaddictny · 3 years

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Kicksaddict Sneakerhead PROFILES Interview Series: @CakedaGawd

After a long Hiatus, we’ve returned! Our popular Profile series has been requested almost on a daily basis (Thanks for the tweets, dms and emails). We were even threatened! (Thanks by the way).

Cake The Gawd! This one was so much fun. Tap in.

Where are you from? Brooklyn, NY born in Crown Heights raised in East Flatbush.

How long have you been collecting sneakers? I was introduced to sneakers in 1991 but I started collecting for myself in 98.

What’s your favorite sneaker and why? Air Jordan 6 Infrared. It's the shoe Michael was wearing when he won his first championship, and to me just it’s just the most beautiful Jordan shoe to date! The silhouette is unmatched, it is timeless, and no matter how many times it is retroed I will buy it!

Besides your hometown, what is the best city for sneakerheads that you know of? Why? I would say LA 100% !! It is a vibe out there. I am part of a sneaker group and 75% of the people in there are from LA. They really about the culture they know their shit and they are fresh as fuck too.

Do you collect just for collecting or do you collect and rock? I collect and rock. That is why I double up on certain shoes.. Some kicks you gotta have for store and show but some you just have to rock them!

What sneaker got you into the sneaker game? I cannot pinpoint one thing, it is so many things. It was Music, my parents introducing me to Nike, my older cousin, basketball, the dope boys around the way, and my 3rd grade crush and her cousin who both had Aqua 8's. (LOL) I cannot just say 1 thing because they all had a significant part in it.

What are your thoughts on these fake celebrity sneakerheads? I hate them all! All of these dudes just get perks, some of them do not even know the shoes. That shit really gets under my skin. Showing off shoes that they get and not even knowing the name or numbers of the shoes, creating their own names. Shit is sickening. S/O to the Sneaker Gawd Wale !

How do you feel about the Off white collabs? I liked the first round of the collabs. With the Presto's, Air maxes, Blazers, and Jordan 1's. I think after that it should've been left alone. But I can respect what they are doing over there. I just won my first pair of Off-White's with the Lot 50 joint.

If you could wear only one sneaker for the rest of your life, what would it be? Air Jordan 3 Black Cement. Yes 6's are my favorite of all time but the Black Cement 3's just go with EVERYTHING!

What advice would you give as far as storing and preservation of your sneakers? Wear your kicks man. I store and rock! I get it, wanting to save shoes but putting them away and never rocking them, when you finally do ya it’s separating and crumbling. In order for your kicks to last they gotta be worn anyway. Unless you're truly just on some collecting only for show vibes.

What is the most you’ve ever spent on a pair of sneakers? $900... I was able to land Black and Red and Royal 1's from 2001 together. A friend of mine had them and said he couldn't think of anyone else. I had literally just started my new job. A chunk of my first check went to that pick up.

Have you ever waited in line for a pair of kicks? I waited in line once in my life for shoes and swore I would never do it again. It was for the 2001 True Blue 3's. I waited online at like 7 in the morning at Kings Plaza. LMAO I said this will never happen again. I didn't have the patience for it. I do not know how ppl used to do that shit or camp for kicks. I was there for 1 hour and I was like this is ridiculous.

You're also a photographer, how long have you been taking photos? I have been taking photos since 2011 but officially became a photographer in 2013.

How do sneakers play a role in your photography? That is a great question because I didn't want the 2 to mix at all. Because I'm a scenery and landscape photographer. But I got into photography because of sneakers. No offense to anyone but a bunch of these "influencers" get on IG with their DSLR cameras, take some on foot shots and call themselves "Photographers". 90% of them do not even understand lighting. I didn't wanna be one of those guys because I actually live this and study it. But recently I just started letting it be that and owning it. I am nice with this photography shit when it comes to sneakers. I have a deep connection with shoes and I love incorporating that into my art. I thank my wife for that. I told her I don't wanna be just another sneaker photographer and she said to me who said you have to be ?! I took that and ran with it. Off-White just recently featured some of my pictures on their Instagram.

I remember you saying you're a sneaker enthusiast, what is the difference between that and a sneakerhead? An enthusiast really studies sneakers. Sneakerheads just love sneakers like it ain't really about the history and all that for them. They just love shoes because it is cool and makes them feel good. Us Enthusiasts are invested. Things matter like knowing years of a shoe. For example, an enthusiast would look at a pair of Jordan's like Taxi 12's, We know Michael wore those in the 1996 - 97 season, but we also know that Martin gave away a pair on his show for the Christmas episode to the kid who had holes in shoes. They are tied to iconic moments. A sneakerhead may love Bordeaux 7's because they are dope looking shoes. Where for me it's that Michael Jordan wore those in a video with Michael Jackson and Kris Kross in the 92 Jam video. MJ and MJ in a video with Kris Kross, do you know what that did to my childhood?! Give you one more example that is not even Michael Jordan related. Piggy backing off of Kris Kross,The Patrick Ewing’s were one of my favorite kicks growing up besides seeing Pat play in them one of my favorite Hip Hop covers of all time is "Totally Krossed Out" and Kris Kross is wearing both colorways. So you see what I mean there is so much tied to it with being an enthusiast. This is just my opinion though some may not agree so don't shoot me! (Ha)

From the time you started collecting up until now, would you say that the sneaker game changed for the best or the worst? I have been collecting for 20 plus years now. I have seen the game at it's best, I have seen it die, I have seen it revive, and now I am witnessing the death of it again. The sneaker game is disgusting right now, and I honestly do not think it will ever recover. It really saddens me. It is a popularity and money contest right now.

Does pricing affect your collection? Hell No! And I hate that some people are trying to make this the norm. IDGAF if you paid $500 - $2000 for a pair, It doesn't mean shit. The narrative is getting outta hand.

What does the word “Hypebeast” mean to you? Hypebeast is a person that only buys shit for status and popularity. They cannot form their own opinion about shit. They have to wear and cop items based on what every celeb is wearing or whatever these Social Media "Influencers" are saying is hot! It is not only sneaker related either. N*ggaz were hypebeasting for PS5 last year..

What are your thoughts on the females in the sneaker game? They are the best! I wish we had a Sneaker union and it was only run by females! The men in this game are annoying and so over the top. It is so bad that they feel the need to compete with women. The men get shoes just to show off to one another. Like what type of shit is that? The females are cool. I had a dude on twitter tell me women don't know the value of a shoe let alone about the shoe. The men feel like they always gotta try to shit on the women. The women are just trying to be part of the culture and enjoy it. And they shouldn't have to try to be part of something that is open to anyone who is willing to be invested and understand the culture.

Any advice for a young kid coming up in the sneaker game? Wear what you like! Respect the game and the people who have been doing it before you. Because this new generation of sneakerheads are little entitled dicks. No respect whatsoever!! I don't care about Travis Scott shoes. Without Jordan being who he is Travis wouldn't have a Jordan silhouette to collaborate with! Same with Off-White. These silhouettes were here before these guys. Say know your history and pay homage!! BUT STAY humble.

See I follow you and I'm loving the way you include your daughter in your work, what does that mean to you? Man, it is beautiful!!!! Without even trying she is invested in the culture. Both photography and shoes. Myself and my wife are both heavy into photography, art, music, sneakers, and clothes. My daughter is into all the same things but we are letting it be her own experience. We are not forcing anything on her. We want her to enjoy being a child and whatever things she picks up from us along the way is just a bonus. But I love shooting her, and I love when she asks myself and her mother "do we like her fit". It is truly a blessing man!

All photos by CAKEDAGAWD

Follow : https://twitter.com/CakedaGawd

https://www.instagram.com/whatsinthesyrup/

#Kicksaddict #cake #photographer #cakedagawd #airjordan #airjordan1 #airjordan6 #clothing #baby #infrared #airjordan4

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ofclaires · 3 years

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IV. CLAIRE WALSH

PAST SELF PARAS: april 2020 / september 2020 / march 2021.

hi, before the read more i just wanted to say THANK YOU. getting to play claire has been absolutely a treat, a challenge, and genuinely, a huge part of my life for the past year and a half or so. it occurred to me when writing this and looking back at other things i’ve written for claire that i didn’t just feel like i was writing this for myself or for claire ; but i was writing it for you guys, too ! that has been one of the most special things about gallagher for me is the writing community that i feel like we built, taking such a huge investment in our characters and everyone else’s writing. i feel like i’m writing with and for some of my best friends. i also feel like i’ve grown so much ( ok, i actually don’t just feel like it, i can look back at those three paras and SEE how my writing has improved. ) i am so blessed to have gotten to write claire with all of you and to share her story, i feel like she has been so fucking beloved & it’s given her so much life. i am so proud of her and it’s really bittersweet that i’m finally saying goodbye to her as well. so, thank you all so, so much, gallagher has been a writing experience like no other for me & i love you all !

trigger warnings : domestic violence & abuse, death

PART ONE: CHILDHOOD.

The trailer that Claire spent the back half of her childhood in never felt like home. Maybe because trailers are made to be temporary, or the fact that if she accepted that this was where she belonged, she’d have to give up hope.

It’s normal Maggie Walsh to be out late, Claire’s usually cleaned up the kitchen and tucked herself into bed by the time her mother comes in the door – but she’s not sleeping. She’s always had trouble with that, brain bouncing around from one thought to the next until eventually she hears the creak of the door.

Her mom’s home.

She hears the usual stumbling, the clatter of dishes falling from where she’d neatly placed them on the drying rack. Maggie’s drunk, Claire’s sure of that. Ten years old and she knows what it means to be so drunk that you can hardly see straight, that the words you say under the influence are a different reflection from the person that you really are. She inhales deeply and crawls out from under the covers to check on her. Ten years old and she knows the steps: Help her take her makeup off, make sure she sleeps on her side, glass of water on the bedside table, trash can on the floor. Maggie is only twenty-six years old herself now, not done with her childhood by the time that Claire was born, not ready to be a mother. Claire’s had to figure it out most of it herself.

“Mom?” Claire knocks on the door lightly, plastic cup full of water already in hand.

“Don’t – don’t come in!” Maggie sputters, and Claire’s confused. She defies her request and opens the bedroom door the rest of the way. When she sees her mom, she drops the cup on the floor, small hands curling into fists.

“What happened? Who did that to you?”

“I told you not to come in here, Claire,” Maggie repeats, but Claire has always been on to disregard commands. She learns at a young age that authority only means older than you or some assigned title, not that they know best.

“Who did that? Why?” She repeats her questions. Despite being mature for her age, it’s hard for Claire to wrap her head around the black eye obscuring Maggie’s face, and the swelling on her cheek.

“It doesn’t matter,” Maggie sighs, dejected as she flops down on the bed. Even in her state, she knows that there’s not much use telling Claire to back off or go away once she’s decided that she’s not going to. Her little girl is a spitfire, strangely enough reminds Maggie a lot of her own mom, like living with a miniature version of her. Maybe that’s why Claire wins most arguments. “Come here.”

Claire walks closer to the bed, kicking the cup aside on her way for no reason other than to kick something. She crawls into bed next to her mom and looks up at her, waiting for more of an explanation or literally anything but silence.

“I don’t know why I keep looking for a happy ending. I leave you home alone, I come home like this...not helping either of us,” Maggie presses a kiss to the top of Claire’s head, runs her fingers through her daughter’s hair. It’s so soft and Claire is so little, she can’t help but look at the spilled cup on the floor with a pang of guilt. “I’m sorry,” she adds, voice choked up and words a little slurred. Tears squeeze out of the corners of her eyes when she closes them, hugging her daughter closer, “I’ve blamed you for my fucked up life for so long...that’s not fair.”

Now, Claire is only ten, but those are the kind of words that you remember forever. Still, she smiles. “It doesn’t have to stay fucked up. It can get better,” a childish spark of optimism in her heart that hasn’t yet been put out. It makes Maggie smile back though, kissing her daughter on the top of her head yet again.

“I like that,” she says, and they fall asleep curled up beside each other. Claire sleeps soundly, thinking that it’s possible. Things really could get better, and for a while, it seems like there really is a sort of shift. Maggie starts cooking, cleaning again, and she doesn’t even stay out so late. That’s when she meets Martin.

He seems better than the rest. Until he isn’t.

But Claire does her job as her mother’s protector, just as she’s been doing all of her life, and it’s that event that jumpstarts the rest of everything that happens next.

PART TWO: GRADUATION.

Claire’s come to the formal conclusion that graduation ceremonies are a waste of time. There’s all this build up, everyone’s so excited, and then you have to sit around and wait for your name to be called so you can spend two seconds walking across a stage while everyone claps. She would have skipped it entirely if her mother hadn’t already come up, and if she knew that people were going to insist. The small talk afterward is even more agonizing than the ceremony itself. It is sort of painful saying goodbye to everyone, and it occurs to Claire that there’s more people that she’s going to miss than she ever expected.

“Callum and his mother are here,” Maggie points out.

“And?” Claire rolls her eyes. Seeing Callum again to begin with had brought up a lot of old feelings, and generally, even though they’d resolved things, she tries to avoid him whenever possible.

“Well, it’s probably weird if we don’t say hello, at least, right? I’m going to say hello,” Maggie interjects, “he’s such a sweet boy.”

Claire’s eyebrows rise on her forehead as she crosses her arms over her chest. “Go ahead then,” she sighs, “I’ll wait right here.”

“Claire,” Maggie draws out her name with a withering stare, but Maggie has never been able to establish that sort of authority with Claire that would prompt any inclination of obedience, so Claire just shrugs her shoulders, unimpressed. She’s not going to budge. “Fine, I’ll be right back.”

Claire’s done her best to put the chapter of their life that includes Martin out of her mind when rekindling things with her mother, and she certainly doesn’t want to stand around making small talk with his other ex-wife, trying not to look at Callum with his matching jawline, trying not to remember everything she hates. It all comes back in a flash. The horrible cracking sound that her mother’s head had made when it connected with the wall, the blood on the marble floor. They say you don’t remember trauma properly, that your memory doesn’t work quite right, but she will never forget the way her fist connected with Martin’s face : like a puzzle piece, like it BELONGED there, and she’d done it over and over again until she heard sirens.

And yet, Claire can’t deny that it’s a part of her life that got her here, where she is today. She thinks life is shitty and random, and that not everything has to happen ‘for a reason.’ Still, she’ll catch Kass’s eye across the room and see her smiling so brightly that it seems impossible not to believe in something. Claire can’t help herself anyway – she smiles back. No one has ever been able to produce Claire’s smile in its truest form the way Kass has, unashamed of being so happy to look at someone. She once thought the idea of looking at a person and seeing your whole future was ridiculous, that you’d have to be stupid to put that much of yourself into someone, but it isn’t like that at all. All of it was unintentional, like by the time she realized it, Kass was already everything. And she feels so safe with that thought that she doesn’t mind at all.

“Am I interrupting something?” A figure steps in front of her, cutting off her line of sight. She’s not really fond of being snuck up on, so she opens her mouth to say something snarky when she’s met with the gaze of Lisanna Harlin, one of last year’s mentors. Her daughter, Elisa, is there, but she’s not graduating, so Claire’s confused by Lisanna’s presence.

“No, Ms. Harlin,” Claire says, though there’s a spark of indignation in her words that practically goes hand in hand whenever an adult commands authority.

“Lisanna is fine,” she says with a light laugh, like she’s amused Claire’s greeted her this way.

“Can I...help you with something?” Claire asks, mostly curious about how long this interaction has gone on. While she’s friendly with Elisa, she was Kass’s roommate last year, they’re not exceedingly close, so she’s not sure what else Lisanna would have to say to her other than maybe a polite hello.

It’s more than a polite hello. Lisanna Harlin works for Lexon Corp in Durham, North Carolina, a private military company that provides armed guards, bodyguards, and guns for hire. They’re the sort of place that would be looking for the best of the best in combat, and they have a bit of a reputation for hiring Gallagher girls. Claire had given up on the job search months ago since the video went out, in fact, she’s had a job lined up for graduation already : at a boxing gym in D.C., where the scene isn’t too bad. It was suited to her, but not exactly the sort of thing that her Gallagher education had prepared her for. Lexon Corp? Everything her rigorous love of January boot camps were tailored to. And they want to interview her.

A month later, Claire’s sitting on the cusp of a completely fresh start. It wasn’t easy to backtrack on the plans that she and Kass had made together, knowing how much was changing for the both of them, it had been nice to have the stable idea of an apartment together on the horizon. Now, she’s a four hour drive away, and she goes home to her one-bedroom studio in Durham after rigorous training throughout the day. But she’s grateful for the chance to work her way back into the field, and she can remember what Lisanna said to her when they gave her the offer.

“We’re aware that with your history that we’re taking a chance on you, Claire,” Lisanna said. “But we think the reasons that made other agencies look past you are exactly what makes you an asset. You care about your jobs, the people that you’re involved in, and you’d have a partner’s back until the bitter end. You listen to your intuition, trust your gut...and above all else, you have follow-through. I’m excited to be able to offer this position. Don’t prove me wrong.”

Claire swears that she won’t.

PART THREE: KIPTYN.

Kiptyn isn’t supposed to be in the left hall closet.

In fact, he’s not supposed to be awake at all. But who can sleep the night before their birthday anyway? Sure, he’ll be thirteen, and that’s probably old enough to have gotten over the magic of it all, but...he’d still been lying awake with excitement, the anticipation keeping his eyes open for hours on end. Well, that and the video game he’d been playing under the covers, but he’d obviously only been playing it because he couldn’t sleep in the first place.

Then he started thinking about the left hall closet and the conversation that they had at dinner the other night. In Kiptyn’s defense, Dahvia – his younger sister – had totally started it and he was an innocent bystander. After all, Kiptyn’s old enough to know that they don’t bring up Claire to mom, because it just puts her in a mood and then you can forget about doing anything else for the rest of the evening. But Dahvia’s ten, practically a baby, and she doesn’t know any better.

“Hey, mom? What sort of accident did Claire die in? Nina asked me at recess and I didn’t know,” Dahvia pipes up, before she’s even properly sat down. Kip visibly cringes. He’s older, wiser, knows this won’t go well. Still, he dares to look at his mom’s face and he notes the faraway look in her eye, like she seems to experience a bunch of things at once. Kip notices how even though her eyes are glassy, she doesn’t cry. Though sometimes, their mom will just cry randomly, like two weeks ago when he asked for help with his Spanish homework and she couldn’t even help him finish the first worksheet.

“It was a car accident,” she says stiffly, “eat your dinner.”

Kiptyn kicks his sister under the table and flashes her a look that says : Great. Look what you did, ruined dinner. Dahvia sticks her tongue out at him.

So, he knows that he’s not supposed to be in the left hall closet because he could ruin many more dinners, but he’s here anyway. He’s been thinking about it ever since they sat in silence for the rest of that half hour, and he’s come to the conclusion – his mother was lying. Because all sorts of things make their mother cry, like a bowl of mac and cheese or Spanish class, or motorcycles, and she won’t let Kiptyn take boxing lessons though his friend Robert is and he thought it sounded really cool, but she doesn’t have any problem with cars or driving, and also, she’s never told them a single thing about Claire except that. They aren’t allowed to know anything about her, especially not anything true, so Kiptyn is pretty sure that’s a lie. There’s just something just weird about it.

So, in the middle of the night before his thirteenth birthday, he looks up a video on how you pick locks and then he figures it out on the door of the left hall closet. He’s there for at least forty-five minutes, practically ready to give it all up when he hears the clicking sound, and then it opens. His first thought is : Woah. This is a load of junk.

And he’s right. There’s boxes upon boxes of paperwork, old clothes. Some things start to click, like when he finds a pair of worn boxing gloves with Claire’s initials embroidered on them. His favorite thing that he finds is the fattest scrapbook he’s ever seen – his mom always makes them, there’s one for every year of his life. Dahvia’s too, they love looking at them. The cover of this one, though, says Italy 2021. It’s all pictures of his mom and Claire, probably in their early twenties. Kiptyn mostly notices his mother’s smile, how he’s only seen her look like that a couple times in his life and yet it looks so EASY here, like she wears it all the time. It’s so strange to him. He sets the scrapbook down and crawls toward the back of the closet. His eyes land on two leather folders with gold embroidery, and he opens up the first one. In big letters at the top : GALLAGHER ACADEMY.

It’s a diploma.

This certifies that Kassandra Sutton has satisfactorily completed the…

“What are you doing?”

Kiptyn yells out like a child, not having heard anyone creeping up on him. He claps his hand over his mouth as if to shush himself. “The door was open! I don’t know how, but I just...noticed it was open and wanted to make sure that...no one was stealing your stuff!” he grins sheepishly, hoping that he can ride on the high of his birthday week to get him out of this one.

“It was just...open?” his mother looks down at him with raised eyebrows before brandishing a twisted paper clip between two fingers. The one that had formerly been stuck in the door. His guilty expression widens, he can’t help it.

“Okay, I might know how it opened,” Kiptyn admits. He hesitates for a moment, before he realizes that he’s ALREADY in trouble, he might as well just come out with it and pray to the birthday gods. He holds up the diploma with her name on it : “What’s Gallagher Academy?”

Kass’s sigh is heavy and deep, accompanied by the amount of exhaustion that comes with raising two curious kids by herself. After Claire died, she moved her family to London to be closer to their aunt and away from everything that reminded her of Claire. She never told her children why. From hiding that world from them, the world that took so many people from her : her father, her ex-girlfriend, and the love of her life. She swore that she would never lose her children to it, too. But Kiptyn looks up at her with wide eyes, desperate to know about his mother and his past, and Kass also knows what it’s like to have part of yourself missing due to family secrets that are being kept from you. He is practically a teenager now. So, she relents.

Kass doesn’t go into all of the details, of course. Just that Gallagher Academy was a school for spies, and that’s where it all started. Kiptyn already knew that his moms met in college, so it’s the spy part that’s most interesting to him. She talks about Claire with a light in her eyes he’s unfamiliar with, how she was one of the best fighters in their year, that she grew up with such a talent in the ring that she probably could’ve gone pro if her life had gone in a different direction. She talks about how they had to part ways after graduation, because Claire got a job in North Carolina and she got a job in Washington, DC, but they made it work, and both got very accustomed to the four hour drive – though it was sometimes closer to three for Claire, because she always drove too fast, even on this big, black motorcycle which Kass swears that she hated. She tells Kiptyn about how they got married, the way she’d almost moved to England for a dream job and that long distance threatened to drive them apart again – until Claire chased her down in the airport with a ring and proposal.

She also talks about how Claire really died : the abridged version. It was an overseas mission where they’d been cornered, and Claire risked her life to save the rest of their team. There were no other casualties, and the information they were able to bring back helped stop the terrorist organization they’d been chasing to end them for good. Kass tells the abridged version for her son, gives Claire a hero’s death. In some ways, it was. She doesn’t mention the ways that Claire was consumed by the case, it was an organization hellbent on killing spies and it likely reminded her of the brotherhood. Kass had been worried about the case the whole time, because it felt like Claire was taking it too personally. In the end, she may have been right : because Claire had let it take her life in order to close it. She also doesn’t mention that such a sacrificial death means that her wife died fighting alone, swinging her fists until her very last breath. But still, she was all alone.

She had no choice but to take her kids as far away from that life as possible.

Kiptyn tries, but he doesn’t really remember Claire. He’d only been three years old when she passed away, and before then, she’d been so consumed by her last case that she was barely present. Still, he thinks she sounds badass.

He falls asleep on his mother’s shoulder that night, looking through the scrapbook of pictures from their trip to Italy in 2021. He’s animated for the first part, pointing out buildings and asking questions, wonders if Claire was sweating in all that leather, but he slowly starts to drift off. He wakes up on the couch the next morning, no trace of the book or any of the other papers he’d hauled out of the closet the night before. He looks at the closet and there’s an extra padlock. Figures.

It comes up in little ways, like a private joke that he has with his mother, like she’ll say something and flash him a secretive smile. He likes that, and he understands that this is a big secret that he has to keep. It doesn’t come up again until his fourteenth birthday the next year, the summer before high school. It’s a strange letter in a manila envelope, sealed with some expensive red wax, his name written in fancy calligraphy. The most attention-grabbing part, however, is not Kiptyn Sutton-Walsh in big cursive letters. It’s the return address :

GALLAGHER ACADEMY.

learn her skills, honor her sword. keep her secrets.

#*#self para

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galaxy-parchment · 4 years

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Nepotism at its Finest

I’m back on my bullshit, fellas! This time we’ve got something fun. A fic that I wrote based on another TMA AU, ‘Timeline of Theseus’, by @creativitycache. All you need to know is Jon has been the Archivist since he was 8 because time-travel shenanigans and now Elias is his reluctant dad, I would highly suggest reading ToT if you enjoy this fic and even if you don’t. This also hasn’t been beta-read because this is spoiler-y and my usual beta-reader hasn’t listened to TMA and honestly this is pretty self-indulgent.

Jon, despite being an Archivist for as long as he could remember, only got the ‘official’ title of Head Archivist once Gertrude finally died. He knew Jonah was the one that did it, but honestly, Jon was just glad he didn’t call in someone else to do his dirty work for once. He always hated when a random avatar barged in and somehow always left some kind of damage in their wake.

Working as an archival assistant wasn’t so bad, other than that. After a while, just to justify him hanging around the Archives all day reading statements, Jonah had given him a position as Gertrude’s assistant. Not that she ever asked him to do anything. It was just a formality.

At this point he’d given up on only reading statements that included people that were already dead. He’d take one over the newer statements, certainly, but the problem was that there’s only a certain number of people that have had supernatural experiences, and if they survived the encounter, they don’t tend to die as quickly as the ones that didn’t make it.

He still occasionally got odd flashes of things he never actually did, but it wasn’t like they had a manual about how his powers worked. Jonah just half-explained that it was probably something to do with his omniscience filling his head up with blanks that didn’t exist. The fuzziness and lack of detail certainly matched up with that theory. Just one of the perks of suddenly gaining knowledge powers at the age of 8, he supposed. At least he’d finally managed to get a grip on what exactly he Knew at random intervals. The Eye still liked to give him the odd unwarranted insight or two, but he didn’t mind all that much.

Strangely, though, he did ‘remember’ all of the assistants Jonah had chosen for him on his first day as the Head Archivist. Sasha, Tim and Martin, although for some reason Sasha didn’t look like how his ‘memories’ picture her.

—

Jon was weird, to be honest. Tim knew it the moment he walked in and saw the guy. Looked like he’d been raised by wolves then taught how to act like he was a respectable academic. Sure, he looked the part, but you could tell he didn’t care about being a ‘scholar’, he only cared about the statements.

He also obviously had some weird tension with Elias. Whenever Tim mentioned him Jon would always change the topic and refuse to acknowledge the man’s existence. He’d worked here for a while, though, probably just a standard ‘gradual resent for your boss’ scenario.

At least Tim thought that was it until Monday.

They were all in the break room, Jon included, eating their lunch, when Elias wandered in and gave them all a polite smile.

“So, Jon,” He said pleasantly, “I was wondering how you were settling in as Head Archivist.”

Jon glanced back from the coffee pot, “Doing fine, thank you…” he grumbled.

“That’s great to hear,” Tim could hear the condescending tone dripping from his voice, “I know that you’re not used to such an active role in the Archives, is all,”

“What? You don’t think I’m capable of the job? You didn’t need to give me the position you know, I can do what I need to do here without it,”

“Oh, goodness, no, you were fully deserving of the promotion,” Elias said, raising his hands in defence, a knowing smile on his face.

“And as I told you when you promoted me, theres no need to worry about me,” the archival assistants stayed silent and glanced at each other awkwardly.

Elias grimaced, “Is it really so bad that I just wanted to see how you were? I have every right to worry,” Tim didn’t know what the relationship there was, but that was definitely a weird thing for your boss to say in his books.

“Elias, I am 24 and an adult who’s been working here for a while, I am perfectly capable of taking care of myself,” Jon said sternly, turning to face him with his arms crossed. Okay, that was definitely a weird thing to say. Sasha hid her face in her mug and Martin was fiddling with his hands and staring at them.

“Fine, but you know where to find me if you need anything,” Elias sighed. He turned and walked out the door.

Jon scowled for a moment, the tension in the air thick. He suddenly marched up to the door and yelled down the hall, “You’re not my father, you know!”

Tim was about to ask what the hell that was about before he heard Elias call back.

“I have paperwork that says otherwise!”

Well, that certainly explained a few things.

—

The ‘break room incident’ was still a talking point among the assistants, but at this point it was mostly just Tim complaining that Sasha just didn’t get the job because of nepotism. Jon didn’t even have a degree of any kind, he just got a position as an assistant and then got the Head Archivist promotion.

Martin tried to connect with Jon, though. He’d heard about how all of the old assistants just went missing over time. That must’ve been lonely for Jon. So he brought him tea every day. Sure, Jon didn’t always drink it, but hopefully it helped him feel more comfortable with them.

He did give Martin odd looks occasionally, though, as if they’d known each other and Jon was trying to place his face. He certainly would have remembered meeting someone like Jon, though.

When he wasn’t reading statements, Jon actually came out and spoke to all of the assistants directly when he needed something, which was a bit odd. Not spooky odd, but still odd.

Jon was instructing Martin on some follow-up he would need to do at his desk when Elias made his second appearance of the month. The others stayed quiet, knowing how things went last time.

“Jon, I have some good news!” Elias said, unusually chipper.

Jon seemed unimpressed, “Do tell.”

“Peter and I are getting married!” Martin was about to congratulate him when Jon beat him to it.

“I give it three months,” he deadpanned, not taking his eyes off Elias, who seemed far less offended than Martin would have been in his situation.

“Give me some credit, Jon”

“You’re right, he never even replaced the vase he broke before the last divorce did he? Make it two.” Wait, divorce? Last divorce?

“He’s changed, really, he even said he’d actually replace it once it was official,” Elias defended. Martin spotted Tim in his peripherals jamming his face into his elbow to stifle his own laughter. Sasha had a not-so-subtle smile creeping onto her face.

“Oh, and let me guess, he also promised you he’d ‘start trying to really connect with Jon’ like he does every time, as if he doesn’t literally feed off of doing the exact opposite.”

“No, but he did-“

“No, wait, I’ve got it this time, he said that this time, he’d keep his voyages short and make more time for you!” Jon guessed, intently waiting for Elias’s response

“Yes.” He said curtly. What on earth was happening? Martin wanted nothing more than to be anywhere but this exact position, right next to both of his bosses having a family squabble.

“Let me guess, you came down here to tell me right at this moment because you need me to drive you? Of course,” Jon ran his hand flat across his head to give his hair the gelled flatness Elias’s always flawlessly maintained, “I’m Elias, I’m going to ask Jon to drive me and my fiancee to the courthouse for our tenth marriage! I can’t drive myself, though, because then Peter is going to insult my driving and then I’ll tell him that he has no place to do so since he doesn’t even have a license! Then we’re going to cancel and try again the next week!” He ranted in a tone that was obviously meant to imitate Elias.

“We’re going next Wednesday.” Elias said.

“Fine.” Jon replied without a second thought, turning back to Martin, who hadn’t realised he was holding his breath. Elias silently turned and headed out of the Archives.

The room was silent for a moment. Sasha spoke up first.

“Did you say tenth time?” She asked incredulously.

“Yes, and that’s only the legal ones. I’ve seen them ‘get married’ one night and the next they’ll swear vengeance on each other. Peter gives excellent Christmas presents, though, what with the insurmountable wealth.”

Tim barked out the laugh he was suppressing, “Jon, I just really want you to know, that is the funniest thing I’ve witnessed in my life, thank you,"

For the record I’ve changed a few rules of how the whole Jon situation works and I mostly just took the concept of adult Jon and Elias father-son dynamic and sprinted with it.

#galaxywrites #the magnus archives #tma #tma spoilers #tma season 4 spoilers #timeline of theseus #elias bouchard #jonathan sims #sasha james #martin blackwood #timothy stoker #season 1 archives crew #slight comedic lonelyeyes #as it should be in every tma fic that mentions either of them #fanfiction

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haberdashing · 3 years

Text

Biting Your Own Neck (6/?)

Mid-season 2, Jon’s life is abruptly upended by the intrusion of two unexpected and eerily familiar visitors.

on AO3

Chapter 1 / Chapter 2 / Chapter 3 / Chapter 4 / Chapter 5 / Chapter 6

A brief moment passed in which Jon, Martin, and Tim all sat in silence before Tim finally spoke up.

“I still want to know why I don’t have my own spooky future double.”

“Perhaps it has to do with the ‘incident’ that apparently led to you being employed here in the first place.” The words came out sharper than Jon had intended; honestly, he was more surprised that his recent investigation into his archival assistants hadn’t uncovered anything about this so-called “incident” than anything else.

“It had better not.” Tim’s tone matched Jon’s own in sharpness. “If it does, well, ‘Jonny’ and ‘Kay’ will deserve what’s coming to them.”

“Wh-”

Jon stopped himself mid-word. Jonny had warned him against asking questions outright, and while Jon certainly didn’t trust Jonny and his cryptic warnings, when the best case scenario was “ask a friend about a probably-sensitive topic” and the worst case scenario was supposedly “steal a friend’s trauma” (whatever that meant), it probably didn’t hurt to be a bit more circumspect in his approach.

“I’m curious about this ‘incident’ Jonny mentioned, and what he knows about it that I don’t.”

“Of course you are.” Tim’s voice wasn’t as sharp as before, but there was still an undercurrent of bitterness within it.

“Jonny, er, said it involved trauma. A traumatic experience, then.”

Tim let out a bark of a laugh. “Yeah, that’s one way to put it.”

“And, and given that it brought you here, I’m guessing it has some connection to the supernatural.”

“Yup.” Tim popped the P at the end of the word.

“So, you came to the Magnus Institute because of a traumatizing encounter with supernatural forces.” A statement, not a question.

“Jon...” Martin said. Jon could hear the unspoken warning in Martin’s voice, but he wasn’t about to let that stop him.

Tim looked away from Jon, pointedly staring at an unexceptional patch of wall as he responded. “Yeah, that’s right. Does it matter?”

“Well. Erm.” Jon cleared his throat before continuing. “I suppose that makes two of us, then.”

“Wait, two of you?” Jon hadn’t expected Martin to be the first one to respond to that statement, and he certainly hadn’t expected the bewilderment in Martin’s voice.

“Sorry, should- should that be three of us, then?”

“What? No, I just- both of you dealt with the supernatural before coming here?”

Jon and Tim exchanged a tense glance before nodding nearly in unison.

“Jesus, am I the only one whose first run-in with that stuff was with Prentiss?”

“Maybe Sasha-” Jon started, but Tim shook his head and interrupted before Jon could finish his train of thought.

“Sasha worked in Artifact Storage when she got here, remember? She knows- she knew as much as any of us did about all this. And look where that got her.”

“If she knew the most of any of us, and she still...” Jon couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence, to acknowledge that Sasha was gone, to admit that the “Sasha” he thought he knew had apparently been an imposter for months now. “What hope do the rest of us have?”

Another silence filled the room for a long moment, this one gloomier than the last.

“The only thing we have going for us that she didn’t is that apparently I have some, some kind of power, if Jonny’s telling the truth, something to do with asking questions... Perhaps we should test that, see how far it can go, in case I need to use it down the line.”

Martin and Tim exchanged a glance, but neither of them said a word.

“Would either of you be willing to volunteer?”

Both Martin and Tim quickly said “No,” though Tim’s response was half a beat faster than Martin’s.

“Why not?”

Tim made a face before repeating Jon’s words in a bitter tone. “Why not?”

“Yes, Tim. For all we know this power might be the only thing saving us from... from the next Prentiss, perhaps, or another thing like the one that got Sasha. Why not see what it’s good for here and now, so we know what the limits are before it comes down to some life or death situation?”

“Why should we?” Tim’s words came out fast and quick. “Why should we go along with being your guinea pigs in some spooky magic experiment just so you can get something out of it? A spooky experiment based on the words of someone you obviously don’t trust in the first place, no less!”

Tim stood up, shoving his chair roughly aside and throwing his hands in the air. “Though I don’t see why you don’t trust Jonny, I mean, it’s not like Jonny stalked your house and took pictures of it, or, or accused you of being a murderer for some reason, after you’d been friends for years... what the hell would we even get out of killing you, anyway? Because if you think we want your job, believe me, I want no part of this mess, I would quit in a damn heartbeat if I could...”

As Tim’s speech slowed to a halt, he pulled his chair back towards him, the chair making a loud noise as it was dragged against the tile floor, before collapsing in it. He was shaking slightly by the time he stopped speaking, though after a brief moment he spoke up again, looking Jon right in the eye as he did so.

“I... I didn’t mean to say all of that.”

It took a moment for Jon to realize what Tim meant by that, but once he did, his stomach sank.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to-”

“Oh, you’re sorry. You’re sorry you used your spooky magic to make me spill my guts. Well, that makes it alright then, doesn’t it?”

“Tim, Jon, can-”

“I didn’t say it was alright, but-”

“Jonny tells you not to ask people questions, and what’s the first thing you go and do?”

“It wasn’t the first thing I did, we had an entire conversation-”

“Will you two stop fighting and realize what this actually means?”

Martin’s voice came out sharper than Jon was used to, and the unexpected harshness in his tone was enough to get both him and Tim to quiet down.

“What are you talking about?”

“Jonny was right, clearly, about the whole question thing. He knew something about you, something you could do, something that you didn’t even know about yourself yet! Even if he was, was some sort of mind reader or something, he couldn’t manage that much. So isn’t this proof that maybe Jonny and Kay are telling the truth about all this?”

Jon thought for a moment. “Well... either they’re telling the truth, or the rabbit hole goes even deeper than I thought.”

Jon didn’t see who, but he heard somebody else let out a long, dramatic sigh.

#tma #tma au #tma fic #tma fanfic #the magnus archives #the magnus archives au #the magnus archives fic #the magnus archives fanfic #personal #my writing

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majwrites · 3 years

Text

Request: Imagine Martin Whitly helping age regression! reader

This one's for @sherazyjade (thanks to you for being the first to request smth😇) who requested Martin Whitly calming down the reader. hope this turned out okay since my knowledge and experience with age regression is very limited. Reader is a journalist and not related to the Whitly family.

Warnings: age regression, talk about murder, mention of a family history of mental illness, psychiatry, Martin Whitly

Spoiler: the real name of the bone collector from the Lincoln Rhyme TV show is mentioned

Today was the day. New York Times well known journalist (Y/N) (L/N) would interview Martin Whitly at Claremont Psychiatric Hospital. They weren't a stranger to interviewing criminals, after everything they had gone through they thought it would be better to face all their fears. This had lead to them being one of the most famous crime journalists in the United States though. (Y/N) was well known for making the cruelest serial killers beg for forgiveness and regret their actions by asking well researched questions. They'd been around the country. Howard Epps, Peter Taylor, Shane Casey...name them, (Y/N) has interviewed them all.

Except for one: Martin Whitly. But that would change now as formerly stated. Everything went smoothly at first. They entered the building, went through all safety checks and finally entered the cell of the surgeon. "Oh look who we have here", stated Martin, "the most popular of them all". "Good morning to you too, Dr. Whitly", answered (Y/N). They took their time to look around the room. For the fact that this was supposed to be a life long prison sentence this man really ended up in a good place. "I'd like to ask you a few questions, it's nothing Ainsley wouldn't have asked you before but this time I demand the honest to God answer and take your time to think about it if you haven't done that during the past 22 years", (Y/N) was set on revealing the truth and if Whitly would come at them with the same 'I am sick in the head' answer they'd lose it. The majority of their own family was mentally ill and they wouldn't tolerate it anymore, the way it was always used as an excuse to murder people. Sure, some people could pledge insanity but not this man. He had enjoyed murdering. And this interview would reveal that.

(Y/N) only had a suspicion as to what caused it, anything had gone well up until this point. Up until the moment they realized Dr. Whitly was on a leash. Which (Y/N) was convinced was even more dangerous than if they just let him run around freely. It stressed them out. Big time. And suddenly they were hiding under the table just like back in school when they were only twelve.

Martin Whitly was surprised, but despite being a serial killer he was also a doctor and he was definitely not stupid. He knew if anything would happen to a journalist (who also was one of the most famous journalists New York had to offer) they'd hold him accountable. So he remembered that he once knew how to take care of children. He was a father after all. So he got up from his chair and knelt down on his end of the table so he was on eye level with (Y/N). To be fair, Dr. Martin Whitly was a surgeon and not a psychologist so he didn't exactly know what was going on and how far gone the journalist was.

He started off simple. "Hey, (Y/N). Could you please look at me", no reaction, they were still looking at the ground. What next? Touching them would be a bad idea, it could trigger something worse. So he continued talking: "There's no need to be afraid. I'm a doctor, it's my job to help people". Nice one Whitly, 23 victims erased from the narrative. But it seemed to work. They looked at him. "Alright, that's better. Now would you like to tell me what's troubling you?, he put on the most sympathetic expression possible. A few seconds of silence followed. "It's not safe here", stated (Y/N). "See, (Y/N). Is any place on earth really safe?", mental note to Martin Whitly, this was a bad move. So he tried again. "I can assure you that we're safe here. You see the door behind you? It's one of the strongest doors this country has to offer. And as I said before, I'm a doctor. If anyone would attack I'd know many ways to get rid of them"."That would be murder and that's wrong" "Don't concern yourself with that, (Y/N). It would pass as self defense", it really would if someone attacked now and the surgeon would try to protect (Y/N). "If you say so", of course (Y/N) would question it. They'd always had the need to question everything. "Alright, now that we're clear on this could we get up from the ground", he offered a hand to (Y/N). They nodded and let him help them off the ground. (Y/N) sat back down in their chair.

A few minutes later (Y/N) returned from their state of distress, unsure as to what had just happened. They decided to let it slide for now and go on about this interview.

#prodigal son #martin whitly #reader insert fanfiction

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when-they-write-stuff · 4 years

Text

Catch Me (If I Should Fall)

pairing: sterek

wc: 4877

notes: a literal pair of idiots, attempts at angst, unresolved sexual/romantic tension until it’s not anymore. written because it’s 2 am and this writer has emotions (sometimes).

Red: is unsolved.

The first time they kissed, Derek’s eyes were red.

Stiles was an idiot teenager and maybe he knew that none of this could last. Falling head over heels was much so easier knowing that they might not survive one day or the next. But still, spending the summer at Derek’s side searching for two missing betas, Stiles really should have known better than to decide against reigning himself in.

He didn’t do it for Derek. Not in the beginning, not in the end. Stiles showed up at the loft one day with his backpack slung over his shoulder and his laptop tucked underneath the crook of his arm because he was haunted by two pairs of terrified wide eyes. Crackles of electricity that buzzed through the air and a steel-toed boot that sunk into his stomach over and over again.

Stiles hadn’t gotten to know Erica outside of “I can be your Batman” or Boyd outside of “Tweeenty” but then again, when three people spent the night together in a basement, maybe all of that could be thrown out the window. There was no bonding experience like torture.

No bonding experience like torture. Stiles really hated his own head sometimes.

There was something about spending entire summer days in close proximity with the same grumpy-growly person that really alleviated the tension. That’s what Stiles would say, at least, when he glanced across the room to watch Derek pour over old maps with his laptop balanced on his knees and his mind wandering.

Because fuck it, Stiles wasn’t invincible. He could look at Derek Hale all day long and insist that he didn’t feel a thing, but he was only human. And only so much could not change when one week turned into two, two turned into three, and one night when Stiles fell asleep at the loft still wearing his clothes with a pen in his pocket, a notebook on his chest, and it wasn’t on the couch this time.

Stiles would like to say that Derek Hale was an enigma, but the man really wasn’t that hard to figure out. There was a morning when Stiles found strong arms wrapped around his chest, pulling him into a warm body, and then that was never mentioned again.

Derek didn’t do feelings, that much was obvious. So Stiles decided he wouldn’t either.

Three weeks turned into four, four weeks turned into five.

Stiles thought that one year ago, he would’ve seen himself spending his Junior year summer playing video games with Scott, getting a part-time job, and maybe, maybe, trying to figure out what he wanted to do with his life. If he was feeling like it, that is.

He was a teenager, remember? Things moved so fast, Stiles felt like he’d been sixteen a day ago, dragging Scott out into the dark and scary woods to go looking for a dead body.

Stiles was a teenager. He moved through life fast and did his best not to linger on that. Or his possible future. He was a teenager and he was determined to milk that for everything it was worth.

And the night Stiles fell asleep in Derek’s arms with no reason other than he wanted to, he realized that really, none of this could last. And maybe that was the beauty of it.

Since Lydia Martin, Stiles knew better than to attempt love.

Sometimes, his dad looked at him and Stiles thought maybe he was aging too fast. The man didn’t know what he was doing with his summer, the silence between them stretched until it was gossamer thin, and Stiles continued to keep his mouth shut. He liked to say it was because he was keeping his dad safe, but he was pretty sure it was a matter of his own pride.

Pride, anxiety, emotional well-being. What was the difference?

Stiles was seventeen and two months old when Derek Hale kissed him. There was something about red eyes and sharp fangs that made Stiles’s heart leap into his chest and dammit if he hadn’t always wondered what kissing Derek would be like. He figured those thoughts all started somewhere between “I’m the Alpha now” and feral roars in the empty police station, Stiles’s heart leaping all the way up into his throat while heat shot straight to his groin.

But still, he didn’t do love, alright? He didn’t.

Kissing Derek Hale was like taking a step off the edge of a cliff, knowing there was an eventual end and not caring as long as the fall came with a rush of adrenaline that would make him feel things he’d never known before. Stiles would accept the fall if it meant Derek was falling right alongside him.

What a cliche.

At this point, Stiles had seen far too much in his life to be a giggling school girl. But he still felt like he was halfway to being drunk throughout the rest of the week, grinning at every word anyone said. Scott noticed, Stiles thought, but the other boy was far too preoccupied with Allison to ever ask.

And Stiles wasn’t the type to kiss and tell.

Fast forward to the end of the summer and they still hadn’t found Erica or Boyd. There were no more soft kisses before Stiles went home, no more lips on his own to bring him back to the real world in the early morning. Derek came at him with the hunger of a wolf and the frustrations of a man slowly losing everything, and all Stiles could do was see the bottom of the abyss as he took it.

He wasn’t losing Stiles. Not yet, at least. But Stiles could never find the words to tell him that.

And then eventually, Derek did.

Lose him, that is.

Stiles stopped coming around the loft as often. His dad was spending more and more time at the station, having re-earned his badge and doing everything he could to prove he deserved it. Stiles was pretty sure Scott had forgotten they were missing two members of the pack, Derek didn’t seem to be around when Stiles sought him out, and then the killings started to happen.

Boyd lost Erica, Derek lost Boyd, and Stiles nearly lost his dad.

He didn’t speak to Derek for a long time.

Gold: is to be determined.

The second time Stiles let himself fall, it was to eyes of gold. Eyes of gold that came to him long after Stiles had been broken.

Scott would ask how he was and Stiles would promise he never had nightmares. That there wasn’t the feeling of blood on his fingers or crusting underneath his skin anymore. He totally didn’t feel like there was still a presence in the back of his mind watching and waiting— waiting for the upper hand.

Scott would ask, eyes distant, the boy’s memory still lingering on Allison, and Stiles would answer the best way he possibly could.

He was fine. They were fine. Everything was fine.

His dad wasn’t always around to pin him to the bed when Stiles woke up screaming.

But then one night, Derek was.

Solid eyes of gold startled Stiles awake so hard one night, he thought he was still dreaming. He was on his feet in a second, stumbling across the room until his back rammed against the wall, and then all he could do was wait. Wait for the wolf standing opposite of him to come and rip out his throat; or maybe Stiles would be the one doing that this time.

Void had always known how to mess with his head. And even three months gone, he still did.

But Derek just raised one hand, blood staining through his shirt, and Stiles straightened. His heart leapt all the way up into his throat as he moved forward carefully, lifting up the bottom of the werewolf’s shirt. And suddenly he realized this wasn’t a dream. This wasn’t a nightmare.

Derek hadn’t come to see him in so long, Stiles almost couldn’t believe it was really the man himself standing in front of him. He could have almost laughed.

He didn’t. But he could have.

If Stiles thought about it, the last skin-to-skin contact they’d had was Stiles resting a hand on the man’s shoulder. Or maybe Void grabbing Derek around the wrist and throwing him against the nearest wall. But then he supposed there was that one time a younger Derek had slammed him against the wall of Scott’s bedroom, eyes flashing blue, and all Stiles had been able to do was try and forget old memories.

He wasn’t losing his mind. He wasn’t. But Derek had a way of making him feel like maybe he was losing everything else.

“Derek, your eyes—”

The man blinked the color away and all but stumbled toward the bed, losing his balance at the last moment as he slipped to the floor. Stiles was moving forward in an instant, linking an arm underneath his own and lifting the man up. Together, they made it to the edge of Stiles’s bed.

“They’re gold,” Stiles said, breathless. Derek just shook his head.

“It’s fine.”

“No, it’s not fine,” Stiles said, eyes flitting to the blood on Derek’s shirt. Once more, he lifted it up, fingertips brushing across Derek’s skin, and the man groaned. “Something’s wrong. Why aren’t you healing?”

“I’m fine.”

Stiles rolled his eyes, biting back a sharp retort.

Because this is what they did, wasn’t it? Stiles made some comment, Derek brushed him off. They could go back and forth over and over again without ever getting anywhere. Stiles was pretty sure this was exactly why he’d stopped going to the loft in the first place.

Or maybe it was because of how empty it felt. Or because Stiles could never glance over at the bed without reliving old memories and realizing he hadn’t been the only one sleeping next to Derek in it.

Like a teenager having fallen head over heels. Stiles really hated his head sometimes. And he was pretty sure he’d had this conversation with himself before.

“Your eyes are different, Derek.”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Then why the hell did you come here? Just to scare me halfway to hell?”

When Derek looked at him, his eyes were tired and sad, and Stiles felt like he’d seen that look before too. Maybe during the time he’d spent at Derek’s side after Boyd’s death, the man wrapped in his arms as he shattered into pieces. Or maybe when Stiles had confronted him about Jennifer and all that Derek had done was look so broken, Stiles couldn’t do anything but turn away.

Stiles was an idiot teenager who knew better than to fall in love. He could claim in a million different ways that he hadn’t, but he knew it would be a lie each time.

Stiles knew better. He was supposed to know better.

He was seventeen years and eleven months old when he kissed a golden-eyed beta and decided it was time to take the plunge yet again.

Sometimes he could think maybe Derek needed him. Maybe he needed Derek. It was this ridiculous dance of pulling together and then pretending as if it had never happened. Stiles had spent so long after the Nogitsune pretty sure Derek had abandoned him, only to learn the man had been buried in an Aztec temple, that he’d gone from zero to one-hundred like whiplash.

And now that was a whole different set of problems that had thrown them together once more. As if they were any better off together than they were separated.

Stiles didn’t know what they were better off at. Certainly not this.

He was pretty sure it wasn’t this.

It didn’t matter, though, when Derek kissed him like a man on his deathbed. He was something that had been missing from Stiles’s life for so long and he realized that maybe he’d been better off without that. Not without Derek, not exactly. But the confusion? The stolen kisses when no one else was looking and all Stiles could think was wait, stop, no, come back.

That was one way to send him plunging off a cliff. And not in a good way. Not like he’d originally thought. Though, he wasn’t sure if it had ever really been a good way. Not in the end.

What a cliche.

One cliche of golden eyes, kisses in the night, and it lasted all the way until suddenly, golden eyes weren’t golden anymore. The man died in front of him and Stiles was pretty sure his heart had been ripped out and stuffed back into his chest again.

Derek came back with blue eyes. He looked at Stiles like he was apologizing and wishing him goodbye all at the same time.

And then he left with someone else.

Grey: is the line in between.

Stiles told himself he wouldn’t call.

Not after Derek left, not as one month turned into two, two turned into three, and Stiles started to forget what the man tasted like. He told himself he’d never call. But then again, he’d always been good at lying.

To himself and those around him.